Anchorage

Explore how producers fix the meaning of texts through anchorage, such as captions and non-diegetic sound, so the audience will decode the preferred reading.

Definition

In the same way a word can have more than one definition, it is possible for signs to have different meanings, so producers will try to direct the audience’s interpretation towards a preferred reading of a media text by using anchorage.

In newspapers and magazines, photographs are often accompanied by captions which are used to fix their meaning. This is probably the most common form of anchorage in the media. The choice of music can also influence our reaction to an advertisement or sequence in a film.Contents

Using Captions for Anchorage

Scroll through the following three slides and think about how the caption changes the meaning of the image:

The first caption suggests the man is full of confidence about his upcoming fight but the second image looks like a profile picture for a dating app. The bio is certainly much softer in tone. The third image is accompanied by the branding for World Mental Health Day.

Although the man’s stare remains, the meaning is decoded differently each time.

When a sign has more than one meaning, we called it polysemic.

EXERCISE: FOUND HOW TEXT/COVER LINE ANCHORES THE MAIN OF IMAGE ON THE COVER OF GQ MAGAZINE.