Representation

Mediation – when you film it, it makes it different, can’t film it without making decisions eg black and white, lighting. Creating an ad, what audience to empathise with emotional pain, the audience being encouraged towards concentrating on one aspect of the text and ignoring others.

Representation - By definition, all media texts are re-presentations of reality. This means that they are intentionally composed, lit, written, framed, cropped, captioned, branded, targeted and censored by their producers, and that they are entirely artificial versions of the reality we perceive around us. When studying the media it is vital to remember this – every media form, from a home video to a glossy magazine, is a representation of someone’s concept of existence, codified into a series of signs and symbols which can be read by an audience.

Bathes code theory:

‘Galaxy of signifiers’ gain access to the signified text through many different entrances, unravel the text and narrative from a different angle.

Hermeneutic code – story avoids telling the truth, drops hints throughout. Eg close ups of mask to suggest they will see her face,  vague backstory/flashbacks to subtextually symbolise she has lost someone, creates the mystery that we don’t know her face.

Enigma code – tension is build and the audience is left guessing. Eg last shot is of the mask being taken off and then a close up of the mask in her hand but you never see her face.

Semantic code – connotation/additional meaning. Eg mask has meaning of hiding away from society and herself, red dress symbolises blood ‘if you’re still bleeding’, black and white is meant to show her dull current life and the colour symbolises how free she feels at the end, implying she has found emotional freedom .

Verisimilitude:

Represents reality that the audience can experience. Shows protagonist wearing a mask and travelling to find emotional freedom, whilst reminiscing on past relationship. It also shows an example of trying to find her own identity, as she wears the mask to imply she has lost a part of her identity hence the mask, and the fact she takes it off. Subject is shown as looking quite vulnerable too as the video is in black and white and she is on her own, isolated. Feeling in this way also shows vulnerability.

This video shows reality as much as possible in that it is her walking through London at a normal pace, dressed in casual clothing such as a red dress, coat and shoes. The narration flows in a chronological sequence which shows realism.

The only aspect of the video that is not realistic is the fact that it is in black and white. The artist would not be viewing black and white and therefore it is an effect to make it look more mellow and upsetting. As well as the black box going against verisimilitude as it is very staged and is clearly separate from the main narrative.

The imitation of reality (techniques)

—Representation is always a re-presentation, in which elements of reality are selected, organized and narrated.

—By nature, media ‘mediates’ reality – it selects it and shows us only what the producer wants.

1B Rewrite - Media Language

Media language is the ability to communicate media texts through language analysis. It is the way in which the meaning of a media text is conveyed to the audience, so they can encode and decode the text, through the use of signs and symbols as well deconstruct text through camera, editing, sound and mise en scene. I was instructed to make a music video to a song of my choice, of which I chose ‘Youth’ by Daughter. I created a narrative around the theme and tone of the song, and it includes a girl wearing a mask who is travelling to London to find emotional freedom, however, she then travels on to Brighton beach, whist having flashbacks of her past relationship. Symbols such as the mask was a very clear way of giving the audience a way to decode the media language and understand why the character feels so lost and confused without having to be so literal about it.

Saussre was the founder of semiotics, he developed the concept of sign, signifier and signified as well as stating that everything has meaning. In my music video the sign was the setting I chose to film parts of the video in, the signifier was the beach and the juxtaposition between the beach and London as theses were the places I filmed, and the signified was the meaning behind the beach location. The seaside was a key setting due to its lonely, isolated, yet freeing and calming atmosphere. The vast land and sea portrays a tranquil and open feeling coupled with the contrasting tones of loneliness. This setting juxtaposes the busy London streets, the binary oppositions of stillness and chaos sub textually symbolise the apparent isolation from the main character. The ways in which the mise en scene so violently contrasts suggest a sense of loss and confusion. The audience’s relation to such signifiers could be that they recognise how the protagonist is feeling through the visual imagery, to deduce the emotion as the wonders alone amongst people yet is free on her own. The audience could take from this the importance of portraying emotion through location in a subtle way.

Laura Mulvey is also a key theorist; she explains how camera work and the idea of the ‘Male Gaze’ can objectify females, creating gender inequality. The main prop in my video is a mask that covers the protagonist’s face and her face is never revealed. This could symbolise a sense of hiding who she is, all her femininity and personality is hidden by an emotionless mask. The audience may relate or understand the characters need to cover up as it is a very directly visual way of conveying that she is purposely hiding her features. However, from Mulvey’s point of view it could be argued that the mask does still draw attention to the over sexualised features of her face due to the male gaze and societies need to sexualise certain features such as the eyes and lips as these are still visible even with the mask on. In the video there are many close ups of the subjects face with the mask on, therefore, this could be seen as a way of purposely attracting attention to these certain features of her face. There are also low angle shots that pan up from the subjects feet to her face, Mulvey would state that this is potentially a provocative shot to sexualise the character, although, many people could counter Mulvey and argue that the close ups and low angle pans do not need to be over analysed that much to be seen as sexual. Seeing as the mask has connotations of concealing or hiding and putting on a fake front to distract others from what’s underneath, the audience could recognise this and see the mask as a symbol for covering who you are so you can face people in public and try to get over a bad memory.

Overall, media language and the theorists that are within the theory is a key way of analysing text using signs, symbols and camera work. There are many symbolic images in my video such as the mask and the location which can be analysed and denotated by the audience through theorists such as Mulvey and Saussre. The finished product has symbolic imagery that the audience can relate to and use it as a subtle way of understanding both the character’s emotions and feelings, and the narrative.

Genre - My Video

Goodwin's theory is going to relate to my music video because part of his concept explores that heavy rock will have a horror genre, my choice of song which is quite sad and dramatic will have a sad and dramatic genre/narrative for the video. Moreover, the music and visuals relation is something I am planning on doing, with written lyrics mimicking the literal meaning of the words (an exact example is on the lyric ‘setting fire to our insides for fun’ I will have the words written on a piece of paper that I will then set on fire). On the contrary, Goodwin states how voyeurism of the female body is a selling point, however, I actually plan to not completely adhere to this idea as the main character will be dressed very average and normal, nothing overtly sexy or obviously trying to cover up. This is because I do not want to support the over sexualisation of females as well as the fact it is simply not something I want to be of focus in my video.

Schatz’s theory is a very specific idea of how there is a cycle within genre. My video will not be a parody as it is touching on a tragedy and mocking that would be inappropriate and I don’t want to do a parody, as it would be unrelated to the genre of the song. Stage 2 which is the classical stage, will be something I defiantly stick too as it is following the idea that media texts adhere to patterns and trends and the conventions of a drama/indie style would be well established. I will use this as a why of understanding the genre and what I should typically include in my video to signal to the audience what genre it is. Additionally, I will hopefully challenge some of the conventional elements that are seen in music videos, whilst still conforming to certain aspects.

The genre of my music video is hopefully going to reflect the style of the song. As I am using the song ‘Youth’ by Daughter which is quite a dramatic and emotional song, I hope to mirror the same tone with my music video. The genre will most likely conform to the hegemonic patterns or a drama as it will have a big, despondent moment that will shape the narrative of the video. Therefore, people can expect the video to be quite emotional as the genre and the style of the song suggests that. Genre is tremendously important as it will influence the text or general idea, such as the age group, the marketing and everything that follows.

The age group will be about teenagers and up as the video will incorporate concepts that many younger people will struggle to understand. Understanding what genre my video will be will be beneficial for both myself and the audience, as it will allow me to advertise my video accordingly (which I make posters etc), moreover, the audience will know what to expect from my music video. In terms of sub-genre, my idea will not stray too far from the typical conventions of a drama, unlike some genres that will have additional styles like slasher is a subgenre or horror, mine is very unlikely to venture too far from what would be expected.

Christopher Booker’s seven plots theory within genre is going to play a part in every text. I believe my idea will incorporate a few different plots from Booker’s theory, as there will defiantly be an element of tragedy one of the two characters featured in my video will die, leading the main character comply to the rebirth or voyage and return plot as the tragedy will make the main character spiral down and then the video will be of the character coming to terms with the tragedy and going on a journey to ‘find herself’ in a sense.

There are two approaches that a concept can take in terms of genre. It can either be descriptive of functional, I think my video will take a more functional approach because it will repeat patterns within dramas and ask questions that has been asked before which would be focused around the characters emotions and situation. Furthermore, the functional approach looks at what is being represented and how this will affect the audience. The way my video will be shot will hopefully allow the emotion of the main character to be portrayed as she is going to be wearing a mask, which would pose a problem to convey emotion as you cannot see her face.

Therefore, I am going to use other elements like colour, flashbacks/memories, and location, props, editing etc to portray the emotion of the character without revealing her face.

The issues touched upon in the video, are not new or evolutionary, typically as time goes on genres will evolve with the time, such as what scared people 100 years ago will be different today. However, they aim to explore current topics faced by society that have always been there. Additionally, the video will reflect on problems or issues of society and people, which may give the audience a sense of fulfillment or familiarity, which is comforting and enjoyable. However, I do believe that this constant state of change within genre will still play a small part in my video as naturally things will evolve with time and that will have inevitable and slightly unconsciously affected how I choose to make my video.  

Genre

Genre is a means of categorising different texts and being able to place them in a particular group based on codes and conventions as well as producer/audience relationships.

ANDREW GOODWIN

Found that music genres have their own music video style and iconography. Goodwin recognised that most artists have a trend of repeating certain actions within their music videos in order to establish this as their ‘trademark’ action and therefore making their songs recognizable due to it reoccurring often. He explains how music videos will generally stick to typical conventions within the genre of the song. More often than not, videos will display stereotypical characteristics that would be associated with the style. For example, heavy rock will include some sort of stage performance which could then intertextuality represent a type of film genre. So heavy rock may have horror film references or style. These intertextual references to film is quite common. However it is not just films, video can reference other music video, games, artists etc.

Goodwin also identified that the female body is often made to appeal as sexual especially in the very generic pop style. It could also be male, as it is the general gestures made by the people such as props or looking in the camera etc. This voyeurism is also seen as a selling point within media.

There is a clear relationship between music and visuals. e.g. either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting. The images within the video will reflect the lyrics of the song.

The artist’s record label will also play a big part in the music video and style. It is very common to see lots of close ups of the artist who will have an occurring motif that runs throughout their work, such as lady gaga who have many adventurous videos and looks. Andrew Goodwin identified 5 key aspects of music videos that we (the audience) should look out for which are:

Thought beats – seeing the sound.                    Narrative and performance.

The star image.     Relation of visuals to a song.    Technical aspects of music videos.

THOMAS SCHATZ

Suggested that genres will have a certain cycle, in the sense that there are a number of stages that are more than likely predictable.

STAGE 1 – INNOVATIVE – This is when genres will experiment with the typical conventions within that style. There may be merging of two existing genres which challenges the audience and put forward some originality.

STAGE 2 – CLASSICAL – The conventions within the genre are well established and the genre tends to be more specific and stable. At this point, genre texts are likely to generate pleasure through the reinforcement of predictable elements and the repetition of popular structures.

STAGE 3 – PARODY – A genre will play on the familiar conventions by drawing attention to specific features and the things the audience will recognise as familiar across that style. They are generally comedic and poke fun at certain aspects of which is fun for the audience as they can acknowledge what is being made fun of.

STAGE 4 – DECONSTRUCTION - Genre texts begin to challenge their generic elements by reformulating the conventions breaking, ignoring or altering the shared understanding of genre. The audience gains pleasure through the genre text’s ability to recognise and to subvert its forms and meanings. This process may redirect the genre back to the beginning of the cycle again.

How Audiences Use Genre

Certain genres can be deemed appropriate or inappropriate for specific age groups, hence why music videos/films can be rated, as certain genres will contain stereotypes of content that is only acceptable for certain ages. Genres will generally follow patterns of conventions of their genre allowing people to form an expectation of what could be featured in the film, video etc. People may identify with a specific genre, eg heavy metal fans may conform to a more punk sub-group.

How Producers Use Genre

Market their texts according to the genre that it fits into as people take pleasure from that type of text. It allows them to cut costs my conforming to standardise production. Follow or challenge genre texts to make to finished product more interesting.

Genre could be referred to as a contract between audience and producer as both parties can be clear on what to expect.

Steave Neal and Tom Ryall

Genre was a 3 part relationship between the text, audience and producer and that these 3 elements are linked, often referred to as Ryall’s Triangle.

Genre ... “Proposes a tripartite process of systems of orientations, expectations and conventions that exist between industry, text and subject (audience)” Steve Neale “The master image for genre criticism is the triangle composed of artist/film/audience. Genre may be defined as patterns/forms/styles/structures which transcend individual films and which supervise both their construction by the filmmaker, and their reading by an audience” Tom Ryall

Subgenres / Hybridgenres

Subgenre – develop in response to a text that challenges the genre and can cross the traditional features of a genre. They are genres within a genre that can make something more diverse, eg slasher is a subgenre of horror.

Hybridgenre – the aim is to frame a plot in a new, fresh way to keep people interested. They are essentially a mash-up of genres, such as romantic horror.

Christopher Booker’s Seven Plots:

Overcoming The Monster – Hero sets out to destroy great, threatening evil.

Rags To Riches – Hero is suppressed, they slowly rise into mature figure with riches, kingdom, the perfect mate.

The Quest – Hero learns of something great that he desperately wants to find, and sets out to find it, often with companions.

Voyage And Return – Hero heads off into a magic land with crazy rules, ultimately triumphs over the madness and returns home far more mature than when he set out.

Comedy – Hero and Heroine are destined to get together, but a dark force is preventing them from doing so; the story conspires to make the dark force repent, and suddenly the Hero and Heroine are free to get together. This is part of a cascade of effects that shows everyone for who they really are, and allows two or more other relationships to correctly form.

Tragedy – The flip side of the Overcoming the Monster plot. Our protagonist character is the Villain, but we get to watch him slowly spiral down into darkness before he’s finally defeated, freeing the land from his evil influence.

Rebirth – As with the Tragedy plot, but our protagonist manages to realize his error before it’s too late, and does a Heel Face Turn to avoid inevitable defeat.

Genre is tremendously important when creating something, as it will influence the text itself as well as the marketing style, the age group and everything that follows. Categorising things through many paradigms helps the audience understand it more.

Descriptive Approach

Comparing the aspects that make up something is the easiest was to categorise what style it should belong to. This approach relies heavily on the use of genre paradigms, or readily identifiable elements such as costume, location, character archetypes, shot transitions, or plot content. However, incorporating the concept of subgenres/hybrids means one video can be categorised and belong to many styles at once. The more stereotypical and obvious something has been created to fit a particular genre, the more predictable, but easy to classify it is.

Functional Approach

The genre is perceived as “collective expressions of contemporary life that strike a particularly resonant chord with audiences”. The repetitions of patterns in a genre are the repetitions of social questions that we need answers to, such as ‘what is the future’ (science fiction). These questions are asked throughout generations.

This approach considers the function and purpose of the genre to society and the lives of the audience, the functional approach looks at what is being represented. Genre texts have certain aspects which up hopes and promises to the audiences. They bring pleasure if they are fulfilled. They films reflect questions / anxieties / problems / dreams of society. If they are addressed they are satisfying.

Genre Evolvement

Genres will shift as time goes on, eg horror, what scared people 100 years ago is different to what scares people today. In todays society we are in the ‘postmodern horror’ stage. Moreover, certain genres become more common with the development of new technology, as well as being able to enhance and adapt genres.

Stability and Evolution

They will exist in one of two states if not at the same time.

A State Of Stability – Where films are being made that follow the same pattern.

A State Of Evolution – Where the genre is changing, more often than not as a result of audience or industry practices.

The Roland Barthes provide a distinction to help show the difference between the types of please felt from the use of familiar and unfamiliar elements.

Plaisir – Mundane, everyday pleasure i.e. the parts of the genre text that we expect

Jouissance – More challenging, intense pleasure i.e. the parts of a genre text that seem to step outside of the normal generic expectation.

Genres and Myths

Genres will evolve from technology, audience, new social concerns etc. Although, Jim Kites believes it is due to societies need for genres texts just like people have relied on myths to shape culture.

Levi-Strauss worked on the idea of myths and how they are more than just entertainment. It is essentially dealing with the values in fictional forms of a myth so society can defuse potential tension as a type of safety.

Therefore the role (or function) of a genre text it to help societies make sense of their worlds. They teach us the same universal values that we get from myths – what to be afraid of, how it is acceptable to behave, the importance of being ‘good’, the need to find partnership etc.

Media Music Theory

https://www.emaze.com/@AIRIFLCI/music-video-theorymy-video

1B

Genre:

Genre is a means of categorising different texts and being able to place them in a particular group based on codes and conventions as well as producer/audience relationships.

ANDREW GOODWIN:

Music genres have their own music video style and iconography. Goodwin recognised that most artists have a trend of repeating certain actions within their music videos in order to establish this as their ‘trademark’ action and therefore making their songs recognizable due to it reoccurring often.

He explains how music videos will general stick to typical conventions within the genre of the song. More often than not, videos will display stereotypical characteristics that would be associated with the style. For example, heavy rock will include some sort of stage performance which could then intertextuality represent a type of film genre. So heavy rock may have horror film references or style. These intertextual references to film is quite common. However it is not just films, video can reference other music video, games, artists etc.

Goodwin also identified that the female body is often made to appeal as sexual especially in the very generic pop style. It could also be male, as it is the general gestures made by the people such as props or looking in the camera etc. This voyeurism is also seen as a selling point within media.

There is a clear relationship between music and visuals. e.g. either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting. The images within the video will reflect the lyrics of the song.

The artist’s record label will also play a big part in the music video and style. It is very common to see lots of close ups of the artist who will have an occurring motif that runs throughout their work, such as lady gaga who have many adventurous videos and looks.

Andrew Goodwin identified 5 key aspects of music videos that we (the audience) should look out for which are:

Thought beats – seeing the sound.

Narrative and performance.

The star image.

Relation of visuals to a song.

Technical aspects of music videos.

THOMAS SCHATZ:

He suggested that genres will have a certain cycle, in the sense that there are a number of stages that are more than likely predictable.

STAGE 1 – INNOVATIVE – This is when genres will experiment with the typical conventions within that style. There may be merging of two existing genres which challenges the audience and put forward some originality.

STAGE 2 – CLASSICAL – The conventions within the genre are well established and the genre tends to be more specific and stable. At this point, genre texts are likely to generate pleasure through the reinforcement of predictable elements and the repetition of popular structures

STAGE 3 – PARODY – A genre will play on the familiar conventions by drawing attention to specific features and the things the audience will recognise as familiar across that style. They are generally comedic and poke fun at certain aspects of which is fun for the audience as they can acknowledge what is being made fun of.

STAGE 4 – DECONSTRUCTION - Genre texts begin to challenge their generic elements by reformulating the conventions – breaking, ignoring or altering the shared understanding of genre. The audience gains pleasure through the genre text’s ability to recognise and to subvert its forms and meanings. This process may redirect the genre back to the beginning of the cycle again.

Audience:

An audience is something we tend to analyse at a distance, make generalisations about, talk about in the abstract – and don’t usually think of ourselves as a part of. However, it is also, of course, something we are a part of, whether we like it or not, and, once we start analysing the concept, we see that ‘it’ is in fact not an ‘it’ but a collection of different things, depending on where you’re standing, and why you’re looking. In this article we’ll look at some of the ways in which audiences are studied by media theorists, and how audiences are talked about in the media.

USES AND GRATIFICATIONS THEORY:

Suggested in this theory is the idea that we have moved beyond passive reception of media and instead use the media for our own purposes.

These 4 uses and gratifications they provide us are:

INFORMATION– This is learning about events and conditions that are relevant in sudden surroundings, the world and society. As well as, looking for advice or opinion and decision choices, satisfying curiosity and general interest, learning; self-education and gaining a sense of security through knowledge

PERSONAL IDENTITY – This is when we find reinforcement for values that are personal as well as models of behaviours and generally gaining insight into oneself.

INTEGRATION AND SOICAL INTERACTION – This is more to do with gaining insight into other people and their circumstances. Moreover, people will identify with others creating a feeling of belonging and connecting with family and friends in society.

ENTERTAINMENT – This can be a person’s escape or a way of hiding from a situation, it can be emotional, relaxing or just something that they enjoy and find interesting.

RECEPTION THEORY:

Stuart Hall developed this theory as he implied the idea that the producer will encode meaning with the media text, and then the audience will understand or decode them. Due to an audience being so diverse, everyone may decode the subtextual message differently depending on a person’s culture, viewpoint etc.

He suggested that there are 3 ways in which a text can be read or decoded by the audience. These are:

DOMINANT (OR ‘HEGEMONIC’) READING – The preferred reading within the text is completely accepted by the reader. So, its meaning, attitudes beliefs etc.

NEGOTIATED READING – The audience will general accept the preferred reading, however, they will alter it in a way that reflects their own thoughts and personal interests.

OPPOSITIONAL (‘COUNTERHEGEMONIC’) READING – The reader will fully reject the preferred reading.

An essay written by the Roland Brothers called ‘The Death of the Author’ is in line with reception theory. It is highlighted that despite the intention of the author and their message, it is completely down to how the audience perceive and interpret the meaning. The reader’simpression of the text is what is essential, rather than the passions of tastes of the writer.

Narrative:

Narrative theorists are typically not interested simply in what happens in a story but more importantly how the story is told. Moving Image (like the written form) is able to utilises many interesting methods in presenting the narrative to the audience. As music videos are by their nature creative, they are able to explore both classic and experimental methods in the way they present a narrative.

TVETVAN TODOROV:

Todorov developed a theory involving five stages that he stated all music videos will include. He also explains how all music videos have a circular narrative as they are all about a story trying to reach the beginning. Todorov’s theory can be seen in many music videos as it is a very common structure.

The 5 stages that Todorov explains are:

The equilibrium – This is usually the state were the audience understand and know the character and the situation that they are in within the music video. It is normally (if the narrative is linear) the beginning of the video or it is the point before things start to take a turn.

The disruption – This stage it the moment when the climatic point of the video will just start to surface. The story begins to move forward and oppositional characters or events are introduced in the narrative.

The recognition (of the disruption) – The story continues to develop and moment within the narrative will become more involved, this could be an event or character, basically anything which will con tribute to the story and characters recognising the unveiling of the drama ready to occur.

The attempts to repair the disruption – The big dramatic moment of the story. It could be a twist or a big/significant part that all of these events have been leading up to.

The new equilibrium – The narrative is concluded (or it could end on an enigma). The problem could be resolved despite the fact many things within the story could have changed and altered due to the events that took place.

VLADAMIR PROPP:

Propp devised an almost universal rule that all videos, films, narratives etc will have the same characters in. they will be portrayed in different ways to fit the style of the music video, but all stories will pretty much have the same general characters and these will all have the same general actions.

He studied hundreds of fairy tales before deciding that all narratives have the same structure.

He believes that there are eight roles in every narrative structure. These are:

The Hero

The False Hero

The Princes

The Father (Ofthe Princess)

The Helper

The Villain

The Donor

The Dispatcher

Within the narrative each of these characters will obtain a slightly different yet very specific role. The hero will be sent on their quest by the dispatcher, the princess (though not necessarily a woman or even human) is then the reward for the hero. Obviously this will vary as some characters may play the role of the hero and the princess. The helper and donor will assist the hero on their journey in some way, stories like Percy Jackson have very clear character roles.

CLAUDE LEVI-STRAUS:

He came up with the idea that all video narratives are based on the concept of the binary opposites or any generally direct juxtapositions eg good vs evil, young vs old etc. Claude Levi-Staus’ theory will cover virtually all narratives as there will nearly always been some sort of binary opposite that the video revolves around. Levi Strauss theory is that the conflict is based around the binary opposites and that the binary opposites are the central climax of a narrative structure.

Representation:

The concept of representation embodies the theme that the media construct meanings about the world they represent it, and in doing so, help audiences to make sense of it in particular ways. For representation to be meaningful to audiences, there needs to be a shared recognition of people, situations, ideas and values. What require closer examination are the ideas and meanings produced by those representations. There may be shared recognition through the world as represented through familiar or dominant images and ideas, but there is sometimes little social consensus about how to interpret those representations, and always the possibility of alternative representations.

HEGEMONY:

The hegemonic model was developed by Marxists; it says that the ruling classes maintain their power through control of ideas and culture rather than force. They control the way the media represents the world therefore influencing the way people think about the world, and the ruling classes. It is suggested that representations are encoded into media texts in order to reinforce dominant ideologies in society. Antonio Gramsci, was an Italian Marxist who developed the idea of Hegemony, he explained that the power that lies at its heart is constantly being negotiated, rather than enforced. Another Marxist named Louis Althusser looked at the way audiences were hailed in a process known as interpellation. This concept is the ideological/social practice of misrecognising yourself based on a false consciousness mediated by media representations. Another approach to hegemony states that the mass media adopt an idea of what is normal; this then becomes common sense so that the audience does not question it.

PLURALISTIC:

This theory opposes Marxism as is states that the media is actually very diverse and there is a wide range of available choices for consumers. Rather than the media influencing consensus, consensus values influence media representations. The more dominant representations is argued to be that way because they popular with the audience instead of the idea that media institutions are forcing a particular ideology.

The main function of the media is to be entertaining for an audience and meet their expectations of representations hence why there are many stereotypes within the media as they meet the views of the audience, thus allowing the institution to make more money.

FEMINIST:

Women are represented in a hegemonic way and feminists like Laura Mulvey would argue that there is this ‘male gaze’ and that the camera is always male, establishing woman as the subordinate sex. The audience is always treated from a masculine point of view and there is voyeurism that is displayed with the female body. Whilst the pluralist model insists on diversity in the media, feminists would oppose that as women tend to just be given the terms as ‘the Madonna’ or ‘sexy’. Mulvey was referring to the ways in which women are represented either as saintly angelic housewives – Madonnas, or as sexually available pinups. Women are still being portrayed as what is effectively a Barbie within advertising. Yet with men there seems to be more diversity and leniency within advertising.

Media language and theory:

Media Language refers to the methods of communication that exist within all media products. All media texts are rich with meaning whether it be structural, symbolic or ideological. Producers rely on a generally agreed set of interpretations of the language by the audience in order to communicate their message.

FERDINAND DE SAUSSURE:

Regarded as the founder of semiotics. A sign = signifier / signified. A sign must have both a signifier and a signified. you cannot have a totally meaningless signifier or a completely formless signified. you should consider your use of signs iwn your video, what are the signifiers signified.