The document discusses the burden of representation for minority and marginalized groups in media. It addresses how frequently and proportionally these groups are represented, as well as the limited and often stereotypical nature of their portrayals. The document also examines how individuals are represented as celebrities and media stars, exploring how their public images and personas are constructed for commercial purposes and consumption by audiences.

1. Mass Communication & Media
Literacy 08

2. The Burden of Representation
 Negative stereotyping and the limited range of
representation
 Dominant and subaltern groups
 Kobena Mercer: ‘Black Art and the Burden of
Represention’

3. The Burden of
Representation
There’s nothing you can
say that we haven’t said
already ourselves
http://www.heebmagaz
ine.com/

4. Proportionality
 How many people from a particular group are
represented?
 How frequently do representations of a particular
group exist in media forms?
 What is the extent of those representations?
 Content Analysis:
 a quantitative method of analysing the denotative content of
media output based on defined samples and recognisable
categories.
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_analysis
 http://seokeywordanalysis.com/seotools/
 http://www.ultimate-research-assistant.com/

5. Content Analysis
http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/pmt/exhibits/1810/GWTV.pdf

6. Fame: representing individuals
 What does the claim that ‘we live in a celebrity
culture’ mean?
 Media stars:
 Are commodities produced by media for consumption by
audiences – profit driven
 Represent ‘economic capital’
 Represent investment
 Status is governed by economic imperatives
 But how is the meaning of stardom constructed?

7. You’re a Star?
 Actors become stars when their off-screen lifestyles
and personalities equal or surpass acting ability in
importance. (Gledhill, 1991)
 A star ‘is a performer in a particular medium whose
figure enters into subsidiary forms of circulation and
then feeds back into future performances.’
(Ellis, 1992)

8. Stars as media texts
 The image is a version of media output
 ‘Brad Pitt’, ‘Angelina Joli’ are corporate (media)
images not real people.
 They are therefore signs that can be analysed as
such.
 Clint Eastwood – choice and combination
 Primary elements: films
 Secondary elements: posters, badges
promo materials, PR campaigns etc.

9. Stars as social barometers
 ‘She is what she says’ … more than an actor
 The process of audience identification
 The elevation and validation of the individual

10. Westminster
Papers
Mediating Celebrity
http://www.wmin.ac.uk
/mad/page-1197