re-thinking media and sexuality education

Re-thinking Media and Sexuality Education

A/Prof Kath Albury

School of Arts and Media

University of New South Wales

k.albury@unsw.edu.au

Twitter: @KathAlbury

These workshop materials can be re-used for non-commercial purposes, with attribution.

Where did this workshop come

from?The creation of this workshop was supported by a UNSW GoldStar

Award, 2015. The contents was adapted from two Creative Commons

courses (authored or co-authored by Kath Albury). You are welcome to

re-use them for non-commercial purposes, with attribution:

Sources:

Senft, T., Walker Rettberg, J., Losh, E., Albury, K., Gajjala, R., David,

G., Marwick, A., Abidin, C., Olszanowski, M., Aziz, F., Warfield, K., &

Mottahedeh, N. (2014). ‘Sexuality, dating and gender’, Studying Selfies:

A Critical Approach. Retrieved from

http://www.selfieresearchers.com/week-four-sexuality-dating-gender/

Albury, K (2009) Media and Sexuality, One-day module for International

‘Short Course in Critical Sexuality Theory and Research

Methodologies’, for the Ford Foundation and the International

Association for the Study of Sexuality, Culture and Society (IASSCS).

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

• Recognise & articulate their current ‘media theories’ and

theoretical frameworks drawn from the field of media and

cultural studies (in basic terms)

• Reflect on & evaluate the utility of alternative theories of

media (in basic terms)

• Articulate the reasons for choosing/applying specific

theories in workplace/settings (in basic terms)

• Apply media & cultural studies frameworks/theories in

practical settings when appropriate (in basic terms)

Group discussion

• What are your current hot topics in terms

of young people & online & mobile media

(in terms of your professional role)?

• What are your current sources of

knowledge, theoretical frameworks,

resources for addressing these issues in

your professional context?

Media, cultural studies and textual analysis: some key

ideas

• How do we move beyond the issue of whether texts accurately represent the real world, and consider instead how we use languages and images to make sense of reality?

• How can we move from asking what media does to us to ‘what do we do with media?’

Culture ‘has been used [in the past] to indicate the spread of civilised ideas and beliefs’, but is now applied ‘more neutrally to describe the symbols,

meanings and practices that can be associated with living within a media-dominated society’.

Nick Stevenson (2002: 227)

Understanding Media Cultures

• Media and cultural studies view culture as a site of political conflict, or, in Foucauldian terms as ‘a productive network of power relations.

Culture and Media

The active audience

• Audiences or (media users/consumers) are not just passive receptacles who are brainwashed by ‘media bias and stereotypes, but are active interpreters of the information that is presented to them.

• Audiences can also use commercial or mass-produced texts in such a way that they gain a new meaning in their new context.

• Media operates on multiple levels.

• There is always the possibility of multiple strategies for interpreting and using media.

• Meanings are not ‘fixed’ into texts, and they are not stable. They change according to the time, or location in which they are consumed.

• Factors like class, ethnicity, religion, gender, age, political affiliation, health and physical ability can all effect how a consumer or audience makes sense of a media text.

Stuart Hall 1932-2014

Stuart Hall and encoding/decoding

• ‘Sender-message-receiver’ model

• This model supposes that a signal or message is formulated by a sender. Then, it is transmitted in a clear and coherent way to a waiting receiver. The receiver could be a blank piece of paper written on by the sender, or a body ‘injected’ with a message by the sender.

• Otherwise known as the ‘Hypodermic model of communication’.

• Hall is critical of this model

• According to Hall, the message can not be fixed or controlled by the sender/producer, because he or she can not control all the factors involved in transmission and reception.

• ‘Distortion’ of the message is built into the process of communication itself, it is not the result of a breakdown in the process.

• The meanings that audiences make out of images are produced in particular contexts, and they are also consumed in specific contexts.

TREE ARBRE

• No shared language = no shared understanding.• Representations do not distort ‘reality’ – they allow

us to make sense of it.• Particular groups have their own collective sense-

making practices, also known as codes or discourses.• Media images are not simply faithful renditions (or

distortions) of the real world. • They are representations that re–present versions or

impressions of reality, and these impressions are based on shared assumptions or understandings.

• Encoding - media producers choose to include or exclude certain kinds of words or images in order to shape a meaning that fits a particular world view.

According to Hall, images may be decoded in three main ways:

1. Dominant reading – the audience’s understanding of a media representation is shaped by the dominant assumptions in their culture.

2. Negotiated reading – the audience accepts parts of the embedded codes, but accepts them selectively, according to their own understandings or experiences.

3. Resistant or oppositional reading – the audience may reject the messages ‘encoded’ outright, because they conflict with the audience’s beliefs or understanding of the world.

The Circuit of Culture (du Gay et al.

1997/2012)

Example: Facebook

• Who ‘makes’ it? Where & why?

• Who uses it? How? Where?

• What functions does it serve for its users?

• How is it regulated? (macro and micro)

• How does it encourage certain kinds of

use, and discourage others? (affordances)

Contemporary media culture

and ‘produsers’• Smartphones, social media and

convergent media culture blurs the line

between ‘producer’ and ‘consumer.’

• People of all ages use media to negotiate

their identities – including gender and

sexual identity.

• Can Hall’s model’s of encoding/decoding

be applied to these practices?

Couldry’s taxonomy of media practice

(2012)

• Searching and search enabling (a process that includes ‘liking’

Facebook posts);

• Showing and being shown (a loosely defined set of practices that

might involve posting selfies on Instagram);

• Presencing (or “managing presence-to-others across space” –

again, selfies and sexting might fit in this category) (2012, 49);

• Archiving (or “presencing’s equivalent in time”- for example, a

Tumblr page, or Facebook’s Timeline) (2012, 51-52) and;

• Complex media related practices. These include: ‘keeping up with

the news’, ‘commentary’, ‘keeping all channels open’ via ‘continuous

connectivity; and ‘screening out’ (i.e. going offline, or deleting social

media profiles) (2012, 53-57).

• The Selfie Course

Public privacy selfie exercise

• Take a selfie that DOESN'T show your

face (could be your bag, your feet, your

body, whatever) that your friends might

recognise you by.

Producing sexuality and gender

online• Which look gets the most Tinder matches?

Exercise: Sexuality & mediated

self-representation

• In pairs, use your smartphone, take a

‘public’ (head and shoulders) selfie that

you would use for dating website or app.

Questions for reflection

• How did you (or your partner) communicate

identity through media production?

• How easy/difficult was it to create you image?

• What qualities did you try to communicate? (ie

friendly, not creepy, easygoing but not ‘slutty’)

• Did you try to avoid or actively confront ‘myths &

stereotypes’ in relation to sexuality or gender?

Why? Why not?

Small group brainstorming

exercise• How could you use the theoretical

frameworks we’ve looked at today in your

professional setting?

• In groups of four (or pairs if you prefer)

think of an exercise or activity you

currently use, and incorporate one (or

more) of the following frameworks:

Encoding/decoding(all texts are open to dominant, negotiated and resistant

readings)

The circuit of culture

(any text or practice can be studied in relation to

production, regulation, representation, identity &

consumption)

Media as practice(showing & been shown, searching & search enabling,

archiving, prescencing, commentary, keeping up with the

news, connecting & disconnecting etc)

• Evaluation

• Final Q & A

• Many thanks!

Useful readings• boyd, d. (2014) It’s complicated: the social life of

networked teens

• Couldry, N. (2012) Media, Society, World: social theory

and digital media practice London: Polity

• Du Gay, P., S. Hall, L. Janes, A.K. Madsen, H. Mackay &

K. Negus. (2013) Doing Cultural Studies: The Story of

the Sony Walkman, 2nd.Ed. London: Sage.

• e Silva, A., and Frith, J. (2012), Mobile interfaces in

public spaces: Locational privacy, control, and urban

sociability. Routledge,