CNM aims to be a global leader in interdisciplinary education and research in the fields of communications and new media, integrating cultural studies, media studies, communication management and media design. This approach, reflecting global trends in media convergence, has and will continue to attract top students and faculty not only from the social sciences, arts and humanities, but also computer science, engineering, design, and management.

CNM leverages its strategic location to bring Asian perspectives into communications and new media studies, with an emphasis on generating multidisciplinary dialogues with communication and new media practitioners and serving as a springboard for opening up conversations between theory and practice, between mainstream communication perspectives and Asian perspectives, and among the various disciplinary strands that come together to define communications and new media.

The core 'clusters' of CNM in cultural studies, media studies, communication management and media design place an emphasis on (a) integrating new and digital media with traditional forms of communication; (b) forging interdisciplinary collaborations across multiple levels, methods and paradigms; and (c) generating knowledge transfer through ongoing dialogues between theory and practice. These research, teaching, and knowledge transfer aims of CNM are connected by exploring, nurturing, growing, and transforming the interstitial spaces of cross-cutting conversations that are simultaneously committed to disciplinary theory-building and interdisciplinary creativity.