2. • Media texts are encoded by producers
• Audience decodes
• Audiences are generally thought of as
active
• Many different readings (polysemic)
• Codes = meaning system consisting of
signs – signs are things which potential to
generate meaning
3. • Looking at how communication is the
product of shared meanings
• Messages, texts, images etc… all interact
within social and cultural space
• Meaning often hidden/encoded within text
4. Denotation
• Denotation is the part
of the sign which is
immediately
Gold
recognisable
• Has direct
relationship to the real
world
• Is what we see
5. Connotation
• Connotation includes
associations which
producer & audience
Gold
bring to the sign
• Links to other
concepts, memories,
ideas
• Different cultures
have different
meanings
6.
7.
8. • Preferred reading = that which the
producer meant i.e. they successfully
encoded and consumer decoded
• Negotiated reading = encoder and
decoder agree on some elements of the
text
9.
10. Aberrant reading
• If audiences are
active and
connotations are
cultural and
personal then
sometimes we
can incorrectly
decode texts
• This is an
aberrant reading
11.
12. Analyse an image in pairs and write a brief
summary including discussion of…
• Denotation
• Connotation
• Preferred meaning
• Negotiated meaning
• Aberrant meaning
