Media Studies - Representation Theorists

Representation Theory - Stuart Hall

Concept 1: Media Representation Processes

• The media does not mirror real world events but produces an edited version of the events depicted

• Media representation are constructed through codes - through the use of language, imagery, layout, sound, and editing

• The media plays a vital role in the shaping of our views of the world

Concept 2: Stereotypes and power

• Stereotypes are used by media producers to create instant characterisation

• Stereotypes reduce social groups to a few traits or visual cues and suggest that those groups are naturally inclined towards a specific set of negative behaviours

• Stereotypes are mostly found where there are huge inequalities. They exclude and demonize groups in a manner that both reflects and reinforces social hierarchies

• Social groups can internalise the behaviours inferred by stereotypes

• Stereotypes can be contested through transcoding strategies

Gender Performativity - Judith Butler

Concept 1: Our gendered identities are not naturally given by constructed through repetition and ritual

• Our bodies or sex do not define our gendered identities

• Genders are not fixed by childhood experience

• Gender is constructed through the continuous repetition of micro-rituals

Concept 2: Contemporary culture reinforces a traditional gender binary - identities that fell outside of that binary are constructed as subversion

• Heteronormativity is entrenched within society

• Non-heteronormativity identities are marginalisation of subversive identities through absent representations, abjection, and parody

• The performance of gender trouble is difficult, sometimes painful, process given the entrenched nature of heteronormativity

Intersectionality - bell hooks

Concept 1: Interconnected oppression

• Representation of black women (and men) have been shaped by historical forces

• Feminist movements of the twentieth century have largely been dominated by a white viewpoint

• A social hierarchy exits that places white men at the top followed by white women, male ethnic minorities, and, last, female ethnic minorities

• Oppression of minority groups (racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia) are constructs of a white male dominated social hierarchy

• The lack of black female power results in absent representations and a range of negative stereotypes that some black women have internalised

Concept 2: From evaluation to action, bell hooks’ call to action

• hooks’ intersectional work does not just provide us with an analytical tool, but also prompts media producers to fashion their products in ways that draw attention to social inequality

• Intersectional media foregrounds the interconnected nature of inequality

• Intersectional media celebrated the social diversity and gives voice to social groups that have been marginalised by white male power

Feminist Theory - Liesbet van Zoonen

Concept 1: The female body as a spectacle

• The roles that females are expected to play within society vary enormously across different cultures and historical periods

• The dominant representational mode in Western culture positions women as an erotic spectacle

• Second wave feminists have challenged the dominance of men in society

• Their wave feminists have reasserted the right of women to occupy traditional female roles

• Fourth wave feminists continue to challenge male privilege using both mass media and social media forms

Concept 2: Masculinity in the media

• Masculine depictions are not subject to the same objectification processes and females

• Male social dominance is reinforced using active representations of masculinity

Postcolonial Theory - Paul Gilroy

Concept 1: Racial binaries, otherness, and civilisation

• Black communities are constructed as an ‘other’ to white culture and are associated with criminal activity and lawlessness

• The media reflect civilisationist attitudes through simplistic reportage and the demonisation of Muslims - media products nurture fear and the idea that Muslims and Europeans are incompatible

Concept 2: The enduring legacy of the British Empire on the English identity

• A deep-seated postcolonial melancholia infects the media as a result of Britain’s diminishing global importance

• Postcolonial melancholia prompts a nostalgic construction of Englishness

• Postcolonial melancholy produces a sense of English rootlessness as an anxiety surrounding British identity

Media and Identity - David Gauntlett

Concept 1: Traditional and post-traditional media consumption

• Gauntlett’s ideas build upon Anthony Giddens’ assertion that society has progressed to a stage that Giddens calls ‘late modernity’

• The conditions of late modernity enable audiences to escape the prescriptive identities that are constructed for them through localised social norms and traditional viewpoints

• Gauntlett argues that contemporary media has brought audiences into contact with a wider range of representations - and, importantly, that audiences can consciously shape their own sense of self

Concept 2: Reflexive identity construction

• The media provides a variety of role models and lifestyle templates that audiences use to guide their own outlooks

• Audiences are engaged in a continuous revision of their identities

• Media narratives mirror the process of identity transformation

• Audiences are in control of the media - adapting and assimilating ideas about themselves through the various representations that the media presents