Rethinking Media Coverage: Vertical Mediation and the War on Terror

In the post-9/11 era, media technologies have become increasingly intertwined with vertical power as airwaves, airports, air space, and orbit have been commandeered to support national security and defense. In this book, Lisa Parks develops the concept of vertical mediation to explore how audiovisual cultures enact and infer power relations far beyond the screen. Focusing on TV news, airport checkpoints, satellite imagery, and drone media, Parks demonstrates how "coverage" makes vertical space intelligible to global publics in new ways and powerfully reveals what is at stake in controlling it.
Review
"In this fearless piece of critical scholarship, Lisa Parks brings into sharp focus a principle strategy of the US military’s interminable 'war on terror'―namely, its global domination of the 'vertical field.' As Parks’ intricate analysis reveals, this process has both infrastructural and performative dimensions: the staged spectacle of US 'vertical hegemony' has gone hand-in-hand with logistical maneuvering and the physical exercise of military might. Covering a breadth of conceptual territory, Rethinking Media Coverage makes a vital contribution to our understanding of both post-9/11 geopolitics and twenty-first-century media culture." -Kelly Gates, University of California San Diego
"Lisa Parks’ call to rethink how we conceptualize the organized violence of the ‘war on terror’ couldn’t be more timely. A brilliant study that ranges from satellite imaging, airports, drone infrastructure and more, Rethinking Media Coverage is an essential guide to understanding the intersections of militarism, technology, entertainment, and resistance." -Simone Browne, University of Texas at Austin
About the Author
Lisa Parks is Professor of Comparative Studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Director of the Global Media Technologies and Cultures Lab. She is the author of Cultures in Orbit: Satellites and the Televisual and co-editor of Life in the Age of Drone Warfare.