Intro to representation and theorists

1. Draw me picture of a….

2. Someone of Arabic descentA Scottish Person
A Frenchman An inner-city youth

3. Someone of Arabic decentA Scottish Person
A Frenchman An inner-city youth

4. Someone of Arabic decentA Scottish Person
A Frenchman An inner-city youth

5. Someone of Arabic decentA Scottish Person
A Frenchman An inner-city youth

6. So why do we have these
images in our heads? Where
do they come from?

7. Definitions
• Stereotypes
• Media Industries use stereotypes because the audience
will instantly understand them. Think of stereotypes as a
‘visual shortcut’. They’re repeated so often that we
assume they are normal or ‘true’.
• Archetypes
• This is the ‘ultimate’ stereotype. For example, the white
stiletto wearing, big busted, brainless blonde bimbo
• Countertype
• A representation that challenges tradition
stereotypical associations of groups, people or places

8. Representation

9. Representation
• The way in which people, events and
ideas are presented to the audience.
• To break it down, the media takes
something that is already there and re-
presents it to us in the way that they
choose.

10. • These representations are created by the
producers (anyone who makes a media
text) of media texts.
• What they choose to present to us is
controlled by Gatekeepers…

11. Gatekeepers?

12. Gatekeepers
• A media ‘gatekeeper’ is any person
involved in a media production with the
power to make a decision about
something the audience are allowed to
read, hear or see – and, of course, not get
to see; for instance, a newspaper editor
has the final say on what goes into his or
her newspaper, where it goes within the
pages, next to what other piece, with
which pictures, strap-lines and headlines,
etc.

13. Moguls
• But the in the example of the newspaper
editor’s decision, this will not be made
freely: it will have been affected by
technical issues, by the kind of person
who owns the newspaper, for example
(i.e. the so-called media moguls, such as
Rupert Murdoch), and by many other
things.

14. Who, What, Why, Where
When you're analysing representation, think about the
following questions:
•Who or what is being represented? Who is the preferred
audience for this representation?
•What are they doing? Is their activity presented as typical, or
atypical? Are they conforming to genre expectations or other
conventions?
•Why are they present? What purpose do they serve? What
are they communicating by their presence? What's the
preferred reading?
•Where are they? How are they framed? Are they represented
as natural or artificial? What surrounds them? What is in the
foreground and what is in the background?

15. What can you say about the
following two images?

17. Now let’s try a media text

19. How is
Rooney
being
represente
d? Think
about his
body
language;
what might
he have
done?
Why does he have red & white
paint on his body? What might
this represent?
Who is the AUDIENCE
for this advertisement and
where might we see it?
This advertisement was
created by an ADVERTISING
AGENCY for Nike. Why
doesn’t it have ‘Nike’ on the
advert?
Applying Representation to Advertisements

20. DR CAGES
Disability
Regional identity
Class
Age
Gender
Ethnicity
Sexuality

21. Task
Choose ONE of the key representation
group from DR CAGES.
1.List the stereotypes of that group
2.Find three STEREOTYPICAL media texts
(try to make them from different media areas
– eg a film, music video and magazine
cover)
3.Find one COUNTERTYPICAL media text.
DUE FRIDAY 13th
OCTOBER

22. How about something a little
trickier…

23. How are women
represented on the
front of this
magazine?

25. Representation Theory

26. What can you say about the
representation of women in this clip.
Also how are we as the audience
positioned?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=

27. The Male Gaze (Laura Mulvey)
The cinema apparatus of Hollywood cinema puts
the audience in a masculine subject position with
the woman on the screen seen as an object of
desire. Film and cinematography are structures
upon ideas.
Protagonists tended to be men. Mulvey suggests
two distinct modes of male gaze – “voyeuristic
(women as whores) and fetishistic – women as
unreachable madonnas”. (Also narcissistic –
women watching film see themselves reflected on
the screen).

28. Are the times a changin’?

29. The Bechdel Test
• The Bechdel Test, sometimes called
the Mo Movie Measure or Bechdel Rule is
a simple test which names the following
three criteria:
(1)It has to have at least two (named)
women in it.
(2) who have a conversation with each
other…
(3) … about something besides a man.

30. http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=y1nsgU0meaw
How are young people from the
inner city represented in the
following clip?

31. How we treat people (Richard
Dyer)
Dyer argues that how we are seen determines
how we are treated and how we treat other
people is based on how we see them. This
comes from our understanding of
representation.
He believes that stereotypes come down to
power. Those who have power stereotype
those who don’t.
How many stereotypes of white middle aged
men can you think of?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=y1nsgU0meaw

32. How is London represented in the
following clip? Do you think that it
is a true reflection?
http://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=Ig_88q9M3SU

33. Myths (Roland Barthes)
• Barthes theory looks quite closely at the
idea of mythology, usually in regards to
people and places. He suggested that the
media often gives us mythic
representations or a fairytale-like portrayal
or a particular place person.

34. Subculture (Dick Hebdidge/Ken
Gelder)
• Hebdidge said that a subculture is a group of like minded
individuals who feel neglected by societal standards and who
develop a sense of identity which differs to the dominant on to
which they belong.
• Ken Gelder lists 6 ways in which a subculture can be recognised:
• 1) Often have negative relationship to work
• 2) Negative or ambivalent relationship to class
• 3) Through their associuations with territory ( The street, the
hood, the club) rather than property
• 4) Through their stylistic ties to excess
• 5) Through their movement out of home into non-domestic forms
of belonging (social groups as opposed to family)
• 6) Through their refusal to engage with they might see as the
‘banalities’ of life.

35. http://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=VjZ5tgjPVfU
Takes notes on the representations
in the following clip.
Think about gender, ethnicity,
location

36. Homework
• Representation in a film opening sequence of your choice:
• What/who is being represented?
• How is it being represented?
• How is the representation made to seem 'true', 'commonsense' or 'natural'?
• Is Dyer theory more appropriate in relation to the opening? Justify, using
detailed examples.
• What is foregrounded and what is backgrounded? Are there any notable
absences?
• Whose representation is it? Whose interests does it reflect? How do you know?
• How do people make sense of the representation? According to what codes?
(Consider Mulvey’s theory and Barthes concept of myth – make reference to
both).
• Apply the theory of semiotics to the sequence: i.e. what are the signs and their
associated meanings?
• Considering semiotics, what as the audience, have you learnt about the overall
direction of the film’s representation?
• What way do you believe you have ‘received’ the meaning of the film: through
preferred, negotiated or oppositional reading? (Hall’s theory) Explain in detail,
using supporting textual reference.