A Level Media Studies

Key Terms Explained

by Year 12

Archetype

The original pattern or model of which all things of the same type

are representations or copies (e.g., Romeo and Juliet is the

archetype for a tragic love story.)

HegemonyHegemony was a concept previously used by Marxists such as Lenin to indicate the political leadership of the working-class in a democratic revolution, but developed by Gramsci into an acute analysis to explain why the 'inevitable' socialist revolution predicted by orthodox Marxism had not occurred by the early 20th century. Capitalism, it seemed, was even more entrenched than ever. Capitalism, Gramsci suggested, maintained control not just through violence and political and economic coercion, but also ideologically, through a hegemonic culture in which the values of the bourgeoisie became the 'common sense' values of all. Thus a consensus culture developed in which people in the working-class identified their own good with the good of the bourgeoisie, and helped to maintain the status quo rather than revolting.The working class needed to develop a culture of its own, which would overthrow the notion that bourgeois values represented 'natural' or 'normal' values for society, and would attract the oppressed and intellectual classes to the cause of the proletariat. Lenin held that culture was 'ancillary' to political objectives but for Gramsci it was fundamental to the attainment of power that cultural hegemony was first achieved. In Gramsci’s view, any class that wishes to dominate in modern conditions has to move beyond its own narrow ‘economic-corporate’ interests, to exert intellectual and moral leadership, and to make alliances and compromises with a variety of forces. Gramsci calls this union of social forces a ‘historic bloc’, taking a term from Georges Sorel. This bloc forms the basis of consent to a certain social order, which produces and re-produces the hegemony of the dominant class through a nexus of institutions, social relations and ideas.Gramsci stated that, in the West, bourgeois cultural values were tied to Christianity, and therefore much of his polemic against hegemonic culture is aimed at religious norms and values. He was impressed by the power Roman Catholicism had over men's minds and the care the Church had taken to prevent an excessive gap developing between the religion of the learned and that of the less educated. Gramsci believed that it was Marxism's task to marry the purely intellectual critique of religion found in Renaissance humanism to the elements of the Reformation that had appealed to the masses. For Gramsci, Marxism could supersede religion only if it met people's spiritual needs, and to do so people would have to recognise it as an expression of their own experience.

The meaning of the text will be constructed differently according to the discourses (knowledges, prejudices, resistances etc.) brought to bear by the reader, and the crucial factor... will be the range of discourses at the disposal of the audience... Individuals in different positions in the social formation defined according to structures of class, race or sex, for example, will tend to inhabit or have at their disposal different codes and subcultures. Thus social position sets parameters to the range of potential readings by structuring access to different codes. Whether or not a programme succeeds in transmitting the preferred or dominant meaning will depend on whether it encounters readers who inhabit codes and ideologies derived from other institutional areas (e.g. churches or schools) which correspond to and work in parallel with those of the programme or whether it encounters readers who inhabit codes drawn from other areas or institutions (e.g. trade unions or 'deviant' subcultures) which conflict to a greater or lesser extent with those of the programme. (1983, p. 106-7; see also 1992, p. 87).

AudienceAudience theory is the starting point for many Media Studies tasks. Whether you are constructing a text or analysing one, you will need to consider the destination of that text, ie its target audience and how that audience (or any other) will respond to that text.For GCSE, you learned how audience was described and measured. For AS level you need a working knowledge of the theories which attempt to explain how an audience receives, reads and responds to a text. Over the course of the past century or so, media analysts have developed several effects models, ie theoretical explanations of how humans ingest the information transmitted by media texts and how this might influence (or not) their behaviour. Effects theory is still a very hotly debated area of Media and Psychology research, as no one is able to come up with indisputable evidence that audiences will always react to media texts one way or another. The scientific debate is clouded by the politics of the situation: some audience theories are seen as a call for more censorship, others for less control. Whatever your personal stance on the subject, you must understand the following theories and how they may be used to deconstruct the relationship between audience and text.

“Hegemony is the dominance of one group over other groups, with or without the threat of force, to the extent that, for instance,

the dominant party can dictate the terms of trade to its advantage; or more broadly, that cultural perspectives become

skewed to favour the dominant group.”

“Theories of hegemony attempt to explain how dominant groups or individuals can maintain their power -- the capacity of

dominant classes to persuade subordinate ones to accept, adopt

and internalize their values and norms.”

•An eponym is the name of a person, whether real or fictitious, who has (or is thought to have) given rise to the name of a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item.

•An eponymous person is the person referred to by the eponym. In contemporary English, the term eponymous is often used to mean self-titled.

•Eponyms are usually false, i.e., things are rarely named after the person who discovered or invented them.

• A character in a story, etc: having the name which is used as the title.

Interesting fact: eponymous was the name of R.E.M’s album!

• Ideology, in simple terms is a set of beliefs and ideas that we are born with, in our cultures and by what we see.

• set of ideas which produces a partial and selective view of reality.

• Ideology is a difficult - but important - concept to grasp. Simply put, it is the ideas behind a media text, the secret (or sometimes not-so secret) agenda of its producers. It is important to be able to identify the different ideological discourses that may be present in even an apparently simple photograph.• When we examine the ideology of media, we are not so much interested in the specific activities depicted in a single newspaper, movie, orhit song as in the broader system of meaning of which these depictionsare a part. For ideological analysis, the key is the fit between the imagesand words in a specific media text and ways of thinking about, evendefining, social and cultural issues.

contemporary lifestyle and items that are well known and generally accepted, cultural patterns that are widespread within a population; also called pop culture.

Jade n Shel

Popular culture, sometimes abbreviated to pop culture, consists of widespread cultural elements in any given society.

Such elements are perpetuated through that society's vernacular language or an established lingua franca. It

comprises the daily interactions, needs and desires and cultural 'moments' that make up the everyday lives of the

mainstream. It can include any number of practices, including those pertaining to cooking, clothing, consumption, mass

media and the many facets of entertainment such as sports and literature. (Compare meme.) Popular culture often

contrasts with a more exclusive, even elitist "high culture, that is, the culture of ruling social groups.

Pop culture finds its expression in the mass circulation of items from areas such as fashion, music, sport and film. The world of pop culture has had a particular influence on art from

the early 1960s on, through Pop Art. According to popeducation.org, when modern pop culture began during the

early 1950's, it was harder for adults to participate. Today, most adults, their kids and grandchildren "participate" in pop

culture directly or indirectly.

Jade n Shel

A stereotype is – a conventional, formulaic and over simplified conception, opinion or image.

An example of a stereotype is…gay men e.g., Jack off ‘Will and Grace’. He is very camp and effeminate. He is very bothered about his hair and how he looks and what people think of him. His mannerisms are very camp.

Stereotypes are often displayed in the media in situation comedies. Stereotypes often create much debate in the modern world, particularly with social status. E.g. men are the main money earners and women should stay at home and look after the children.

Realism

Definition

The relationship between particular mass media forms/examples and the "reality"

that is being represented.

1. Interest in or concern for the actual or real, as distinguished from the abstract, speculative, etc.

2. The tendency to view or represent things as they really are.

Example

If there was a volcano eruption on TV it would be shown through sounds, peoples reactions and visual images of terror to show it to be realistic and believable. If there was somebody acting joyful at it, it would not contain ‘realism’.

Example

If there was a volcano eruption on TV it would be shown through sounds, peoples reactions and visual images of terror to show it to be realistic and believable. If there was somebody acting joyful at it, it would not contain ‘realism’.

What is verisimilitude?

Verisimilitude is the state or quality of something that exhibits the appearance of truth or reality. In literature and theatre, a work with a high

degree of verisimilitude means that the work is very realistic and believable; work of this nature are often said to be ‘true to life’.