A presentation explaining genre and the conventions of genre theory as well as a brief overview of 2 genre theorists.

1. Daniel Grimley

2.  Genre comes from the French word ‘type’. It is a way
of categorising a particular media text according to its
content and style.
 Genre does not always rely solely on what’s in the text,
but also how it is constructed. For example; to
distinguish between a horror and a thriller, two genres
with similar content, the horror will take you to a
borderline supernatural place whereas the thriller will
stick to reality. Furthermore; editing techniques such as
fast cuts and fade to blacks will help distinguish a
horror film whereas prolonged tension building shots
and possibly fade to whites will convey a thriller.
These techniques will clearly show the different genres
despite them having the same content.

3.  Genre is currently a very controversial concept. There are certain expectations within
each genre category, such as action having some form of fighting or confrontational
content. These are audience expectations although the producer may be defying the
conventions and producing an action film without any fighting. Despite the fact this is a
perfectly plausible production technique, conflictions start to arise as to question if it can
be classed as an action film. There are subgenres within each genre, such as a action
adventure or action comedy, these help the producer to narrow down the classification of
their production. However if the film is classed in a subgenre category then when the
film is being advertised, no one will realise the production isn’t what they expect. The
audiences will view the advertisements for an action production and will instantly
associate it with fighting and confrontation, but if the film doesn’t depict any of this in
the trailer for example, then it will not persuade ‘action’ fans to view the product. And
the people who would want to see this production wouldn’t know about it because it has
to be categorised as an action, whereas in reality it may contain a lot of comedy or drama,
but it can’t be categorised in those classes, only sub-categorised. Original productions
that defy conventions will make less profit than classic genre ones because people know
what they like and will only pay to see the genres they know they will like, as when it
comes to media texts, audiences often have closed minds when perceiving certain texts.
Profit
Originality

4.  John Fiske defines genre as ‘attempts to
structure some order into the wide range of
texts and meanings that circulate in our culture
for the convenience of both producers and
audiences’.
 Most texts contain a ‘preferred’ meaning (as
intended by the producer) but they also offer
possibilities for consumers to create their own
readings. Media is an ‘enabler’ of ideas and
meanings, ultimately promoting diversity.

5.  Conventional definitions of genre tend to be
based on the notion that they create particular
conventions of content (such as themes or
settings). They can also form structure or style
which are shared by the texts associated with
them.
 Chandler also states that individual genres are
impossible to define as there are so many sub
genres.