2. What is ‘Mediation’?
“Misunderstandings are the medium in which the non communicable is
communicated.”
– Theodor Adorno, Prisms
Mediation is being presented with something that is not reality but somebodies
representation of the subject matter. For example: Within media people tend to
present the world in a number of different ways in order to represent the message
they’re trying to convey.
Mediation can be presented through:
•Gender
•Social class
• and ethnicity
3. How is gender represented through
mediation?
When directors want the audience to be able to recognise that a female
character who has been recused by the protagonist, the male character then
creates the reorientation that he has rescued the ‘Damsel in destress’ . The
women is often stereotypically blonde and seen as ‘dumb’ and the male is
seen as strong and the most ‘heroic’ character. An example of a film in
which this happens in is ‘Taken’ when ‘Maggie Grace’ needs to be recused
by her father – who is represented as a ‘manly’ and ‘strong’ character.
4. How is social class represented
through mediation?
The director may represent different social classes based upon
the stereotype that they’re normally associated with ( this Is
normally done in comedies) Working class may be represented as
a ‘typical’ family who live on a council estate and often use bad
language and only wear certain brands ( such as Adidas and
Nike)
Whereas middle class families are shown having jobs such as
being a lawyer or doctors and therefore bringing in a significant
income.
An example of a film on when mediation is shown in is, Notting hill
when a man meets and falls in love with a movie star, the male
character is the other extreme since he is working class and she
is classed as ‘higher class’.
5. How is ethnicity represented through
mediation?
Directors use mediation to portray certain aspect of
personalities. For example: Something that is
stereotypically used within films is the representation
of people from the Asian culture as being really
smart clever. When using ethnicity directors need
to be very careful as it can be taken as racism.
An example of when ethnicity is used is in Mean
girls. This includes references to the ‘gender
specific’ representations (Karen, the blonde,
intellectually challenged ‘Plastic’) a particular part
which shows this is Indian or Asian, are smarter than
others. A quote from the film singles out a table
called ‘Asian Nerds’, and one of the characters,
‘Kevin Gnapoor’ an Indian/American, is team captain
for the Mathletes team.
6. How is ethnicity represented through
mediation?
Directors use mediation to portray certain aspect of
personalities. For example: Something that is
stereotypically used within films is the representation
of people from the Asian culture as being really
smart clever. When using ethnicity directors need
to be very careful as it can be taken as racism.
An example of when ethnicity is used is in Mean
girls. This includes references to the ‘gender
specific’ representations (Karen, the blonde,
intellectually challenged ‘Plastic’) a particular part
which shows this is Indian or Asian, are smarter than
others. A quote from the film singles out a table
called ‘Asian Nerds’, and one of the characters,
‘Kevin Gnapoor’ an Indian/American, is team captain
for the Mathletes team.
