This document discusses key theories of media language used to communicate meaning to audiences. It introduces Ferdinand de Saussure's concept of the signifier and signified, how signs have both a literal object and associated concept. Roland Barthes expanded on this with denotation, the literal meaning, and connotation, meanings drawn from cultural/social knowledge. Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding looks at producers encoding intended meanings that audiences can decode as a preferred, negotiated, or oppositional reading. The document uses examples to illustrate these theories for analyzing how media texts communicate and how audiences interpret them.