This volume began with the question: what analytical possibilities can scholarly
work on language ideologies offer the study of media? Studying media ideologies
is not new, but calling the metalanguage that emphasizes the technology or bodies
through which we communicate a “media ideology” is. By examining media ideologies,
the authors in this volume are building on previous ethnographies of how
people on the ground understand the ways the medium shapes the message (see
e.g., Barker 2008; Schieffelin 2000; Spitulnik 1998/1999). Media ideologies as a term
can sharpen a focus on how people understand both the communicative possibilities
and the material limitations of a specific channel, and how they conceive of
channels in general.