2. There a different narrative theorists who came up with different approaches to the structure of videos.
Propp analyzed folk tales and developed a theory that within each narrative there are a set of stock
characters, which reappear in every storyline. These roles are:
Hero
Princess
Helper
False Hero
Dispatcher
Father
Villain
Donor
Levi Strauss’ theory dictated that in every media text there are binary oppositions. This is when you have
two things which are the complete opposite. For example, love and hate, rich and poor. The audience
subsequently are aware of who they should side with.
Barthes was a French semiologist who identified 5 different codes which a narrative uses to catch the
audiences attention. These are:
The enigma code – the audience is intrigued by the need to solve a problem.
The action code – the audience is excited by the need to resolve a problem.
The semantic code – the audience is directed towards an additional meaning by way of connotation.
The symbolic code – the audience assumes that a character dressed in black is evil or menacing and forms
expectations of his/her behavior on this basis.
The cultural code – the audience derives meaning in a text from shared cultural knowledge about the way
the world works.
Todorov’s theory states that in a media text there are five stages.
Original equilibrium Disruption Recognition Attempt to restore New Equilibrium
3. The video starts off straight away
demonstrating Propp’s theory of there
being a hero. Taylor Swift is shown as
the hero in this music video, we can
tell this as an audience by the fact
that she is recognizable as the
artist/singer through the use of close
ups.
4. The music video also has aspects of Levi-Strauss’s theory which is binary
opposition. We can see that there is love and hate throughout the music video
and this makes it recognizable to the audience on who they should side with.
There is also binary opposition of different environments – her in a
vintage/trendy style apartment and him in a ‘downtown’ bar. This
demonstrates that they are two different people and aren’t right together.
5. Barthes theory can be applied to the
music video as well as it follows the
cultural code in that the audience
can relate to the girl going through a
break up as it is typical for the 21st
century. How she is looking through
a window thinking about the
breakup at the beginning is typical.
This is typical to the genre as most
artists in the same genre will sing
about boys/breakups. It makes the
audience feel as though they can
relate.
It also has the symbolic code in the
music video. The ‘ex boyfriend’ is
always in darker clothes than Taylor,
also he is in darker clothes/lighting.
This mise-en-scene makes the
audience see him as evil and side
against him.
