The document discusses several key concepts relating to how media texts are classified and understood: 1) Genre provides audiences with expectations about a text based on recognizable elements or "paradigms" like plot points, costumes or music. This allows for variation while audiences can still appreciate how elements are represented. 2) Narratives in all media texts, including fiction, news, ads and docs, involve a constructed series of events with a beginning, middle and end that audiences interpret based on their experience. 3) All media texts are representations of reality that are intentionally composed using signs and symbols. Audiences need media to make sense of the world, but representations also reflect a producer's perspective.

1. Key ConceptsMedia

2. GenreA text is classified in a genre through the identification of key elements which occur in that text and in others of the same genre. These elements may be referred to as paradigms, and range from costume to music to plot points to font. Audiences recognise these paradigms, and bring a set of expectations to their reading of the text accordingly: the criminal will be brought to justice at the end of the police thriller. These paradigms may be grouped into those relating to iconography (i.e. the main signs and symbols that you see/hear), structure (the way a text is put together and the shape it takes) and theme (the issues and ideas it deals with).Audience: Select text based on genre/Have systems of expectations/identify with repetition and may shape their own identity Producers: Market texts according to genre/Standardise production practice according to genre conventions, which cuts costs Genre can provide structure and form which can allow a great deal of creativity and virtuosity, especially when a genuine reworking of generic conventions comes along Genre provides key elements for an audience to recognise, so that they may further appreciate the variation and originality surrounding the representation of those elements.

3. NarrativeIn media terms, narrative is the coherence/organisation given to a series of facts. The human mind needs narrative to make sense of things. We connect events and make interpretations based on those connections. In everything we seek a beginning, a middle and an end. We understand and construct meaning using our experience of reality and of previous texts.Media Text : Successful stories require actions which change the lives of the characters in the story. They also contain some sort of resolution, where that change is registered, and which creates a new balance for the characters involved. Remember that narratives are not just those we encounter in fiction. Even news stories, advertisements and documentaries also have a constructed narrative which must be interpreted. When unpacking a narrative in order to find its meaning, there are a series of codes and conventions that need to be considered. When we look at a narrative we examine the conventions of :Genre/Character/Form/Time Narrative StructureThere are many different ways of breaking down narrative structures: Todorov, suggests narrative is simply equilibrium, disequilibrium and new equilibrium

4. Propp, suggests characters and actions

5. Levi-Strauss, suggests constant creation of conflict/opposition propels narrative. Narrative can only end on a resolution of conflict. opposition can be visual or conceptual. Binary Oppositions RepresentationAll media texts are re-presentations of reality. This means that they are intentionally composed, lit, written, framed, cropped, captioned, branded, targeted and censored by their producers, and that they are entirely artificial versions of the reality we perceive around usWhen studying the media it is vital to remember this - every media form, from a home video to a glossy magazine, is a representation of someone's concept of existence, codified into a series of signs and symbols which can be read by an audience. However, it is important to note that without the media, our perception of reality would be very limited, and that we, as an audience, need these artificial texts to mediate our view of the world, in other words we need the media to make sense of realityWhen studying the media it is vital to remember this - every media form, from a home video to a glossy magazine, is a representation of someone's concept of existence, codified into a series of signs and symbols which can be read by an audience. it is also important to note that without the media, our perception of reality would be very limited, and that we, as an audience, need these artificial texts to mediate our view of the world, in other words we need the media to make sense of reality.The study of representation is about decoding the different layers of truth/fiction/whatever. In order to fully appreciate the part representation plays in a media text you must consider:Who produced it? What/who is represented in the text? How is that thing represented?Why was this particular representation (this shot, framed from this angle, this story phrased in these terms, etc) selected, and what might the alternatives have been?What frame of reference does the audience use when understanding the representation?