Media Theory Revision

This contains media theory

which you can use and apply.

Revision Tips
Go through the different theories and
make notes as to how you can apply these
to both your course work Section A (1b)
and the case study you are preparing.

Laura Mulvey
The Male Gaze
Film represents women as passive
objects of male desire.
Audiences are forced to view women
from the point of view of a
heterosexual male even if they are
indeed; heterosexual women or
homosexual men.

John Berger
Men look, women appear
Women are there solely for the
objectification of women within all
platforms of the media.
(Think of examples of different
magazines, films, TV shows or
websites where this is evident, how
are women represented in your
production?)

Michel Foucault
'Archaeology' is the term Foucault used during the
1960s to describe his approach to writing history.
Archaeology is about examining the discursive
traces and orders left by the past in order to write
a 'history of the present'.
Archaeology is about looking at history as a way
of understanding the processes that have led to
what we are today.
Therefore when analyzing your contemporary case
studies you need to take into account those past
representations and how they have contributed to
what we have today e.g. Birth of a Nation 1913,
Blaxploitation films (70s), The slave trade
(colonialism) etc.

Audience Reception Theory

A preferred reading (or dominant system of response) is a way of

understanding the text that is consistent with the ideas and intentions of
the producer or creator of the product. This may lead to an acceptance of
the dominant values within the text.

With a negotiated reading (or subordinate response) the individual

has a choice as to whether or not they accept the preferred reading as their
own. Audience members may read the text though the filter of their own
personal agenda. Although there may be an acceptance of the dominant
values and existing social structure, the individual may be prepared to
argue that a particular social group may be unfairly represented.

In an oppositional reading (or radical response) individual members of

an audience may completely reject the preferred reading of the dominant
code and the social values that produced it.

An aberrant reading is where an entirely different meaning from that

intended by the maker will be taken form the text. This could be when
individual members of the audience do not share, in any way, the values of
the maker of the text.

Hypodermic Theory
The theory suggests that the mass
media could influence a very large
group of people directly and
uniformly by shooting or injecting
them with messages designed to
trigger a response.

Moral Panic
A moral panic is the intensity of
feeling expressed in a population
about an issue that appears to
threaten the social order.

Narrative Theory
Todorov: Equilibrium, disequilibrium,
new equilibrium
Levi Strauss: Binary Oppositions
Roland Barthes: Enigma Codes
Propp: Characters/roles often found
in narrative

Todorovs Narrative Theory

1.
2.
3.
4.

Equilibrium
Disruption of equilibrium
Recognition of this disruption
An attempt to repair the equilibrium
is made
5. Equilibrium is restored OR a new
equilibrium is established

Propps Narrative Theory

Hero: Individual(s) who's quest is to restore the equilibrium.
Villain: Individual(s) who's task is to disrupt the equilibrium.
Donor: Individual(s) who gives the hero(s) something,
advice, information or an object.
Helper: Individual(s) who aids the hero(s) with their set
task.
Princess (Prince): Individual(s) which need help,
protecting and saving.
The King: Who rewards the hero.
Dispatcher: Individual(s) who send the hero(s) on their
quest.
False Hero: Individual(s) who set out to undermine the
hero's quest by pretending to aid them. Often unmasked at
the end of the film.

Levi-Strauss: Binary
Oppositions
Argued that meaning in narrative is based
upon binary oppositions. He observed
that all narratives are organised around
the conflict between such binary
opposites.

Good Vs Evil
Human Vs Nature
Black Vs White
Protagonist Vs Antagonist
Humanity Vs Technology
Man Vs Woman
Human Vs Alien

Roland Barthes: Enigma

Code
Refers to any element of the story
that is not fully explained and hence
becomes a mystery to the reader.
The purpose of the author in this is
typically to keep the audience
guessing, arresting the enigma, until
the final scenes when all is revealed
and all loose ends are tied off and
closure is achieved.

Stuart Hall
The media and therefore audiences often
blur race and class. Often associating
particular races with a particular class.
Audience reception theory; audiences
read/understand a particular text according
to their cultural upbringing.
Western (white dominated) cultures.
Continue to misinterpret ethnic minorities
in the media due to underlying racist
tendencies. Ethnic minorities are often
represented as the other.

Stuart Hall: Slave Figure

Black Characterisations in the
Media

Hall outlines three base images of the

'grammar of race' employed in 'old
movies'. The first is the slave figure
which could take the form of either the
'dependable, loving devoted
"Mammy" with the rolling eyes, or the
faithful fieldhand attached and
devoted to "his" master' (Hall, 1995:21).

http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-rol6.htm

Stuart Hall: The Native

The second of Hall's base images - the
native (ibid:21). Their primitive nature
means they are cheating, cunning,
savage and barbarian. In movies, we
expect them 'to appear at any moment
out of the darkness to decapitate the
beautiful heroine, kidnap the children

http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-rol6.htm

Stuart Hall: The

Clown/Entertainer
The last of Hall's variants is that of the
clown or entertainer, implying an
'innate' humour in the black man
(ibid:22). Interestingly, the distinction
is never made as to whether we are
laughing with or at the clown; overt
racism is rare in the media rather, says
Hall, it is 'inferential' (ibid:20).
http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-rol6.htm

Bell Hooks
The colour codes: Lighter skinned women
are considered more desirable and fit
better into the western ideology of beauty.
Black women are objectified and sexualised
in hip-hop reflecting the colonialist view of
black women (sexually disposable).
Commodified blackness, a mediated view
of black culture that is considered the
norm.

Tricia Rose
Hip Hop gives black female rappers a
voice introducing female
empowerment.
Hip hop gave audiences an insight
into the lives of young black urban
Americans and gave them a voice.

Paul Gilroy
Black music articulated diasporic
experiences of resistance to white capitalist
culture.
Employs the notion of diaspora and how
ethnic minorities (particularly black people)
experience dislocation from their homeland.
E.g. feeling as if you do not totally belong in
Britain but you also are considered English
in the Caribbean, Africa or Asia etc

Michael Eric Dyson

Political rap didnt get the support
that it deserved when it was
prominent in the 80s and early 90s.
Therefore it reverted to the flashy,
sexualised, criminal rap which we
know today, as through displaying
this it became more prominent and
more mainstream.

Kobena Mercer
Black gay film opens up audiences to the
understanding of the dual exclusion (being
gay and black).
But through directors such as Isaac Julian
they introduce a varied representation not
just pigeon holing into the black or gay
stereotype.
Audiences are exposed to diverse
representation displaying verisimilitude
rather than stereotype.

Jacques Lacan
The Mirror Stage: Where infants see their
reflections in the mirror and see it as a superior
reflection of themselves that they must aspire
to.
The ideal-I
Seeing iconic rappers who are successful
young black males may see them as a
superior reflection of themselves they could
aspire to. Particularly those iconic figures
whom have struggled through a deprived
childhood e.g. 50 Cent and Biggie Smalls
(Notorious BIG).

Books
David Gauntlett. Media Gender and Identity:
An Introduction. 2002.
Dan Laughey. Key Themes in Media Theory.
2008
Stuart Hall. Representation: Cultural
Representation and Signifying Practices.
1997
Bell Hooks. Black Looks: Race and
Representation. 1992
Tricia Rose. Black Noise: Rap Music and Black
Culture in Contemporary America. 1994

Books
Hall, Stuart (1995), 'The Whites of Their
Eyes - Racist Ideologies and the Media' in
Dines, Gail and Humez, Jean M., Gender,
Race and Class in Media - A Text Reader,
Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, London
and New Dehli.
Hooks, bell (1991), Yearning - race, gender
and cultural politics, Turnaround, London.
Gilroy, Paul (1983), 'Channel 4: Bridge or
Bantustan?', Screen, 24, 130-136. Cited in
Ross (1996), p.130.
Ferguson, Robert (1998), Representing Race
- Ideology, Identity and the Media, Arnold,
London, New York, Sydney and Auckland.

Notes
Some of the theorists have videos on
Youtube which are very useful in
understanding their theories and concepts
in relation to representation and audience
reception.
Link the views of the theorists to all
sections of the exam. Mostly to section 2
(which will be based on your case-studies).

YouTube Clips

Stuart Hall Representation

Bell hooks Rap
Bell hooks Commodified Blackness
Michael Eric Dyson Hip Hops
commodity fetish
Paul Gilroy Contemporary Racism