Communication Studies

School

College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

School Dean

Nancy LaGreca, Ph.D.

Department

Communication Studies

Program Director

Amanda Hill, Ph.D.

Program Specific Admission Requirements

Admission is granted only to those with high promise for success in graduate study. Potential may be demonstrated by significant professional experience, previous schooling, and acceptable test scores recorded within the past five years on the GRE . A minimum GPA of 3.1 is acceptable, with special consideration given to course work in the broad field of Communication Studies. Generally, students must provide acceptable test scores at the time of enrollment. If students are otherwise highly qualified, they may take the GRE during their first semester of enrollment with continued enrollment contingent upon test results.

Effective Fall 2022, we are currently accepting students for the Digital Communication Certificate; the Public Communication, Public Policy, Public Leadership  Certificate; and the Media Concentration of the MA Program. For more information, please contact the graduate program director.

Program in Communication Studies

CM 6000X. Continuous Graduate Enrollment. 0 Semester Hours.

CM 6150. Practicum in Group Process. 1 Semester Hour.

Theory and practice in group work. Psychological foundations of group work, including group guidance, growth groups and group counseling and therapy, with an opportunity to apply experientially the basic principles of group leadership. Limited enrollment.

CM 7196. Communication Internship. 1 Semester Hour.

CM 7301. Publication Design and Layout. 3 Semester Hours.

A workshop in which students design layout, and produce an in-house magazine, newsletter, or annual report. Includes experience in solving problems of design and makeup, as well as evaluating publishing techniques and procedures.

CM 7302. Electronic Publishing and Presentations I. 3 Semester Hours.

This course looks broadly at applied topics in digital communication. Topics might include web design, social media, audio/visual design, digital writing, digital humanities, database, and other relevant topics. Includes basic use of a Web building application.

CM 7303. Electronic Publishing and Presentations II. 3 Semester Hours.

This course examines digital communication analysis and application and the role of communication professional as content creator and manager. Helps students to create web analyses, hone writing skills, consider stakeholders, and determine how to make quality products.

CM 7305. Photojournalism. 3 Semester Hours.

The course will examine a wide range of photo communication and pictorial forms in newspaper, magazine, and other print media, as well as the design and techniques used to construct visual messages. Topic areas include a history of photojournalism and documentary photography, photo communication research, photographic styles, subliminal messages in visuals, journalistic ethics including the art of lying through photo manipulation. The class will utilize traditional and digital photographic tools.

CM 7311. Media Script Writing. 3 Semester Hours.

Explores various approaches and conventions of film, television, motion picture, and audio visual script writing, with special emphasis on narrative and documentary production.

CM 7313. Video Design and Production. 3 Semester Hours.

The course will give participants an opportunity to explore the techniques employed in lighting, camera work, and audio manipulation for a full range of television presentations.

CM 7332. Public Relations Writing and Campaigns. 3 Semester Hours.

The study, analysis, and application of principles of and formats used in public relations communication to consumers. Participants learn how to collect, prepare and distribute information through the mass media, reports, and other forms of public information campaigns. Additionally, the course offers experience in the preparation and execution of campaign strategies, presentation of position papers, and scenarios to work out realistic and efficient solutions to communication and public relations problems.

CM 7334. Grant Proposal Writing. 3 Semester Hours.

This course is designed to teach the fundamental process of grant development for the beginning grant writer. Participants will be expected to develop a complete grant proposal suitable for submission to a funding agency. Those registering for the course should have conducted preliminary, independent research about a potential grant development project suitable for a major grant submission. Projects may be related to education, public works, museum programs, art, research, or similar areas. Specific projects are normally developed during the first two weeks of the course.

CM 7336. Report Writing. 3 Semester Hours.

Development of writing skills appropriate to the demands of the counseling discipline and profession. Acquisition of advanced writing proficiency in areas such as reports, proposals, articles for publication, and technical documents, as well as an understanding of protocols for the dissertation. (Open to Counseling Students Only).

CM 7341. Interpersonal Communication Skills. 3 Semester Hours.

Explores the theory and research pertaining to interpersonal communication skills in dyadic, group, and organizational contexts with emphasis on developing the skills necessary for effective personal and professional relationship building and maintenance, listening, problem solving, and conflict management. Other topics include the dynamics of culture and power in communicative interactions, the ethics of interpersonal communication, and differences in communicative styles.

CM 7343. Business Communication. 3 Semester Hours.

A study of style, organization, and formats used in business communication--both corporate and non-corporate--including interoffice communications, major letter formats, and business report writing. Emphasizes critical thinking, problem solving, and maturity in handling tone and style.

CM 7345. Applied Persuasion. 3 Semester Hours.

Explores the theory, practice, and research methodology of persuasion with the dual purpose of providing a scholarly understanding of persuasion and practical knowledge of the principles and tools of persuasion.

CM 7347. Technical Writing. 3 Semester Hours.

A study of the methods and processes organizations require to produce and use technical information through planning, drafting, and revising. Emphasis on the organization and presentation of written information.

CM 7350. Topics Communication Studies. 3 Semester Hours.

Examines the theory, practice, and role of news and news products in shaping the public dialog. Includes consideration of the news as input in politics and policy making, and practica in the uses of news to shape and articulate public issues.

CM 7390. Seminar in Professional Development: Quantitative Methods. 3 Semester Hours.

A survey of quantitative methods used to advance communication research. Includes an overview of statistical techniques employed to analyze, organize, interpret, and summarize information, as well as basic probability concepts, sampling techniques, and survey methods. Introduction to statistics recommended, but not required as a prerequisite.

CM 7395. Graduate Colloquium. 3 Semester Hours.

Gives students an opportunity to present and defend a research paper or creative project to an audience of graduate students and faculty in the department. The interaction contributes to a greater sense of community in the department, enhances stronger relationships between faculty and graduate students, and enables participants to gain insightful feedback about completed projects or work in progress.

CM 7396. Communication Internship. 3 Semester Hours.

Provides practical experience in selected communication fields under the guidance of practicing specialists. Supervised by a graduate faculty member. Prerequisite: 24 hours graduate work and approval of the graduate program director.

CM 7696. Communication Internship. 6 Semester Hours.

CM 8300. Foundations in Communication Studies: Qualitative Methods. 3 Semester Hours.

A survey of qualitative methods used in communication research. Provides students with hands-on application of qualitative approaches to research.

CM 8301. Survey of Critical Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course is a broad introduction to the nearly endless varieties of critical and interpretive methods. As such, it will survey a variety of specific critical and interpretive methods and examine the essential tenets of each approach. Participants should expect to leave this course with ability to understand and critically discuss scholarship that employs such methodologies.

CM 8303. Topics in Critical and Interpretive Methods. 3 Semester Hours.

Although the specific focus of this course will change with each offering, its purpose--to allow students to understand and employ critical methods as a tool for analysis--will remain the same. Offerings may include emancipator ethics, semiotic analysis, discourse analysis, feminist epistemologies of color, case analysis, and narrative. Other methodological positions addressed may include post-positivist and post-structural approaches to validity and interpretation, voice, audience and art, the politics of interpretation, and multiple interpretive communities.

CM 8311. Survey of Rhetl Criticism. 3 Semester Hours.

Beginning with the understanding that rhetorical criticism is an approach to critical analysis used unconsciously by all humans, this course is designed to assist students in making conscious decisions and improving each of the steps of this process of making sense of various communicative tests--journalistic articles, essays, television programs, literature, films, song lyrics, political rhetoric, business correspondence, commercials, billboards, clothing, architecture, etc. The course surveys formal methods of criticism, examines various critical texts, and provides students with significant opportunity to write their own criticism.

CM 8313. Topics in Rhetorical Criticism. 3 Semester Hours.

Although the specific focus of this course will change with each offering, its purpose--to allow students to gain experience in utilizing rhetorical criticism as a tool for analysis--will remain the same. Offerings will focus either on a specific human event (e.g. the Holocaust or the environment), through the lens of many types of criticism, or on many different texts through the lens of a specific method. Regardless of topic, however, each course will provide participants with examples of criticism and experience as a critic.

CM 8321. Survey of Film Criticism. 3 Semester Hours.

The course provides a broad overview of the methods and practice of film criticism. Consequently, participants in this course will examine and critique various approaches to film criticism and will become familiar with the essential framework of philosophical assumptions of each approach.

CM 8332. Qualitative Methods in CommRes. 3 Semester Hours.

CM 8395. Thesis. 3 Semester Hours.

Requires students to develop a project or thesis in some area of communication. The course is repeated for a total of 6 hours.

CM 8396. Project. 3 Semester Hours.

CM 9144. Topics in Communication Study. 1 Semester Hour.

CM 9244. Topics in Communication Study. 2 Semester Hours.

CM 9300. Foundations in Communication Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

The interdisciplinary nature of communication requires that practitioners in the field be knowledgeable of humanistic, empirical, and quasi-empirical contributions to a scholarly interpretation of communication phenomena. This course introduces students to seminal and current literature on the various approaches to communication theory. Its primary purpose is to give participants an overview of the scholarship in the area.

CM 9301. Survey of Communication Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course moves beyond the Foundations in Communication Theory course to a more detailed exploration of specific theories in each of the areas of specialization within Communication Studies. Thus, it creates a more detailed map of the theoretical foundations of this field and suggests areas of overlap with other academic areas. As a result, participants should leave the course with an understanding of their personal orientation among communication scholars and within an intellectual tradition or approach.

CM 9303. Topics in Communication Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

Includes topics that focus on a variety of figures, movements, and research areas in Communication Studies that form the intellectual background of the discipline today. Although the specific focus of the course will change with each offering, possible areas include: Marxism, post-structuralism, post-modernism, family communication, intercultural communication, and political communication.

CM 9311. Survey of Rhetorical Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course traces the evolution of rhetorical theory through its major eras and configurations. Starting with the Sophists and pre-Socratics, participants will trace the intellectual path of rhetorical theory through the ancient period into medieval times, from the church fathers to fathers of the Renaissance, from the modern era into the post-modern world. Thus, participants should expect to leave the course with a strong understanding of the relationship among power, knowledge, and rhetorical theory throughout history.

CM 9313. Topics in Rhetorical Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course explores the rhetorical theories of a particular author, period, or genre, and it will seek to demonstrate the relevance of these theories to contemporary life. Possible offerings include the Rhetoric of Social Change, The Works of Kenneth Burke, Contemporary Rhetorical Theory, Feminist Rhetorical Theory, The Rhetoric of Religion, and Argumentation.

CM 9321. Survey of Film Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

The course provides an opportunity for participants to conduct a survey and engage in a critique of the theories offered by the various approaches to cinema, including formalism, structuralism, semiotics, narratology, phenomenology, Marxism, psychoanalysis, and feminism. Participants will also have the opportunity to develop an overview of questions and concerns raised by film theorists.

CM 9323. Topics in Film Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

Although the specific focus of this course will change with each offering, possible topics include theories of film and ideology, race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, culture and politics, as well as modernity and post-modernity. Regardless of the topic, however, participants will read and examine critically the essential theoretical works relating to the specific topic and will seek to apply such theories in an original piece of scholarship.

CM 9324. Communications Law and Ethics. 3 Semester Hours.

A study of the historical development of the First Amendment and a discussion of the moral reasoning which informs a responsible exercise of press freedom. Participants will pay special attention to areas of law essential for mass communication practitioners, such as libel, invasion of privacy, copyright, and information access. The course also includes a discussion of the growing convergence between information delivery systems and ensuing patterns of regulation and deregulation.

CM 9331. Survey of Critical Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course is a broad overview of the contributions to communication theory that have been made by critical theorists. Thus, participants will examine the historical development of and the relationships among such approaches as Marxism, feminism, post-structuralism and post-modernism. Participants should expect to leave the course with an understanding of the basic commonalties between and differences among the various critical schools.

CM 9333. Topics in Critical Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course focuses on the critical, interpretive approach to human communication, particularly the contribution of the Frankfurt School scholars such as Lukas, Herbamas, Freud, and the Feminists. Topics explored center on the basic principle that understanding is historic, linguistic, dialectical, and gender based.

CM 9341. Survey of Feminist Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

The course seeks to make sense of and offer inroads into the mass of contradictory theories that have been labeled feminist theory. Specifically, participants will examine and contrast the traditions of social theory around which feminist theories coalesce and will critique the viability of each school of thought.

CM 9343. Topics in Feminist Theory. 3 Semester Hours.

This course will address a range of issues germane to feminist theory and gender studies. Its primary aim, however, will be to describe, analyze, and discuss the issues that inform current feminist theories in the interrelated fields of communication studies, literary studies, cultural studies, new histories, as well as studies in race and post-colonialism. Possible issues include the ways feminism constructs, the relationship between theory and practice, the way political and ethnic issues are dealt with in feminist theory, and concepts of identity and community that inform feminist viewpoints.

CM 9344. Topics in Communication Study. 3 Semester Hours.