1. Key Media Concepts/Theory’s
Genre
David Buckingham (1993)– Argues that ‘genre is not
simply given “given” by the culture: rather, it is in a constant
process of negotiation and change’.
Claude Levi-Strauss (1958) – Ideas about narrative
amount to the fact that he believed all stories operated to
certain clear Binary Opposites e.g. rich vs. poor.
Steve Neale (1995) – “Genres are processes of
systemisation” – they change over time.
Christian Metz (1994) – argued that genres go through a
cycle of changes during their lifetime.
Barthes (1997) – suggested that narrative works with five
different codes and the enigma code works to keep up
setting problems or puzzles for the audience. His action
code ( a look, significant word, movement) is based on
our cultural and stereotypical understanding of actions that
act as a shorthand to advancing the narrative.
Pam Cook (1985) – “Linearity of cause and effect within an
overall trajectory of enigma resolution”. A high degree of
narrative closure. A fictional world that contains
verisimilitude especially governed by spatial and temporal
coherence.
Representation
Charles Sanders Peirce (1993) – “ we think only in signs”
David Gauntlett (2007) – argues that “Identity is
complicated. Everybody thinks they’ve got one. Artists play
with the idea of identity in modern society.
Baudrillard – discussed the concept of hyperreality – we
inhabit a society that is no longer made up of any original
thing for a sign that is now the meaning. He argued that we
live in a society of simulacra – simulations of reality that
replace the real.
Media Language
Andrew Goodwin –
- Thought Beats

2. - Narrative and Performance (repeatability)
- Star Image ( also Dyer)
- Relation of visuals to a song ( illustration, amplification,
disjuncture)
- Technical aspects( Camera, editing, effects etc.)
Carol Vernallis – Vernallis’ theory centres around four
key concepts that all relate to the way the music video is
constructed (how it creates meaning). They are:
1. Narrative
2. 2.Editing
3. Camera movement and framing
4. Diegesis
Audience
Mass/Niche & Mainstream/Alternative
Stuart Hall (1980) – analysed the readings within
audiences as either:
1. Dominant or Preferred Reading: The meaning they
want you to have is usually accepted.
2. Negotiated Reading: The dominant reading is only
partially recognised or accepted and audiences might
disagree with some of it or find their own meanings.
3. Oppositional Reading: The dominant reading is
refused, rejected because the reader disagrees with it
or is offended by it, especially for political, religious,
feminist, reasons etc.
John Hartley (1987) – “institutions are obliged not to
only speak about an audience, but – crucially, for them –
to talk to one as well; they need not only to represent
audiences but to enter into relation with them.
McQuail (1972) – An audience can be described as a
“temporary collective”
Ien Ang (1991) –“Audiences only exist as an imaginary
entity, an abstraction, constructed from the vantage point
of the institution, in the interest of the institution”.