ABSTRACT
Production studies run the gamut from amateurs who make and distribute media in their free time to multinational conglomerates that earn billions of dollars per year from high-budget projects. The intellectual roots of media production studies trace from four related yet distinct traditions: ethnography and cultural studies, auteur studies, critical theory, and organizational sociology. General agreement exists among scholars that digital production and distribution technologies, consolidation of ownership, and the globalization of labor markets, programming markets, and media corporations have all deeply altered media production; debate centers on the impact of these changes. The chapter discusses the following types of critical media production studies: creative industries studies, critical media industry studies/production studies, cultural industry studies and independent production studies. The analysis of large-level, systemic developments in regulation, technology, and the economy generally fall under the purview of political economy approaches to media.
