UAL Creative Media Production & Technology Unit 4: Critical & Contextual Awareness Lesson 2 Media Language, Semiotics

1. Creative Media Production & Technology
Unit 4: Critical and Contextual Awareness
MEDIA
LANGUAGE

2. MEDIA LANGUAGE
• Semiotics
• Structuralism
• Genre
• Narrative
• Postmodernism

3. MEDIA LANGUAGE
What is media language?

4. MEDIA LANGUAGE
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/language
Examples?

5. MEDIA LANGUAGE
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/language
Examples
• English, French, Latin
• Body Language
• British Sign Language
• Python, C++, PHP
• Hieroglyphics
• Music?
• The Media!

6. MEDIA LANGUAGE
All media use a system of elements to communicate meaning to an audience. These
elements are referred to as signs or codes
• Visual and Verbal Codes – logos, semiotics, colours, design and layout, typography
• Technical codes – camera, editing, sound
• Narrative Codes (how a ‘story’ is told)
This is true for all media forms:
• Audio Visual (TV, film, radio),
• Print (magazines, newspapers),
• Interactive (video games, online), etc.

7. MEDIA LANGUAGE
In media we deconstruct these codes to understand how
meaning is created by the text. This is known as textual
analysis.
You will have done this in English already when analysing
poetry or prose. In media, we do the same, but for other non
verbal communication forms as well, such as TV adverts,
vlogs, and music videos.

8. MEDIA LANGUAGE
Consider the ‘Language of Film & TV’.
How might the use of camera communicate meaning?
• Framing
• Angle
• Movement

9. WEEK 2
MEDIA LANGUAGE
Why has the director chosen a high angle for this
shot?
What is the effect?
What meaning is it communicating?

10. Why has the director chosen a low angle for this
shot?
What is the effect?
What meaning is it communicating?

11. KAHOOT: CAMERA
• A quick kahoot: What do you already know about camera framing, angles and
movement?
• https://play.kahoot.it/v2/?quizId=bfcff165-8a45-4074-9212-d0a86fe8536f

12. SIGNS
What do the following signs mean to you?

13. SIGNS
What do the following signs mean to you?

14. SIGNS
What do the following signs mean to you?

16. But in parts of the
Middle East, this signal
is considered extremely
rude
– equivalent to
‘Up Yours’!

18. Or you’re an Internet
conspiracist in which case
you believe it is a sign of
The Number of the Beast
(666) and The Illuminati

19. Internet hoax (4chan) that it was a far-right,
‘white power salute to ‘troll’ the left.
However, it then started to be used by far
right members, apparently turning the hoax
into reality.
New Zealand Right wing/racist terrorist
appeared to make gesture in court after live-
streaming his attack on 2 mosques, resulting
in 49 dead.
Or…

20. MEDIA LANGUAGE
SEMIOTICS
These hand gestures can be thought of as codes or signs.
These examples show that:
• A sign’s meaning is not ‘inherent’, but arbitrary
• The same sign can have a wide variety of meanings
• How a sign is understood depends upon the context.

21. Semiotics (AKA Semiology)
The Study of Signs
Examines how symbolic, written and technical signs
construct meaning
Looks at how meaning is made and understood
A sign is something that stands for something other than
itself. For example:

22. Semiotics (AKA Semiology)
“TREE”
“Arbre”

23. Semiotics (AKA Semiology)
“TREE”
“Arbre”

24. What do you think this sign represents?

25. What do you think this sign represents?

26. Semiotics and Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes (1915-1980) was a French literary theorist, philosopher,
linguist, critic, and semiotician

27. Semiotics and Roland Barthes
Barthes is credited with 3 key ideas that you are required to know and
understand
• [Media] Texts communicate their meanings through a process of
signification
• Signs can function at the level of denotation, which involves the ‘literal’ or
common-sense meaning of the sign, and at the level of connotation, which
involves the meanings associated with or suggested by the sign.
• Constructed meanings can come to seem self-evident, achieving the status
of myth through a process of naturalisation.

28. Signification:
Denotation & Connotation
THE SIGNIFIED
The concept/ meaning/associations that the sign refers
to (i.e. BLUE is often associated with sadness or the
sea etc.).
= The CONNOTATION(S)
THE SIGNIFIER
The actual thing: a word, colour or image (i.e. the
colour BLUE).
= The DENOTATION
THE
SIGN +=

29. The Sign: Example
The Signifier
(denotes)
The Signified
(connotes)
X

30. The Sign: Example
The Signifier
(denotes)
The Signified
(connotes)
Two black lines crossing
each other diagonally
X

31. The Sign: Example
The Signifier
(denotes)
The Signified
(connotes)
Two black lines crossing
each other diagonally
The letter ‘X’,
The Roman numeral 10,
A Kiss,
Treasure,
Incorrect,
Danger,
Toxic,
No,
A signature
Unknown
‘Extra’
X

32. The Sign: Example
The Signifier
(denotes)
The Signified
(connotes)

33. The Sign: Example
The Signifier
(denotes)
The Signified
(connotes)
The connotations may change depending upon who is interpreting the sign and the cultural
context.
The denotation always stays the same.

34. Analysing Visual
Codes
Consider this image.
What meaning is made by the use of
• Colour,
• Costume,
• Gesture and expression,
• Props
• Setting
• Other?
What do these codes tell you about the
character /narrative /genre / target
audience?
For each codes – state the demotation and
connotation

35. Colour Costume
Gesture & Expression Other
Analysing Visual Codes