YouTube: Online Video and Participatory Culture - Softcover

Burgess, Jean; Green, Joshua

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0745644791 ISBN 13: 9780745644790

Publisher: Polity, 2009

Synopsis

YouTube is one of the most well-known and widely discussed sites ofparticipatory media in the contemporary online environment, and itis the first genuinely mass-popular platform for user-createdvideo. In this timely and comprehensive introduction to how YouTubeis being used and why it matters, Burgess and Green discuss theways that it relates to wider transformations in culture, societyand the economy.
The book critically examines the public debates surrounding thesite, demonstrating how it is central to struggles for authorityand control in the new media environment. Drawing on a range oftheoretical sources and empirical research, the authors discuss howYouTube is being used by the media industries, by audiences andamateur producers, and by particular communities of interest, andthe ways in which these uses challenge existing ideas aboutcultural ‘production’ and ‘consumption’.
Rich with both concrete examples and featuring speciallycommissioned chapters by Henry Jenkins and John Hartley, the bookis essential reading for anyone interested in the contemporary andfuture implications of online media. It will be particularlyvaluable for students and scholars in media, communication andcultural studies.

About this title

About the Author:

Jean Burgess is a research fellow at the Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation at Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia.

Joshua Green is a research manager and Postdoctoral Researcher in the Comparative Media Studies program at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Review:

"Jean Burgess and Joshua Green insightfully weave together anengaging and much-needed cultural narrative of the astonishing newphenomenon that is YouTube with an incisive critique of itsrapidly-mythologised yet deeply uncertain transformativepotential."
Sonia Livingstone, London School of Economics and PoliticalScience

"This book is an important and timely contribution to theliterature on participatory culture and media. The analyses provideempirical bases for understanding the diversity of YouTube users'practices and sophisticated theoretical consideration of thesocial, cultural, political, historical and economic contexts inwhich these practices are situated and which they so oftendisrupt."
Nancy Baym, University of Kansas

About this edition

• Publisher: Polity
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0745644791
• ISBN 13: 9780745644790
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 140