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Institution, audience, language&representation Notes

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What is the difference between the culture industries and other industries? [Hesmondhalgh]

Culture industries such as tarmacking the road is an essential thing. It is a necessity in life, however, in the other industries such as media, its purely for entertainment purposes.

Other industries is limited on what you are able to do (same sausage rolls/tarmacking) whereas culture industries are versatile, you can do many things with it to entertain/satisfy the intended audience.

Media industries are a risky business (Hesmondhalgh), you don’t know how people will react, but the other industries (greggs) if you sell a specific unit one day, you can predict what you will sell the next day based of previous data.

Both industries are very profitable/focus on money to survive.

‘Pivotal for the way we make sense of the world’- Golding and Murdock.

Industries

Transnational Media– Media that is accessible to multiple nations, not just one. EG- Netflix/Amazon Prime etc

Commercial Media- Privately owned, audiences don’t pay (adverts). EG- ITV

Structure: Patterns of ownership

NO OFFENCE

  • Production: (Abbott Production/Abbott Vision. Same company that made Shameless. Is a horizontal integration
  • Distribution (Vertical merger/integration- saves money)
  • Consumption (Channel 4, vertical integration)
  • Regulation of Ownership (Don’t allow monopolies)

Types of ownership [State/public ownership-BBC, commercial/private ownership-ITV, community-Hautlieu Radio]​

Channel 4- mixed model/owned by government with adverts​

Hesmondhalgh

‘Media is a risky business’

Public Service Broadcasting

What is it?

  • A broadcasting/media outlet (BBC, Channel 4) that has a main purpose of public service. This is usually funded by the government. It allows diversity in the media, and allows people to understand more things in their nation to an extent. It benefits the public.
  • Inform, educate, entertain.

BBC:

  • An ‘arms length’ away from government
  • It is critical of the government

Horizontal Integration = When a conglomerate acquires media companies of the same media type.

Vertical Integration = Ownerships that allow a media company to produce and distribute products.

Key Theorists:

  • Curran and Seaton- ‘Ownership of media industries’
  • Hesmondhalgh- ‘Media is a risky business’
  • Livingstone and Lunt- ‘Regulation’

Curran and Seaton:

  • ‘The media is controlled by a small number of companies that make products to create profit’
  • ‘The business function of the media industry takes precedence over its creative/public service capacities’
  • ‘PSB provides impartial news, serves minority audiences and champions national unity by offering inclusive rather than exclusive content.’

Media Ownership

Characteristics of the public sphere

Benefits

Livingstone and Lunt:

Pages: 1 2 3 4
Audience, Genre, Institution, Narrative, Television

No Offence and The Killing

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No Offence

A police series based in Manchester from the writer of ‘Shameless’. On channel 4. Has a women as the lead role, and other female characters as well as males.

Genres: Drama, Police procedural, Dark Comedy

The first episode launched with 2.5 million viewers.

Mark Scheme notes:

  • the importance of targeting an audience beyond the national evident in Channel 4’s investment in online company TRX (The Rights Exchange) which aims to facilitate the sale of programmes abroad
  • No Offence is produced by AbbotVision, the independent producer of Shameless – which was successfully remade in the US– suggesting that the appeal to an international audience is a deliberate strategy
  • No Offence represents British national culture to a British audience – but this identity is also used as a selling point internationally through the appeal of difference
  • The series has a social realist aesthetic which is a recognizable
    national style but is also popular in Europe (evidenced in the
    popularity of social realist films in Europe)
  • No Offence was broadcast on France2 the public service broadcaster, to very high viewing figures; the perceived weakness of French broadcast TV provides opportunities for export.
  • The series’ focus on the detective narrative and crime drama is familiar and understood globally, the representation of the independent, female detective has proven popularity.
Pages: 1 2
Letter to the Free, Music Video, Notes, Revision, Theory, Uncategorized

Letter to the Free

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Common

An American rapper and actor. He has won many awards such as grammys for best R&B song, best rap album at the grammys, and many more. He launched ‘Think Common Entertainment, a record label in 2011. He has acted / voice acted in films/tv shows: Date night, suicide squad, small foot, now you see me, never have I ever and many more.

13th amendment

Abolished Slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. There is a loophole in the 13th amendment- which allowed slavery to continue and provided more discrimination that still happens in today’s society.

Documentary:

Released in 2016. Film director and maker, Ava DuVernay, speaks about the history of racial inequality in the USA. Showing us that America’s prisons are filled with many more African-Americans than white Caucasians. It points out how much harm can be caused by slavery.

https://hautlieucreative.co.uk/media23al/wp-content/uploads/sites/58/2022/01/Music-as-Political-Protest.pdf

Cultural Hegemony

Key Concepts:
● Cultural resistance
● Cultural hegemony
● Subcultural theory

The Idea of Resistance and Political Protest

Key idea: the political, personal and cultural are always intertwined

Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

Antonio Gramsci

Hegemonic: dominant, ruling-class, power-holders
Hegemonic culture: the dominant culture
Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values

Functions by framing the ideologies of the dominant social group as the only legitimate
ideology.

(slide 3) The dominant social groups are shown through its economic, political, moral and social institutions.

Subculture

Working-class youth culture
Unified by shared tastes in style, music and ideology
A solution to collectively experienced problems
A form of resistance to cultural hegemony

Song lyrics

“We ain’t seen as human beings with feelings” I chose this lyric because it points out how people of colour are constantly being dehumanised.

“They stop, search and arrest our souls” I chose this lyric because people of colour don’t get the freedom deserve.

Post Colonialism

Looking at identity and representation through the lens of Empire and Colonialism.

Shadow of Slavery

Edward Said

Orientalism- the link between culture, imperial power and colonialism.

The arguments around postcolonial critical thought ‘constituted a fundamentally important political act’ (MacLeod, 200: 16)

The power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism– Edward Said Culture and Imperialism, 1993: xiii

‘In this view, the outlying regions of the world have no life, history or culture to speak of, no independence or integrity worth representing without the West.‘ (Said, 1993: xxi).

Jacque Lacan “The other”

Search for identity by looking at the mirror or other things. You are only self conscious and aware when you see yourself in the mirror.

Uncategorized

Movie poster analysis

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EuphoriaThe clear sign is a close up of the main actress. It has some sort of galaxy/trippy filter to it, giving off the idea that she is hallucinating, which could be a major part to the plot. The logo of the streaming platform it is found on is clearly shown at the top of the page. The signifier (title) ‘Euphoria’ tells the audience what the movie is going to be about. The tears are an iconic sign as it provides extra information about the show.
JumanjiThe sign in this poster is the group standing in some sort of cave. The way in which they are smaller than the background tells us that they are less significant than the forest, suggesting that they are to conquer it. The movie title ‘Jumanji’ is the main signifier as it tells you what it will be about. The jungle vines are an iconic sign as they allow the audience to gain extra knowledge about the movie.
Palm SpringsThe sign in this movie poster is the two main characters in a pool. The way in which the pool is never ending, connoting that it has a lot to do with the meaning of the movie. The main signifier ‘Palm Springs’ suggests that a key part of the movie will be set in or about Palm Springs, allowing the reader to have a clearer understanding of it. The blow up pool rings are iconic signs as it has links to a part in the film and is giving the audience extra information.
The Story of CastlerockThe sign is a close up shot of the main character with grey/eerie makeup and hair, denoting that it is a horror movie. The title ‘The story of castlerock’ is a signifier as it allows the audience to have an understanding of what it will be about. Having the thing on the girl’s forehead alludes to the fact that it has a key part of the movie, which is an iconic sign.
Dora and The Lost City of GoldThe sign in this is the main character standing back to the camera to show off her bag. This denotes to the fact that her bag and the monkey has some significance to the plot. The main signifier in this movie poster is the title as it alludes to what may happen in the film. The iconic sign in this movie poster is the monkey and the backpack. This is because it links to the story/plot and gives off extra information about it.
Moving Image, Narrative

LanGUAGE OF mOVING iMAGE

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Space, size and scale is essentially the main point in media/creative arts. There is a set of rules that goes along with each section- key terminology.

Rack Focus:

Focusing on one subject, then to another to reveal a plot or storyline.

This guides the viewers on who/where/what to look at which usually has great significance to the shot.

Camera shots, angles and sizes

  • High angle / Low angle / bulls-eye / birds eye / canted angle
  • Tracking / Panning / Craning / Tilting / Hand held / Steadicam
  • Establishing Shot / Long Shot / Medium Shot / Close-up / Big Close-Up / Extreme Close Up
  • Insert Shot

High angle shots can be used to make the subject appear small, subordinate. Low angle shots can be used to make the subject to appear big and in power.

Insert Shots:

Used to:

  • Add detail and clarity to visual information
  • Emphasise something significant happening

Edit

Stitching one moving image to another in a way where you control what everyone sees.

  1. EDIT ON ACTION
  2. EDIT ON A MATCHING SHAPE, COLOUR, THEME
  3. EDIT ON A LOOK, A GLANCE, EYELINE
  4. EDIT ON A SOUND BRIDGE
  5. EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT SIZE
  6. EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT CAMERA POSITION (+30′)

I would edit on action when the subject starts to walk. When they notice the tree and point to it, I will cut to an eyeline view of the tree, and back again.

Parallel editing:

When you cut back and forth showing two things happening at once.

Montage editing:

When you have to show a backstory or the history of something, you use montage editing where you reveal key parts of a life/story that helps people understand the story they’re watching.

‘Creates meaning through putting ideas and objects next to each other.’

Sequencing a shot/Logical shot progression:

Used to create verisimilitude and empathy for the audience, gets audience on the ‘edge of the seat’.

  • establishing shot / ES, moving to
  • wide shot / WS,
  • to medium shot / MS,
  • to close up / CU,
  • to big close up / BCU;
  • and then back out again

Shot/Reverse Shot:

When characters are having a conversation and you focus on one person speaking (shot), then the other person (reverse shot).

If you show the person’s head while they’re being spoken to, it is an internal shot, if you show it as if they’re speaking to someone it is an external shot.

Examples in my sequence:

  • I can use an extreme close up/big close up to highlight significance of the tree and the person.

Genre

genre

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Genre is based around similarities and differences.

Genre is a way of thinking about media production (INSTITUTIONS) and media reception (AUDIENCES)

Texts hold similar patterns, codes and conventions that are both PREDICTABLE and EXPECTED, but are also INNOVATIVE and UNEXPECTED.

Genres can have sub-genres as well as hybrid genres (a combination of 2 genres)

It could be said that “genre is a system of codes, conventions and visual styles which enables an audience to determine rapidly and with some complexity the kind of narrative they are viewing” (Turner p.97 Film as Social Practice)

Steve Neale

predictable expectations- Something that can be guessed about a specific thing

reinforced–

amplify 

repertoire of elements

corpus 

verisimilitude– the appearance of being true or real.

realism 

construction of reality.

 historically specific 

hybrid genres/sub genres

Exam Prep, Ghost Town, Music Video

GHOST TOWN CSP

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Youth culture as a political protest:

Political protests are stereotypically petitions, marches etc, but people don’t think about the fact that people make moving images/music etc to help change view points on certain things. Just because a law has changed doesn’t mean the opinion of s topic will have changed, which leads to the fact that the political, personal and cultural are always intertwined.

Cultural hegemony

Framing ideologies of dominant social groups as the only legitimate ideology- The only ‘real’ belief is the hegemonic one, the dominant one.

Antonio Gramsci:

An Italian philosopher 1930s

Subculture-

● Working-class youth culture
● Unified by shared tastes in style, music and ideology
● A solution to collectively experienced problems
● A form of resistance to cultural hegemony

The song challenges the social theories at the time

Paul Gilroy

Author of the book ‘Ain’t no black in the union jack’, exploring the construction of racial ‘otherness’ within the print media in the 1970s. The book traces the story of UK Post war race relations.

Gilroy argues that the racial representations that were ‘fixed in a matrix between the imagery of squalor and that of sordid sexuality’, marginalised the immigrant black community from the outset – constructing them as racial ‘other’ in the predominantly white world of 1950s Britain.

In 1970s and 80s, newspapers related stories concerning the many community riots of the period, depicting the multi-ethnic disturbing events as only black events, suggesting the black community was prone to lawlessness and incompatible with white British values.

QUOTES FROM ARTICLES

‘no night complete without a fight, Skinheads attacking whoever riled them, flick knives at the ready.’ – The conversation.com

‘nods to cinematic soundtracks and music hall tradition, it reflects and engenders anxiety.’ The conversation.com

 deadpan vocals lamenting how “all the clubs have been closed down” because there is “too much fighting on the dance floor”. The conversation.com

‘England was hit by recession and away from rural Skinhead nights, riots were breaking out across its urban areas. Deprived, forgotten, run down and angry, these were places where young people, black and white, erupted.’ The conversation.com

it expressed the mood of the early days of Thatcher’s Britain for many. – BBC