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This essay starts from the premise that sociological analysis has made important and valuable contributions to the conceptualization of the cultural, moral, and institutional aspects of communication. At present, however, the contributions of the sociology seem poorly represented within the field of communicative studies because these commonly overlook the fact that digital communication is inextricably linked to the social and material spaces which humans act and interact. Considering that it can generate a necessarily limited understanding of the communicative phenomenon, the objective of this work is to explore the approaches proposed by five schools of thought regarding the sociology of communication. Firstly, this paper reviews the main works produced by the Chicago School, the Columbia School, the Frankfurt School, the Toronto School and the Birmingham School to try to elucidate the conceptual bases of their postulates and to understand the criticisms they received from other scholars in the field. Subsequently, it describes the historical changes of the disciplinary research program and the approaches through which social researchers are trying to recognize and to understand the complex sociotechnical assemblages that characterize contemporary communication. Finally, it argues that the sociological perspective continues to be substantial in developing a critical comprehension of the social, political, and economic impact of digital mediatization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beyond the topics of "freedom of expression", "the right to reply", and "factual information", which are elements related to present day happenings and Venezuelan public opinion, mass media has been increasingly affecting the process of decision making with respect to control of natural resources and the pernicious effects of programs related to equipping the national armed forces. The objective of this paper is precisely to analyze the importance of research in social communication in relation to communication media and public opinion in relation to the purchase of military technology for use in Venezuela. This paper is based on the research done by Page (1996) in which he studied the communication media as a public actor and how they can influence policy. Page's work establishes an indirect focus of the use of emissions in publications and other media in order to change the beliefs and preferences of the masses and/or of "elite audiences" in the establishment of policies that could presumably affect subsequent decisions that could me made as to these topics, and with important implications for the nature of democratic deliberation. The need for public debate is then proposed in communication media and academic environments, in reference to military technology, negotiation and contract sales, purchasing, modernization and transference. Finally certain conclusions and recommendations are presented for research in social communication on the theme studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following a trend toward technological convergence that feeds a steady concentration of ownership structures, the contemporary market for information, communication and entertainment shows a high level of dynamism. Also, the deployment of a transnational, frequently hegemonic, mediatic discourse consolidates itself affecting the access of each society to the space for its public affairs. By analyzing some witness cases (mainly México, Argentina and Venezuela), this paper proposes to address these changes in the Latin American region using three different interpretative keys: first, state intervention in public information management and definition of the operating contexts for media groups; second, the strategic value of communication within the typically expansive logic of any scheme of ideological and political domination; and third, the place of cultural expression as an axis connecting mass communication processes, in its dual contradictory condition as the object of the freedom of symbolic producers and the universal right of peoples, citizens and consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research objective of this paper is the media representation of poverty and the poor individual as conveyed by the newspaper Últimas Noticias. This study in based on the theory of Social Representations (SR) proposed by Moscovici (1961), which creates the basis for research on the social construction of reality. The corpus consisted of 95 items collected in 2006 and was the subject of content analysis. Seven themes were constructed: Habitat and poverty; Government Programs, Measurement of poverty, Health, Violence and Insecurity, Labor World and Public Space and Educational Exclusion. In addition, four groups of sources were identified: Neighbors, Local Authorities, High Government and Experts and Personalities. We found that poverty is looked upon from two perspectives: one is derived from self experience and the other is external and analytical. The first one is found in thirty (30) texts in which poor individuals talk about the appalling conditions of their habitat and the calamities of daily life. The second look, the external, appears in sixty five (65) texts, and it consists, fundamentally, of opinions of personalities and experts (44), followed in frequency by the High Government and somewhat less, by local authorities. It is in fact a polarized view, with two opposing versions. The external representation is constructed from and through two perspectives: one political, in which the poor and poverty are an object of proselytizing manipulation, the other, academic, where they constitute a subject for study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyses the of re-adaptation of public television channels to the third generation in audiovisual media, in a context of globalization and world-ification of culture. Several studies agree that the function of the public television should be to guarantee a space for the public interest in general. In this sense public television would be a space where alternative contents not selected by the markets would have a space. This paper analyses the changes that have occurred in public TV in Uruguay over the last few years, comparing the differences between the municipal channel (cable) in Montevideo city (TV Ciudad) and the national public channel (Channel 5). In particular, the Installation of municipal cable TV (City TV) is analyzed as a channel which is developing a massive diffusion of local culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]