Hearts and Mines: The US Empire's Culture Industry

by Tanner Mirrlees

Overview

The US security state is everywhere in cultural products: in army-supported news stories, TV shows, and video games; in CIA-influenced blockbusters and comics; and in State Department ads, broadcasts, and websites. Hearts and Mines examines the rise and reach of the US Empire’s culture industry – a nexus between the US’s security state and media firms and the source of cultural products that promote American strategic interests around the world. Building on Herbert I. Schiller’s classic study of US Empire and communications, Tanner Mirrlees interrogates the symbiotic geopolitical and economic relationships between the US state and media firms that drive the production of imperial culture.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780774830157
Publisher:	University of British Columbia Press
Publication date:	06/01/2016
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	982,060
Product dimensions:	(w) x (h) x 0.90(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Tanner Mirrlees is assistant professor in the communication program at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT).

Table of Contents

Preface: The Personal Is Geopolitical vii

Acknowledgments xvii

Introduction: The US Empire's Culture Industry, circa 2012 3

1 The US Empire and the Culture Industry 30

2 Public Diplomacy and Selling the American Way to the World 64

3 The US Culture Industry: Still Number One 103

4 The DOD-News Media Complex 131

5 The DOD-Hollywood Complex 163

6 The DOD-Digital Games Complex 201

Conclusion: US Empire, Cultural Imperialism, and Cultural Policy, at Large 236

References 259

Index 299

What People are Saying About This

Richard Maxwell

A great achievement and timely contribution to the field, Hearts and Mines will rise to the top of all reading lists on the subject of media and empire, US hegemony, and the political economy of communication.

Shane Gunster

A fascinating, provocative book that invigorates our understanding of the relationship between the culture industries and US empire. Mirrlees detonates prevailing myths about the "liberal bias" of popular culture through a meticulous excavation of how imperial political interests, values, and objectives are woven into the production of news, cinema, and digital gaming. Hearts and Mines will change how you think about the politics of culture.