CMUN 217 ethics and communication
Summer 2010
Instructor: Don Heider
Description:
Ethics is an area of academic study, the basis for professional codes, and a way of living a life. It’s all these things and more. Part of what makes studying ethics difficult is that it’s almost impossible to do dispassionately. Doing ethics almost by definition means making moral judgments and these judgments often are woven into who we are as human beings.
During this term we will do a lot of reading and thinking about ethics. We will spend class time discussing ethical principles and case studies and professional journalism behavior and guidelines. But for this course to be successful in any almost any measure, students must also take the time to reflect about themselves, what they believe and why and how it impacts what they do day-to-day.
Italy presents a particularly rich case study for thinking about ethics. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s owns one of Italy largest and most successful media companies; Mediaset. We will look at how he has used his holdings to aid in his election, to try to control public opinion, to attack opponents, etc. It is a unique case study in media ethics.
If you are willing to ask tough questions, question your own beliefs and challenge conventional thinking, then you’re ready to study ethics.
Method:
We will meet daily to discuss readings, view tapes, and share what we’re learning, and work on scenarios. Each day I want you to bring with you a one-page reaction paper to the day’s readings. I want this paper not to be a review of what you’ve read, but instead I want you to personally and intellectually engage the material in the readings. Do you agree or disagree and why? How did the reading make you feel and why? What life experience can you draw from to integrate into what you’ve read?
In addition there will a final paper or project, with references on an ethics topic that will be pre-approved by the instructor.
We will also hear from guest speakers from some of the news bureaus in Rome, such as the BBC and NY Times.
Academic Integrity:
The basic commitment of a university is to search for and to communicate the truth as it is honestly perceived. The university could not accomplish its purpose in the absence of this demanding standard. To the extent that this standard is respected, a genuine learning community can exist. Students of this university are called upon to know, to respect, and to practice this standard of personal honesty.
Plagiarism is a serious form of violation of this standard. Plagiarism is the appropriation for gain of ideas, language, or work of another without sufficient public acknowledgement and appropriate citation that the material is not one's own. It is true that every thought probably has been influenced to some degree by the thoughts and actions of others. Such influences can be thought of as affecting the ways we see things and express all thoughts. Plagiarism, however, involves the deliberate taking and use of specific words and ideas of others without proper acknowledgement of the sources.
The faculty and administration of Loyola University Chicago wish to make it clear that the following acts are regarded as serious violations of personal honesty and the academic ideal that binds the university into a learning community:
Submitting as one's own:
- Material copied from a published source: print, internet, CD-ROM, audio, video, etc.
- Another person's unpublished work or examination material.
- Allowing another or paying another to write or research a paper for one's own benefit.
- Purchasing, acquiring, and using for course credit a pre-written paper.
Plagiarism on the part of a student in academic work or dishonest examination behavior will result minimally in the instructor assigning the grade of "F" for the assignment or examination. In addition, all instances of academic dishonesty must be reported to the chairperson of the department involved. The chairperson may constitute a hearing board to consider the imposition of sanctions in addition to those imposed by the instructor, including a recommendation of expulsion, depending upon the seriousness of the misconduct.
Grading:
Reaction papers 1/3
Discussion 1/3
Final paper 1/3
Required materials:
Text: TBA shortly
Schedule:
May 24 – 28 Ethics Theory. Application to media.
May 31 – June 4 Transparency and Justice
June 7 -11 Harm and Autonomy
June 14 – 18 Privacy and Community
June 21 – 24 Final projects
June 25 Mandatory departure from Rome Center
Instructor:
Don Heider is the Founding Dean and Professor at the new School of Communication at Loyola University Chicago. A teacher, author, researcher and award-winning broadcast news journalist., Heider spent ten years working in TV news as a photographer, reporter, producer and manager. During his career Heider received five Emmy awards, several teaching awards and was selected as an Ethics Fellow at the Poynter Institute. He is the author and editor of four books including Living Virtually, which exams virtual worlds.
