Des Freedman
Completion: 2000
Aim of the study
PhD Experience
CCIS (the former name of CAMRI) was a demanding and stimulating place in which to be based as a PhD student. Regular and often dramatic seminar debates were a vital part of the learning experience and a place in which to assess current controversies. Even for a semi-detached (part-time) student, CCIS provided strong intellectual and professional support with its opportunities for teaching, attending international conferences and workshops, and learning from a wide range of academics and students.
The key to a positive experience was to be flexible in approach in the first year and then as organised (and disciplined) as possible from then on. Letting your supervisor know what you expect of her/him is as important as keeping your promises to the supervisor. Using tutorials to discuss a draft chapter (and then plans for the next chapter) seemed to be a highly productive strategy that facilitated really useful feedback and an incentive to complete work on time.
This also meant that you had a series of chapters that could be submitted to journals during the course of the research the acceptance of which was a confidence-booster and a sign that you were not going completely off-track.
It's hard to overestimate the usefulness (and sometimes enjoyment) of the PhD process, not simply in opening up career possibilities, but in reassuring yourself that you are capable of producing sustained original research. It was an invaluable experience.
Publications
'Dynamics of power in contemporary media policy-making', Media, Culture and Society (forthcoming)
'Media policy-making in the free trade era: the impact of the GATS negotiations on audiovisual industries' in S. Harvey (ed.) Trading Culture: Exploring the 'Indigenous' and the 'Exportable' in Film and Television Culture, John Libbey Press, forthcoming
'Do scholars matter? Some reasons for the declining influence of academics on the media policy-making process', International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics 2(1), 2006, pp. 92-97
'Internet Transformations: "Old" media resilience in the "new media" revolution' in J. Curran and D. Morley (eds) Media and Cultural Theory, Routledge, 2006, pp. 275-290
'Promoting diversity and pluralism in contemporary communications policies in the US and UK', International Journal on Media Management 7(1/2), 2005, pp. 16-23
'GATS and the audiovisual sector: An update', Global Media and Communication 1(1), 2005, pp. 124-128
'New Media: Technology and Cultural Form' in R. Salaverria and C. Sadaba (eds) Towards New Media Paradigms, Ediciones Eunate, 2004, pp. 101-11'
'The Mirror and the War on Iraq: Profits, Politics and Product Differentiation', Mediactive, 3, April 2004
'Misreporting war has a long history' in D. Miller (ed.) Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq, Pluto, 2004, pp. 63-69
'Cultural policy-making in the free trade era: an evaluation of the impact of current World Trade Organisation negotiations on audio-visual industries', International Journal of Cultural Policy, 9:3, 2003, pp. 305-318
'Managing pirate culture: corporate responses to peer-to-peer networking', International Journal on Media Management, 5:3, 2003, pp. 173-179
War and the Media: Reporting Conflict 24/7 (edited with Daya Thussu), Sage, 2003
The Television Policies of the Labour Party: 1951-2001, Frank Cass, 2003
'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? The Politics of Television Exports', Information, Communication & Society, 6:1, 2003, pp. 24-41
'Witnessing whose truth?', Open Democracy, 26 February 2003, (www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-8-92-1007.jsp)
'Raymond Williams', in C. May (ed.), Key Thinkers for the Information Society Routledge, 2003, 173-190
'How Her Majesty's Opposition Grew to Like Commercial TV: The Labour Party and the Origins of ITV', in T. Miller (ed.), Television: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, Routledge, 2003
'A "Technological Idiot"?: Raymond Williams and Communications Technology', Information, Communication and Society, 5: 3, 2002, 1-18
'Modernising the BBC: Wilson's Government and Television, 1964-66', Contemporary British History, Vol. 15, Number 1, Spring 2001, pp. 21-40
'What use is a public inquiry? Labour and the 1977 Annan Committee on the Future of Broadcasting', Media, Culture and Society, Vol. 23, No. 2, 2001, pp. 195-211
'National Culture or International Trade? The media policy of the UK Labour Government' in Stuart Nagel (ed), Global International Policy: Among and Within Nations, Marcel Dekker, 2000, pp. 311-334
'The Labour Party and the Origins of ITV', Media History, Vol. 5, No. 1, 1999, pp.19-32
'Globalisation and Local Consumption: The Labour Party's Attempts to Sell British Media', Contemporary Politics, Vol. 4, No. 4, 1998, pp. 413-431
'Political Consensus on the Information Superhighway', Communications: The European Journal of Communications Research, Vol. 21, No. 3, 1996, pp. 273-290
'Social Democracy and communication technology: the case of the information superhighway', Contemporary Politics, Vol. 2, No. 3, Autumn 1996, pp. 21-38
