This document discusses several theoretical perspectives on genre: 1. Rick Altman breaks genre down into semantic (props, characters, etc.) and syntactic (ideologies, narratives) elements which must be analyzed separately. 2. David Buckingham argues that genre is constantly negotiated and changing through hybridization. 3. Nicholas Abercrombie suggests that economic pressures lead to the "dismantling of genre" through pursuing new audiences. 4. Todorov argues that new genres transform old genres, similar to postmodern bricolage combining multiple genres. 5. Some Marxists see genre as social control reproducing dominant ideologies, while feminists examine how genres produce hegemonic representations viewed as common sense.

1. Genre Theory – Part 2.
Theoretical Debates

2. Rick Altman
He breaks the deconstruction of genre down
into 2 categories:
- The Semantic ( props, character types, locations,
costumes etc.)
- The Syntactic (Ideologies and narratives)
He suggests that the 2 need to be kept and dealt with
separately in order to accommodate the progression of a
genre over time and the emergence of hybridity.

3. David Buckingham
• David Buckingham argues that 'genre is not... simply "given" by the
culture: rather, it is in a constant process of negotiation and
change' (Buckingham 1993, 137).
• We could argue that this is why we have seen the emergence of
hybridity (the splicing of two of more genres).
• Think about your music video. Does it play with the codes and
conventions? Why? Is it to place a refreshing new twist on the
genre and keep the audience interested? Is it to match the subtle
changes in society - Think about the empowerment of women. This
links to the use of archetypal characters and the perpetuation of
ideology.
• Hence you should be discussing the changes to the syntactic
elements of your genre – making a clear link with the work of
Altman.

4. Abercrombie
Develops Buckingham’s theory and suggests that there is
'a steady dismantling of genre' which can be attributed in part to
economic pressures to pursue new audiences.
To what extent do you agree and does your text fall into this
category but not fully fitting a traditional genre? Were you trying
to pursue a new audience or broaden your target audience?

5. Todorov
Would tend to disagree with the latter as he
argues that 'a new genre is always the
transformation of one or several old genres‘.
Is Todorov’s proposal actually postmodern? Is
this not similar to bricolage, whereby we could
argue that genres become blurred together in
order to give new meaning and structure and
ultimately create a new genre??

6. Marxist and Feminist Perspectives
• Some Marxists see genre as an instrument of social
control which reproduces the dominant ideology.
• Within this perspective, the genre 'positions' the
audience in order to naturalize the ideologies which
are embedded in the text (Feuer 1992).
• Casey suggests that Marxist and feminist writers
outline how genres use their syntactic elements in
order to produce hegemonic representations that
become embedded into society and viewed as
common sense amongst the masses.

7. Task
• Now outline what genre theory is and debate
how your production confirms or disputes the
different theoretical perspectives of genre.
• You can do this by answering the following;
• Analyse one of your coursework productions
using the theory of genre.

8. Further Reading
• http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/int
genre/intgenre1.html