Representation of regional identity...

For this section, we watched episodes/clips from "I'm Alan Partridge" based in Norfolk and "The Royle Family" from Manchester.

Alan Partridge and The Royle Family on Prezi

Representation of class & status...

For our first extract we watched Shameless. There were many signifiers of the lower classes in this such as:

• council housing estates
• tracksuits
• police in the neighbourhood
• boarded up houses
• etc

And the themes that seemed to run through the extract we saw were ones which were associated with low class. Smoking, alcohol, violence, theft and many more along the lines of this.






In total contrast to this, we watched an extract from Wuthering Heights where the ladies were all wearing posh dresses and had maids and servants, everybody spoke with received pronunciation and they lived in a manor house. These things are also signifiers of higher class. 












(I will now compare the two extracts.)

In the mass media there are so many different representations of class; some of which may be true representations and some that are exaggerated for comical purposes. However are the exaggerated representations a fair showing of people from certain demographics, or are they considered offensive and fuel unreasonable prejudgements?

The story of ‘Shameless’ is based around a father and children living in a council estate. Immediately because they live in a council estate people assume that they will be from a lower class. The way in which the narrator (father) speaks is also slurred and sounds as though he is drunk. He uses simple English and a basic vocabulary - this would imply that he is not very well educated. The clothes that the family wear are tracksuits and lots of gold jewellery; none of which appear very clean. All of these become signifiers for the lower class.

There are also many negative themes throughout the programme such as alcohol and smoking, violence, crime and inability to care for children. Theses are things often associated with the lower classes however, as an audience, can we generalise the entirety of the lower classes to behave in such a manner just because of one representation on the television.

A viewer with a well-balanced view of the class system in Britain would understand that these representations of a lower class family have been exaggerated for comical/dramatic purposes. However somebody with not such a view could either take offence from these representations or have their already unfair prejudgements strengthened.

From even the first five minutes of footage we begin to build up a picture of exactly what this family are like. This is because the programme heavily plays on the stereotype of ‘council estate chav’. Using stereotypes enables the audience to quickly establish character types and then can begin following the plot. Within this first five minutes we meet many characters from the family all of who conform to this ‘chav’ label.

There are many issues confronted in this episode, some of which may be risky. For example there is a clear underlying problem with the father’s inability to care for the children; leading to the threat of social services becoming involved. The father refuses to go to the school to speak with teachers about his son’s progress. The son then tried to make him see that he must attend if not the social services will ‘get on their backs’. The father then immediately agreed to go to the appointment. His change of heart was blatantly due to the potential involvement of the social services. This would imply that the father knew he was an incapable parent and had something to hide; yet did not want to improve on that and better the care for his children. Now if an audience had generalised other ideas from this group of people to lower class people in the ‘real world’ then this is another factor that they may do so with. This was a very dangerous theme to include because of people making assumptions about others based on what they see on television. Also lower class people (like the one’s featured in this programme) could be highly offended by the portrayal of their class.

However part of this ‘chav lifestyle’ is that they don’t care what people think about them. So it is disputable that the type of people featured in ‘Shameless’ who watched it, would not care about the negative representations of themselves in the media.

In total contrast to the representations in ‘Shameless’ we have the positive depiction of the upper class in ‘Wuthering heights’.

In the short extract we saw, the ladies were representing the ‘giggling upper class’ and through a few simple signifiers, we can immediately identify that this piece is heavily based on the upper class.

For example the way the ladies are dressed would only be something that the upper class could afford. They had maids and servants in their house to tend to their every need – these maids and servants would presumably be lower class people looking for a job. The family clearly needed to the staff to assist in their house because it was so large. We saw a long, establishing shot of the manor and instantaneously knew that the family must be wealthy – being wealthy ‘makes’ you upper class. Also when the man is in his library, (even the fact that they have a library lets us know that they are upper class) he is reading and writing. This tells us that as well as being wealthy, he is well educated and would be able to use sophisticated language. (This is then demonstrated later in the extract when we hear him speak).

All of the family speak with received pronunciation (Queen’s English), which is not something that lower class members of the time would be able to do. This was mainly due to the fact that they received no (or very poor) education and had jobs such as farmers or servants – which didn’t have the need for them to be able to speak well.

So in conclusion, we studied two very different representations of two different classes. In the media the upper class are often represented as positively, wealthy and happy – something for an audience to aspire to, in comparison to the negative representation of the downtrodden and helpless or rude and uncaring lower class. These representations rely heavily on stereotypes and signifiers to get across exactly whom they are representing and in what manner.

Representation of sexuality...

In the media, the typical 'norm' we have grown to expect to see is heterosexual. However when homosexuals do appear in the media, they are often stereotypical.

 For one of our studies into this topic, we watched brokeback mountain - one of the most talked about films featuring homosexuals. The film started with two cowboys - fitting the usual cowboy constraints. They were doing very typically male jobs and this is what we expect to see. So when these ideas were challenged - some audiences reacted badly. The film was created to show that 'gay' doesn't always conform to a certain type of man.

Another film we looked at was Bruno. The opening piece of music was very typically camp and gave us the immediate impression that this is what he was going to be like. The relationship Bruno had with his partner was shown to be very open and explicit - so because the audience haven't been exposed to many gay relationships; they make the assumption that all are like this. Diesel (Bruno's boyfriend) was shown as very fickle and blunt. Bruno didn't know his staff's names - although they were always around - which makes him appear ignorant and ungrateful. The clothes Bruno wore were very flamboyant and daring and had to make a statement with everything he wore. Bruno was very open with his sexuality however when he was around straight South American men, he tried to be more masculine and cover up the fact he was gay. This, I felt, was a very controversial point because an audience could take meaning from this that all homosexuals should hide who they really are when around heterosexuals. An audience could also build up an image of what they think homosexuals are like - when in real fact this is only a representation of some of the homosexual population. But because there are so few media texts featuring gay people, the audience can only assume that the representations we are exposed to in the likes of Bruno are true (because they have not many other representations to compare it to!).

A quote I really liked we came across when researching representation of sexuality in the media was by Vito Russo (1987) : The Celluloid Closet. "There have never been lesbians or gay men in Hollywood films - only homosexuals" and this really said a lot to me. This quote alone says to me that the representations of homosexuals in Hollywood movies are nothing like real life. 

Representations of Race...

From watching a DVD about racial stereotyping, the media are much more sensitive these days to making sure they include a mix of races today. Back in the 50s and 60s, media was produced for a white audience so they were the sorts of people included in the media. Then in the early 20th century, there were 'few people of colour' in power, so the media reflected this. However more recently the first black American president was elected, we are constantly surrounded by people from different ethnic groups and few people still hold the belief that anyone who isn't white is inferior, so this again is reflected in the media.

A point they mentioned which I found particularly interesting was "People that aren't racists can make decisions which could cause unfair representation of race". For example if a white person is constantly surrounded by other white people, then of course they are more likely to chose a white actor over a black actor (if both are level on talent etc). And also a quote that I really liked was "visibility doesn't always transfer into equality". 

For one of our studies into racial representation, we looked at the film Borat. One of the first things you see at the start of the film is that the wording that comes up on screen in the native language of Kazakhstan. It has been translated poorly into English, but it is intentionally wrong. The people of Kazakhstan are living in slums strewn with litter, the town kindergarden had guns to play with and the blacksmith was also an abortionist! All of these little details are adding up to a negative representation of Kazakhstan and it's people.

We posed the question "Is this type of overt and intentional stereotyping breaking down barriers or fuelling the fire of racism?" and I will now share some of my opinions.

In this film there are many examples or blatant racism purely based on stereotypes. One of the most prominent I feel was when Borat visited the rodeo. In the film you see and American man telling Borat to shave off his moustache because he looks like "one of them bombing Muslims with all that black hair and moustache". To me (and many others) this was a totally irrational comment to make/belief to have. Just because somebody has black hair does by no means imply that they are a Muslim or a terrorist. Also, the man telling Borat to change himself to suit that man's picture of what 'normal' was a disrespectful thing to do. I believe that on this occasion, that people could be led to add fuel to the fire of racism if they weren't aware of Sacha Baron Cohen's intentions when making the film. SBC wanted to expose how ridiculous the prejudgements we make can be. These prejudgements are often based on stereotypes of what we are exposed to via the media - and they are often highly incorrect and offensive to the group/individual we hold them against.

There is another moment in which I felt the audience would find so ridiculous that they would no way take it seriously (and realise that the humour behind it was laughing at the extent we sometimes take our prejudgements to). When Borat enters the hotel room and drinks from the toilet implies that he has never seen a toilet before (so must have a very primitive way of living) and does not know what it's used for. This is such a far-fetched notion that I believe that people would not take it seriously and therefore not believe that this stereotype was at all true.

Personally I believe that the whole point of this film was to take some of the stereotypes people have about certain groups and push these to absolutely ridiculous stereotypes people have about certain groups and push them to the absolute extremes. So that people could actually look at it and laugh at how ridiculous these prejudgements are. There will always be a small minority which will believe these views expressed in the film are for real and justified; but you will probably never be able to change their minds.

The portayle of Kazakhstan was a poor country with low morals and human rights. (For example when we see the local day care centre, the children have guns). This is such an obscene idea and I believe was done to show people how ridiculous it was. This is but a mere example of the ludicrous preconceptions people hold about cultures they do not know much about. And the filn challenges this by pushing these preconeptions to the extremes; so far so that people no longer beleive them.

So in conclusion, I think that the film is helping to break down barriers of racial issues by showing us how ridiculous some of our preconceptions are. At the end of the day, everyone is human and essentially we all don't wish to be prejudged so we should not do so to other. I think the film highlights this crucial moral.

Representations of Gender...

Gender is a key issue when discussing representation. As children we grow up with an awareness of what the 'appropriate' characteristics of gender are; the media shapes our ideas of what it is to be male or female.

Representations of Females

Media representations of women remain worryingly the same over time, even though there has been a huge shift in the way that women are viewed in society.

Women are often shown to be:

• beautful and delicate
• small in size/physique
• weak/little power and strength
• emotional and intouch with their feelings
• in relationships (opposed to being independant and free)
• part of a family.

Women in the media tend to be very stereotypically represented and anyone differing from this is seen as weird or dangerous (this could oppress inidiviuality).

Representations of Males

Strength, power, attractiveness and independance are just a few common representations of males in the media. Men are shown as dominant over females; they often have to rescue the weak, little female from distress which gives them a hero-like quality in a lot of circumstances. On the other hand, sometimes males are shown as the 'bad guy' and use violence, but this is all part of the macho bravado that defines what it is to be 'male' and never harms their reputation (like the negative representations of females do).

We briefly looked at one edition NEW! magazine. The males were largely shown as the boyfriend who cheated. There was a severe lack of independant males and it felt like the males were only there to make the women feel better about themselves. Also the women were being provided with an unrealistic image for them to try and achieve because of all the beautiful and thin women featured in the magazine. Finally, we noticed that all of the articles were about either hair, fashion, make-up, weight or relationships. These articles all included the stereotype of the typical women and a negative portratyle of a man.

Wire in the blood II

This series was written by a woman so we felt it would be interesting to see if the representations of women were any different to all the other media we are exposed to (which are laregly produced by males).

• A women brought food to a man - slave. She then got locked away in a room - she was a prisoner and powerless.
• A male was a doctor wearing a suit which meant he was wealthy and successful.
• The women had mundane, low skill jobs when they were included at a work place.
• All the other women had no jobs, looked after the children and went shopping.
• There was a male pathologist which is a highly skilled and well paid job.
• The victim was a woman and the antagonist was a man.

We found that even though this series was indeed written by a woman, it did not challenge the idea of the stereotypical woman. This may have been because the writer did not want to lose viewers because the programme showed women in a way we are not used to.

And finally, we came up with an acronym to identify gender in the media.

Purpose within plot

Actions

Ratio

Treatment

Interaction with others

Extras

Social postitions

Some conventions of a thriller...

Convention: Quick cuts
Effect: Fast pace, unpredictable, builds tension, audience really have to focus to not miss anything.

Convention: Close up on actor's face
Effect: Shows emotion best, makes the audience feel more sympathetic towards the character because they're more likely to feel the emotions if they can see them via the actor's face. Or if the close up is on the antagonist, it could show menacing expressions.

Convention: Plot twists
Effect: Surprises will always keep an audience waiting in anticipation. Using a plot twist shows the audience that anything could happen (and builds more suspense).

Convention: Discordant music
Effect: Any underlying music (even if very quiet) will highlight that something in the scene just isn't right. It also serves as a signifier to the audience that something 'bad' is about to happen. Without music, there would be very little suspense and tension created.