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Click on a category below to view a list of courses in the Communication Media major They represent all courses in the three emphases (1) print journalism, (2) broadcast media, and (3) advertising and public relations
JOUR is the prefix for the skills courses	MCOM is the prefix for the theory courses
You also can view the film courses	and the graduate courses

JOUR 190 News Writing
Covers the fundamentals of writing the news for print journalism. Stress is placed on style, grammar, and note-taking skills for journalists. In addition to writing news, students will learn to use a computer word processing program.

JOUR 200 Mass Media Marketing
An introduction to the role of the mass media in direct marketing to consumers and businesses. Focus is on marketing strategies designed for print, broadcast, and direct mail media as well as for catalogs and telemarketing.

JOUR 205 Computer Mediated Writing
Students will use techniques of computer word-processing and other applications to compose sophisticated written documents. Primary focus is on using computers to improve design, composition, editing, and revision skills.

JOUR 210 Legal Writing
Writing and correctly citing legal briefs, memoranda, and letters constitute the primary content. Considerable attention given to grammar, style, and organization. (Cross listed as PLGL 210.)

JOUR 215 Sports Broadcasting
Examination of the industry, history, practice, ethics, and theory of sports broadcasting. Particular attention given to sportscasts, play-by-play and color commentaries, and production techniques.

JOUR 290 News Reporting
An introduction to the practical knowledge and skills used in reporting news. Students will build upon news writing skills developed in JOUR 190 by concentrating on the use of news gathering techniques, including research and interviewing. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 292 Principles of Advertising
A study of the psychology, sociology, economics, and philosophy of advertising with special reference to planning, production, and testing of copy. The course focuses on the role and impact of advertising on society. Prerequisite: ENGL 100.

JOUR 295 Broadcast Journalism: Radio
The development of skills in reporting and writing for radio. Use of cassette and tape cartridge machines, and manual and electronic editing are introduced. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 305 Television Criticism
A survey of contemporary critical methods used to examine the aesthetic and sociological aspects of television. Extensive reading in critical literature is supplemented by analyses of selected television programs. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 310 Broadcast Journalism: Television
Development of skills in reporting, writing, and assembling visual materials for television news. Use of studio and portable cameras, microphones, and electronic editing equipment. Prerequisite: JOUR 295.

JOUR 315 Corporate Video Production
An introduction to the planning and production of video programs for business, industry, and nonprofit institutions. Focus is on the use of video as a promotions tool in the business sector. Prerequisite: JOUR 295.

JOUR 318 Video Workshop
An introduction to the basic principles and skills associated with effective television performance. The course emphasizes those skills necessary for practicing television journalists. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 320 Radio Workshop
A workshop providing practical experience in radio. Develops skills in producing dramatic musical productions as well as commercials and public service announcements. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 325 Film Today
This course will examine current and recent cinema, evaluating critically films of all kinds. These will include products of the American film industry, independent, documentary, and experimental films, films made for television and video-cassette, and foreign films released in this country.

JOUR 328 Contemporary Travel Literature
This course will focus on writings of travelers, largely to non-Western countries, from the late 19th century to the present. The course will look at issues of race, gender, and class as well as writing styles. Students may choose to either write a critical paper about a particular travel writer or work on a travel diary for a trip they have taken.

JOUR 340 Advertising Design
Advertisements that can be designed on a computer constitute the content of the course. Enticement, composition, and impact form the three theoretical areas upon which advertising design will focus. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 369 Internship
Students can take internships in any area of journalism or mass communication. These areas include newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations, book publishers, public relations offices, and advertising agencies. Prerequisite: 64 hours and a minimum 2.5 grade point average.

JOUR 370 Topics in Journalism
A topical approach to applied journalism practice designed to explore specialized knowledge and skill pertinent to the work of media practitioners. Topics might include, among others, business news, education news, agricultural public relations, television directing, concepts of computer graphics for print and broadcast, and desktop publishing. Prerequisite: JOUR 290 News Reporting or permission from the instructor.

JOUR 390 Feature Writing
Focus is on writing issue-oriented features and personality profiles. Attention given to structure, style, and content of features and to various ways to begin and end features. Also discussed are techniques of fiction writing that can be applied to features. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 391 Sports Writing
A workshop providing direct practical experience in sports writing. Focus is on news gathering and writing techniques. Attention is also given to the ethics, business, and financial aspects of sports, sports columns, investigative sports writing, sports features, and the history of sports writing. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 392 Documentary Film
A study of the art and development of non-fiction film, examining the major documentary film movements and filmmakers. Prerequisite: ENGL 110, JOUR 290 or FILM 328.

JOUR 393 News Editing
Editing copy and designing news pages and news programs constitute the core of this course. In addition, some attention will be given to the elements of typography and computer usage in the news room. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 394 Magazine Writing
A workshop providing direct practical experience in magazine writing. Researching, writing, and marketing professional magazine articles of various kinds. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 410 Non-fiction Writers
A detailed study of non-fiction writing that appears in newspapers, magazines, and books. Most of the work studied is post-1960. The course examines how the writer's style often reflects the values and attitudes of the time. Prerequisite: ENGL 100.

JOUR 450 Opinion Writing
Writing opinion in the form of editorials and reviews. For editorial writing, the course will use a critical thinking model to analyze social issues; for review writing, it will focus on aesthetic issues in various art forms. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 488 Case Studies in Public Relations
This course adopts a case study approach to examine concrete public relations settings and situations that illustrate the possibilities and limitations of public relations effectiveness. Students explore the range of strategies that businesses, nonprofit organizations, and government agencies have adopted in varied circumstances and learn how to assess the practical and ethical implications of these strategic choices, thus developing an effective public relations management perspective. Prerequisite: SPCH 305 or JOUR 495.

JOUR 493 Technology Enhanced Reporting
An examination of new media technologies that are used to communicate journalistic information about the public sector of society. The primary focus is on using the internet to gather publicly available information and write news reports about government, corporations, labor, science, medicine, and education. Prerequisite: JOUR 290.

JOUR 495 Public Relations Writing
Writing news releases, annual reports, speeches, two-fold brochures, radio scripts, sports backgrounders, print advertisements, and political papers forms the center of this course. In addition, designing newsletters and fund raising packets is important. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

JOUR 496 Advertising Campaign Development
This course acquaints students with the major phases involved in the development of an advertising campaign, from market research, creative copy writing and advertising design, to media placement and the testing of advertising effectiveness. Students examine and critique specific advertising campaigns and construct a campaign for a specific client as a major course project. Prerequisite: JOUR 492.

MCOM 100 Introduction to Communication
A study of the process of communication on the personal, group, and mass levels, and a survey and analysis of the basic communication process and techniques as applied to various situations through various media. (Cross listed as SPCH 100)

MCOM 150 Introduction to Mass Communication
Survey of mass communication with emphasis on historical development, economic, structure, organization, function, language, culture, and the effects of the media in society today. The course will also focus, to a lesser degree, on the difference between mass communication and other forms of communication.

MCOM 205 Supervised Communication Practicum
The primary focus is upon pre-professional communication praxis. Close supervision by journalism and mass communication faculty members is required to ensure a high quality field experience. Prerequisites: (1) JOUR 190; (2) 30 hours of credits; and (3) permission of journalism committee.

MCOM 210 Gender and the Mass media
This course explores significant issues and representational practices concerning the relationship among women, men, and the mass media. Students will examine the sociological, historical, and cultural construction of gender and the influence of the media upon these processes.

MCOM 215 The Movies Look at the Media Professions
This course will encourage students to think critically about the media professions--journalism, advertising, public relations, and the entertainment industries--by watching and analyzing movies about them. Students will compare these filmic representations with scholarly and critical readings that explore how media professionals and others view the work that they do. Prerequisite: MCOM 150.

MCOM 220 Communicating Criminal Procedures
Communicating through the mass media the impact of procedures most commonly followed when an accused enters the criminal justice system. Emphasis is placed on determining what the public needs to know about criminal procedures and how to communicate them to a mass audience so that informed citizens in a democracy can make rational decisions.

MCOM 315 Introduction to Communication Research
Focuses on the basics of research in the field of communication. Through reading, class discussion, lecture, exercises and assignments, students will explore how to write a professional, academic or business research proposal. In addition, students will critically analyze others’ research. (Cross listed as SPCH 315) Prerequisite: Two writing emphasis courses.

MCOM 328 Media Literacy
This seminar introduces students to critical analysis of the range of mass media messages that have potential to influence individuals, social groups, and society as a whole. The course explores media influences on our ideas, our values, and our use of time and money.

MCOM 328 Religion and the Mass media
Understanding the sociological, political, historical, and economic impact of organized religion in a multicultural society and evaluating the reporting of it in the mass media forms the theoretical basis of this course. Based on this understanding, students will write news stories about religious leaders, groups, movements, and issues. Prerequisite: ENGL100

MCOM 328 Topics in Mass Communication
A thematic or topical approach to mass communication texts, practices, or policies, with emphasis on analysis, synthesis, and critique. Topics might include, among others, the media and terrorism, media effects and consequences, comparative study of international news processes, trends and issues in photojournalism, and media representations of disability, ethnicity and age. Prerequisite: ENGL 100 Composition or permission from the instructor.

MCOM 330 Cultural Studies in Mass Communication
This course examines the issues of access and representation in the mass media. Of central interest are the constraints and possibilities for change in the media industries’ structures, practices, and relationships with social change coalitions concerned about gender, race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and other markers of cultural identity. Prerequisite: MCOM 150.

MCOM 335 Gay and lesbian film
This course will look at the ways that gays and lesbians have been portrayed in American feature and documentary films from early days of film to the present. It will examine how the Hollywood film industry presented largely negative images of gays and lesbians up to the late sixties. The second half of the course will concentrate on films with more sympathetic portrayals and will include films with homosexual themes and films made by gay and lesbian directors.

MCOM 400 Communication Capstone Seminar
Designed to use a workshop format to address communication theories, communication issues as they relate to the public, and practical applications. Students will read, discuss and analyze various communication theories, develop a major research project and a professional portfolio, and explore current issues affecting the industry, including the impact of emerging technologies and matters of professional ethics and responsibility. Topics will be addressed from the perspective of the student’s major emphasis. (Cross listed as SPCH 400) Prerequisite: MCOM 330 or a 300 level SPCH course.

MCOM 491 Propaganda and Public Opinion
A detailed study of propaganda and public opinion from World War II to the present. Special emphasis is given to the media of propaganda. The course also focuses on propaganda strategies in industrial and non-industrial countries.

MCOM 494 Communications Law and Ethics
A detailed study of the First Amendment as it affects the press and a survey of broadcast regulations. Students explore the relationships between law and ethics and examine and discuss ethical problems and practices. Prerequisite: JOUR 190.

FILM 328 Introduction to Film
An introduction to cinema as an art form. The seminar will screen outstanding films of the past and present, discuss and write about the films, and read screenplays and critical studies. Principal objective of the course is to increase students' understanding and appreciation of film.

FILM 410 Seminar: Great Film Directors
This seminar will focus on the work of one major filmmaker for in-depth study. The initial focus will be on the films of Ingmar Bergman. Subsequent seminars will study the films of Federico Fellini, Akira Kurosawa, John Ford, Frank Capra, and other outstanding directors. Prerequisite: FILM 328 or JOUR 325.

FILM 628 Introduction to Film
An introduction to cinema as an art form. The seminar will screen outstanding films of the past and present, discuss and write about the films, and read screenplays and critical studies. Principal objective of the course is to increase students' understanding and appreciation of film.

MCOM 628 Topics in Communication
A thematic or topical approach to mass communication texts, practices, or policies, with emphasis on analysis, synthesis, and critique. Topics might include, among others, the media and terrorism, media effects and consequences, comparative study of international news processes, trends and issues in photojournalism, and media representations of disability, ethnicity and age.

MCOM 628 Religion and the Mass Media
Understanding the sociological, political, historical, and economic impact of organized religion in a multicultural society and evaluating the reporting of it in the mass media forms the theoretical basis of this course. Based on this understanding, students will write news stories about religious leaders, groups, movements, and issues.

MCOM 630 Cultural Studies in Mass Communication
This course examines the issues of access and representation in the mass media. Of central interest are the constraints and possibilities for change in the media industries’ structures, practices, and relationships with social change coalitions concerned about gender, race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and other markers of cultural identity.

MCOM 691 Propaganda and Public Opinion
A detailed study of propaganda and public opinion from World War II to the present. Special emphasis is given to the media of propaganda. The course also focuses on propaganda strategies in industrial and non-industrial countries.

MCOM 694 Communications Law and Ethics
A detailed study of the First Amendment as it affects the press and a survey of broadcast regulations. Students explore the relationships between law and ethics and examine and discuss ethical problems and practices.

* Note: All undergraduate Communication Media courses have a prerequisite of ENGL100 Composition except for MCOM100 Introduction to Communication and MCOM150 Introduction to Mass Communication.