Week 5 - Representation: Ideology, Discourse and Power

This week’s lecture was on Representation: Ideology, Discourse and Power. The key readings were Long and Wall’s chapter on ‘Discourse, power and media’, Machin D and Mayr, A’s ‘How to do a Critical Discourse Analysis’.

Long and Wall’s chapter focused on exploring media representations of gender and sexuality within TV series. ‘As Tessa Perkins (Perkins, 1997) tells us, while we think of stereotypes as simple ideas and readily identified the concept is full of complexity, as evidence in your exploration of new stereotypes’. (Long and Wall, 2012) This could possibly suggest that because as an audience we consume products and see people represented in a certain way, this may become part of our idea of that particular thing. This draws attention to the lack of questions we ask about what we consume and why things are presented to us in that way, linking this in also to media power. Furthermore, Long and Wall explain discourse through using Michael Foucault’s theory and support the idea I was explaining further up. ‘Foucault meant by his definition that discourses are ideas embedded in what we do, say and think and that these create in terms upon which we know the world’ (Long and Wall, 2012) 

In the second reading, Machin and Mayr talk about discourse and ideologies within media and how to carry out a Critical Discourse Analysis. They state that ‘we should all think of all communication, whether through language images, or sounds, as being accomplished through a set of semiotic resources, options and choices.’ (Machin, D and Mayr, 2012). Through this they explain how what is communicated through the media is simply seen by many as a set of semiotic sources.

For my found reading this week, I will be looking at a study by Davies, F, which focuses on ‘Pragmatically Oppositional Representations in The L Word’. In the reading Davies points out that ‘Lesbian identity is shown as a status that can be liberating and positive’ (Davies, 2008). This suggests that the increased screening of such characters on TV ensures a positive effect on viewers outlook on these programmes as well as the characters presented.  

To further my knowledge on this topic, I could see how lesbian characters are treated within TV series by other characters. I could furthermore use virtual ethnography to see the opinions viewers have on these characters, such series include Pretty Little Liars and Orange Is the New Black.

References:

1. Long, P and Wall, T (2012) 'Discourse, power and media’ IN Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context (2^nd Edition), London: Pearson. Pp.: 100-129, 363-369

2. Machin, D and Mayr, A (2012) How to do a Critical Discourse Analysis, London: Sage. pp 1-29

3. Davies, F. (2008) ‘Pragmatically Oppositional Representations in The L Word’ IN Beirne, R, (2008) Televising Queer Women, London and New York: Pelgrave Macmillan.  

word count: 403

Week 4 - Censorship, effects, and moral panics: what do the media do to people?

This week’s focus was censorship, effects, and moral panics. According to Oxford Dictionary moral panic is defined as an instance of public anxiety or alarm in response to a problem regarded as threatening the moral standards of society. The key readings for this week were Long and Wall’s chapter on ‘producing audiences: what do media do to people?’  Bignell’s ‘An Introduction to Television Studies’ and Nelmes’ ‘An Introduction to Film Studies, 2^nd Edition’.

Bignell explores Television Studies and does so through applying it to broadcasting in Britain and explaining the two ways in which the two government bodies monitor what we watch. ‘The most important of these bodies are the Independent Television Commission (ITC) and the Broadcasting Standards Commission (BSC)’ (Bignell, 2004), further explaining how these bodies put the ‘watershed’ in place. This means ‘programmes that could be offensive or disturbing to children will not be broadcasted’ (Bignell, 2004), a great idea one which may not work as it isn’t guaranteed that children won’t be part of the audience members after that time. Furthermore, he also touches up on the impact political economy has on censorship by saying ‘ television companies are reluctant to bring themselves into confrontation with the government’ (Bignell, 2004), suggesting that even if they wanted to broadcast something which in their eyes doesn’t harm a viewer, they wouldn’t go against the governments regulations for many reasons, such as power.

Similarly, Nelmes looks at the main approaches to film studies and does this through looking at the relationship between text and context and further links this to issues of the representation of gender and sexuality within television. He furthermore, explores the ‘legality of censorship in the UK’ and ‘that a charge of obscenity, or any of the following (sex, drugs, violence), will likely result in cuts’. (Nelmes, 1999). This shows similarly to Bignell’s points how important it is to the government to protect the innocence of children, at least through the consumption of television.  He further compares the censorship then and now; his points are also supported in Long and Wall’s chapter. ‘We need to think about the nature of audiences as audiences, the literalness and quality of being ‘in the act’ of consuming media products’. (Long, and Wall, 2012) This suggests that even if there is censorship, this might not be effective as now; especially with the advent of the digital age audience members have access of media and other content through other means.

It would be interesting to explore how other countries operate in terms of censorship and viewing with the aim of seeing how these are put in place for children’s well being.  

References:

1. Long, P and Wall, T (2012) ‘producing audiences: what do media do to people?’ IN Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context (2^nd Edition), London: Pearson. pp 274-299

2. Bignell, J (2004) An Introduction to Television Studies, London: Routledge. Pp 229-252

3. Nelmes, J (1999) An Introduction to Film Studies, 2^nd Edition, London: Routledge. Pp. 48-53

word count: 438

Week 3 - Text: Is Film/TV a language?

This week in our lecture, we focused on whether TV and Film is a language. The given readings this week were John Ellis’ ‘Visible Fictions: Cinema, Television, Video’ and Geoffrey Nowell-Smith’s ‘How films mean, or, from aesthetics to semiotics and halfway back again’. In order to further understand why Film and/or TV can be considered a language we looked at what techniques and methods are used to convey meaning. We also applied certain methodologies (one of which was semiotics) to understand this further.

Ellis compares the importance of sound and image as elements and explains how these differ when consumed through TV or Cinema. He also describes the impact this can have on the viewing experience audience members have. He further explains that because people watching TV are within the comfort of their own home, they could easily get distracted suggesting that their attention isn’t 100% focused on what is on the TV. Because of this, Ellis points out that ‘TV uses sound to appeal to it’s audience, using a large degree of direct address whose function is to attract the look and attention of the viewer, and to hold it’. (Ellis, 1982)

Exploring why producers and directors of TV do this, he explains the impact imagery as well as sound have on the overall viewing experience at the cinema by highlighting lack of it in TV. ‘TV does encourage the same degree of spectator concentration. There is no surrounding darkness, no anonymity of the fellow viewers, no large image, no lack of movement amongst the spectators, no rapt attention.’ (Ellis, 1982) Through this Ellis explains that all of these variables (sound, image, atmosphere) have an impact on not only the viewing experience but also how much they interpret and pay attention to the film. He also states that although audience members may not concentrate on it fully, TV still has a ‘more extended period of watching and more frequent use than cinema’ (Ellis, 1982), this is because of its accessibility as well as cost.

However, Geoffrey looks more at the study of meanings in film through exploring the features of semiotics, aesthetics and political economy. He does so in order to try and explain the ways in which these things allow people to interpret and make meaning of a narrative by themselves. ‘Films mean because people want them to mean’ (Nowell-Smith, 2000) As well as this, Geoffrey explores the importance of cinematography and the impact this has in creating meaning within a narrative.

To develop my understanding of this, I could use textual analysis deconstructing the cinematography used in a film such as Deadpool.

References:

1.Ellis, John (1982) Visible Fictions: Cinema, Television, Video, Routledge: London - pp. 127-159

2.Nowell-Smith, Geoffrey (2000) ‘How films mean, or, from aesthetics to semiotics and halfway back again’ in Gledhill, C and Williams, L. (2000), Reinventing Film Studies. London: Bloomsbury Academic.

word count: 435