This article identifies the primary features of what we term ‘‘criticalmedia industry studies,’’
emphasizing midlevel fieldwork in examining media industries and delimiting new ways of
understanding, conceiving, and studying media industries from a critical perspective. We
provide a general framework for the nascent yet growing body of work that locates industry
researh on particular organizations, agents, and practices within vast media conglomerates
operating at a global level. We mark out the most general boundaries of such an endeavor
by synthesizing the extant research in critical media industry studies, the ways in which
concepts and methods of cultural studies have been adapted to the study of industry
practices, and address the main gaps and trajectories of such research.