Bachelor’s Level courses
This page provides information on the various courses offered in specialised MCM disciplines at the Bachelor’s Level.
Fall
3,756: Social Science Foundations and Concepts in Communications Theory (Christian Fieseler & Miriam Meckel)
The course provides a general outline and discusses important basic principles of communications theory and social psychology. The leading exponents of the various levels of theory are introduced and discussed. In turn, the significance and challenges of their works are illustrated.
Today, communication theory, communication sociology and communication psychology look back on several decades of continuous progress. Many theoretical principles have endured and continue to be handed down. They have also shaped scientific development in other disciplines such as the economic sciences. On the other hand, theories of communication are also subject to a social transformation and shift in how they are interpreted. In other words, they change in order to remain contemporary and to analyse or explain communications phenomena.
The most important communications theory principles are analysed in the seminar, applied to present situations and their importance assessed in group projects.
3,184: Visual Literacy for Management, English (Martin J. Eppler)
The main contents of this course help students to become familiar with the main types of images used in management and their implicit and explicit conventions and rules. These visualizations range from ad-hoc heuristic sketches to quantitative charts (such as bar charts, pie charts, scatter plots, box plots, etc.), to conceptual diagrams (such as matrices, timelines, Venn or Euler diagrams, etc.), to complex maps or interactive and spatial visualizations.
Students will see the properties of these and other forms of visualization and explore them in action for diverse management contexts, ranging from to strategizing to advertising.
Another module of this course consists of giving students a systematic introduction to the theory behind the visualization field: Students will learn about our visual perception (i.e., gestalt laws of perception, inattentional blindness, framing effects), retinal variables (e.g., size, form, position, shape, color) and about existing technology or tools to support visualization in management.
In a last module of the course students are asked to develop their own visual solutions to pressing business challenges , for example re-inventing the org chart without emphasizing hierarchies, supporting Q&A sessions graphically, or visualizing a business strategy for internal communication.
3,570: Book and Publishing Studies: Introduction (Vincent Kaufmann)
The “Introduction to Book and Publishing Studies” course is the first offered as part of the Certificate in Book and Publishing Studies programme (LBW) and is based on a humanities and social sciences foundation, providing an interdisciplinary introduction to the methods and objects of book and publishing studies. The course is offered during the Fall Semester each year.
The course curriculum comprises an introduction to Book and Publishing Studies, an introduction to the general theory and history of media (Régis Debray’s mediology approach), a history of books and reading (from antiquity all the way to the digital age), and selected chapters from book and publishing culture which, by way of example, are discussed with regard to the social and cultural functions of books.
3,820: French-speaking Cultures: Cultural and Social History of Modern France, 1945-2005 (Vincent Kaufmann)
Selected topics and chapters from the cultural and social history of France between 1945 and 2009. The course focuses on the specific relationships in France between politics and culture and their effects.
What does a specific (political) culture contribute to the modernisation of society? What is the relation between France’s lost “grandeur” and the state’s systematic financing of culture? What is the origin of France’s current resistance not only towards economic and cultural globalisation (which is always portrayed as Americanisation) but also towards a multicultural society and towards the European Constitution in 2006?
Spring
4,130: Communication and Media Management (Christian Fieseler & Markus Will)
The seminar introduces the principles and central spheres of activity in communication management, taking into consideration various forms of media and stakeholders. Parallel to the seminar, students work in groups to examine a case study dedicated to a central communication management-related topic and present their study during the seminar.
The lecture covers the most important aspects of business communication, starting with the principles and conceptual frameworks of communication management. Various applications in the field of communication management (public affairs, investor relations, media relations) are introduced and their importance illustrated through case studies.