Theorist Trump Cards

Media Glossary

Apathy – Not caring

Associations – When things are linked together

Binary Oppositions – Class/race/gender/age/disability

Brand – The company or name that gets popular, attached to the person or product

Buzz Words – Words that have certain triggers

Collective Identity – Sense of belonging, sharing same interests as others

Connotations – The implied messages within media texts

Construction – The way something is put together

Counter Culture – A culture that goes against the mainstream

Democracy – The choice of voting for what you want

Direct Address – When a product or person is made to be reaching out to you personally

Enigma - Mysterious

Global media – The media worldwide

Hegemony – Dominant view

Iconography – Visuals associated with a person, can be part of their collective identity

Identity – Your characteristics and personality

Identity Construction – The creation of an identity

Ideology – A set of ideas

Intertextuality – Referencing other films

Marketing – The way something is advertised to the public

Marxism – Communism, one way of thinking and living

Media Saturated – Media is inescapable, we see it everywhere

Mediated – Changed, adapted

Mise en Scene – Literally what’s on the set (costume, props, backdrop)

Moral Panic – A moral panic is the intensity of feeling expressed in a population about an issue that appears to threaten the social order.

Narrative – Story line

Neo Marxism – Modern Communism

Perspective – The viewpoint of someone or something

Post Modernism – Our reality is constructed

Regulation – Censorship, blocking of content

Representation – The way something is portrayed. (editing, camera, colours, mise en scene etc.)

Social inclusion – The breakup of groups

Social Order – Stance and status (hierarchy)

Star – The popular figure

Subculture – A group with their own separate beliefs to society

Subservient – Doing something without question

Subversion – Going against the stereotype or social norm

The Feminine Mystique – Women are capable of what men are doing

The Male Gaze – Women objectified by male media

Web 2.0 – Websites that allow users to create and share content rather than

David Buckingham “A focus on identity requires us to pay closer attention to the ways in which media and technologies are used in everyday life and their consequences for social groups”.

David Gauntlett – “Identity is complicated – everybody thinks they’ve got one”.

Henri Jenkins – Teens are constantly updating and customising their profiles online adding photos and songs and posting to each other’s virtual ‘walls’. While this could be interpreted as just playing around, these activities could also be a means to construct an experiment with their identity. In particular, it can be a space for exploring one’s gender identification and sexuality.

Henri Tajfel – Individuals strive to improve their self-image by trying to enhance their self-esteem, based on their personal identity or various social identities - ‘in’ group, ‘out’ group.

Hypodermic Needle Model – Media is like a drug, it’s all around us and we even take it in without trying. The Hypodermic Needle Model suggests that the information from a text passes into the mass consciousness of the audience unmediated; the experience, intelligence and opinion of an individual are not relevant to the reception of the text.

Jaques Lacan - Theory of mirroring behaviour

Karl Marx - Marxism theory

 Maslow’s Hierarchy Of Needs – A pyramid of needs:

Biological and Physiological > Safety > Belongingness and Love > Esteem > Self actualisation

Merlau Ponty – We have an embodied experience and anything in which we use our bodies to create, we help builds our identity.

 Michael Foucault – We are born with a basic identity. Our identity mediates as we get older and meet other people. We gain a collective identity by doing this and become part of a group. However, it can be seen as a negative to be part of a collective identity because this encourages stereotypes to be created. Once you are in a group, it’s hard to change and be seen as different.

Stuart Hall – Proposes that the media, as a principle from of ideological spreading, produces representations of the social world via images and portrayals. Hall asserts that ideological things become ‘naturalised’.

To what extent do audiences use media to construct their own sense of collective identity?

Throughout recent years the way in which media is presented to audiences has drastically evolved, particularly with the introduction of the world wide web. Lacan's concept mentions that "by the age of 6, we recognise ourselves in the mirror". This shows that from an early age we begin to create our own identity. Web 2.0 has had a large impact on how we create our own collective identities as it is user genereated content so it allows us to associate ourselves with things that others say. As Henri Jenkins said, teens are constantly creating and customizing their online profiles which helps them to create a sense of collective identity or belonging.

Web 2.0 has been used to create collective identities in more than just creating profiles. The London Riots is a prime example of when web 2.0 has had a great impact on the way in which the events turned out. Youths used social networking sites to co-ordinate attacks on large scales and successfully raid shops before police could intervene. The same social networking sites were also used to upload pictures and videos of the rioters looting items from the shops. Many people viewed and "liked" these photos using the "like" features on the websites which also shows how they used media to construct their own sense of collective identity.

Web 2.0 has made many people create a collective identity for themselves which they probably would not have were it not for the opportunity and being able to be informed much quicker than previously. For example, during the Brixton riots in 1981, word of mouth was the main means of informing the public of the riots and because of this it was on a much smaller scale than the London riots. Many youths only became involved in the events so that they felt some sort of belonging

During the London riots the power of the media was shown in a large way, when both Twitter and BlackBerry messenger refused to terminate their services during the riots. This shows that the media has become so powerful that even the government cannot control it. To some extent this may raise the question, are creating our own collective identities or are they being given to us?

After the London riots tabloid newspapers began to create a moral panic by labelling all youths with discriminatory words such as yobs, brutes, savages, failures, monsters and many more. This combined with excessive use of pictures of a hooded youths created a stereotypical representation of all youths in a negative light which subliminally helped youths to create their sense of collective identity as they were essentially all excluded from the rest of society and were encouraged to behave in a way which conforms to their stereotypical representation.

In conclusion, audiences use media to a great extent to aid them in constructing their own sense of collective identity. In fact, it has almost become most people's main source of finding a collective identity. Whether it be Merleau Ponty's theory of having an embodied experience and anything in which we use our bodies to create new things builds our identity, or Henry Jenkins' theory of using social networking sites to aid us to create our collective identity by uploading photos or leaving comments on people's walls or even simply reading the newspaper, we are constantly trying to construct our collective identities no matter how difficult that may be due to the diverse opinions expressed in the media.

Web 2.0

How does the internet provide an enormous challenge for regulators?

The internet enables us to share and spread information at such a speed that it is difficult to immediately track down and dispose of the information. An attempt to attack Hackney’s Sunday carnival was posted on twitter and resulted in the event being interrupted by the police. However, there were many other events like this which the police were not able to intervene in time before the attack took place. Furthermore, companies such as Twitter have refused to shut down their services during the London riots as they are an independent company are not controlled by the government.

How does the internet provide a postmodern vision of identity?

Postmodernism categorizes people in a social order and controls their mind by constructing a reality for them. Post modernism is inescapable and impossible to avoid. The internet provides a postmodern vision of identity as people are able to create their own identity and join groups which also categorizes people in a social order.

How does web 2.0 present a change for rioters since the Brixton Riots?

The Brixton Riots began with a police constable spotting a black youth named Michael Bailey running away from three other black youths. Bailey was stopped and found to be badly bleeding. The police did not help in obtaining the medical help quickly enough and because of this the crowd intervened. Rumours were spread by word of mouth that the youth was left to die on the street, and from this over 200 youths have turned on the police. Web 2.0 has drastically changed the way and speed at which the rumours are spread and has also increased the scale, which is shown by the London riots. With the Brixton Riots only 200 youths immediately found out, with the London riots thousands immediately joined in.

How has online press affected us in today’s society?

Online press has become the main way we are informed of the news making newspapers almost obsolete. This can be considered a negative progression in media as by reading online press we are much more easily distracted than we would be from reading a newspaper. Furthermore, through reading online press we have become used to skim reading through the information not necessarily consuming all of the information.

How does it present an area of control for today’s society?

Online press creates a moral panic in society through delivering biased views which in turn create our opinions. A good example of this is during the London riots many articles were created referring to all youths as yobs, brutes, savages and many other discriminatory terms which the public then consumes and creates the idea that all youths are like this. Another examples is the fear of hoodies which has drastically escalated since the London riots.

How must we regulate ourselves as young people due to web 2.0? How is it a form of taking our identity back?

How do young people form their collective identity through reality TV?

We begin developing our identity from a very young age and as we grow up we form our collective identites (our sense of belonging). There exist multiple ways of developing a collective identity. This can range from music to movies to clothing to hairstyles, but some decide to develop their collective identites through Reality Television, which shows how people form their collective identities ranging from youths to adults.

Reality Television generally tends to focus on how youths create their collective identites. Good examples of Reality shows which do this are Made in Chelsea, Georgie Shore and The Only Way is Essex. These shows all include their own groups of youths that are from a smilar class and share similar interests. For example, Made in Chelsea consists of exclusively upper class individuals that have built their collective identities over their success and well mannered behaviour. They also have a sense of belonging based upon the expensive clothes they wear, the high class parties they attend as well as the way in which they speak to each other. Henri Tajfel's theory suggests that the groups we chose to associate ourselves with become an important part of our lives and influence our identities. This theory is present in Made in Chelsea as relationships are constantly beginning and ending and throughout the series this has an impact on some of the characters' personalities. An example of this is Spencer spending more time with Caggie, which impacts on his feelings which eventually causes him to end his relationship with Funda.

In some effect, creating collective identities through Reality TV conforms to Marxism as within these Reality shows people generally tend to dress in the same style, act in a similar fashion and communicate using a similar vocabulary. The only factor which contests this point is Henri Tajfel's theory that there is an "in group" as well as an "out group" - something which is shown in Made in Chelsea through having Ollie's circle of friends which generally does not socialise with the rest of the people.

Another collective identity which is different from Made in Chelsea would be Geordie Shore, where the focus is less about financial power and more about going out, partying and having sexual intercourse. This creates a sense of belonging especially for the males who appear to compete to see who is able to get the most women, showing that they share an interest. From this behaviour young people can assume that this is the ideal lifestyle for all teenagers/young adults and thus this becomes a lifestyle they admire and hope to become part of.

Having a large mixture of social identites is what contributes to the diversity of social identites in the world. However, this can also have negative effects as being part of a group can often end up with stereotypes being created. This then takes away from the uniqueness of your identity as you are categorized and essentially given a label based on the people you associate yourselves with. This can make it very difficult for young people to differentiate themselves with the rest of the people they hang out with as others who are not part of the same group cannot see past this label. This point is also backed up by Michael Foucault, who said that when you associate yourself with a group you begin to represent something as a group which creates stereotypes of others who are also related to that group. In some cases people in the reality shows try to break away from their stereotypes by behaving differently or forming different ideas. An example of this would be in Made in Chelsea where Ollie admits to his lack of preference between males and females which in most situations may be frowned upon in a high class environment.

In conclusion, young people form their collective identities through Reality Television such as the cast in Made in Chelsea, Georgie Shore, and The only Way is Essex through having similar personalities and interests as well as they way in which they dress, behave etc. This all combined creates their collective identity.

To what extent does social digital media give us a sense of belonging - a 'collective identity'?

Social digital media enables us to create virtual profiles which represents who are are as a person. We are able to express our opinions and reveal our activities to many people who are also able to share their input through commenting on statuses. Using facebook as an example, people are able to have a sense of belonging by joining groups that they are interested in.

Social digital media goes against the marxist theory as everyone is able to create their own identity through uploading pictures of videos and being able to express their own opinions - meaning they are not all the same. 

Henry Jenkins' theory supports the idea of social media giving us a sense of belonging. This is because his theory mentions that activities such as upading profiles, uploading pictures and writing on eachothers virtual 'walls' is a way for people to experiment with their identities, and 'can be a space for exploring one's gender identification and sexuality'. Therefore, creating your identity and finding others who also share your interests will give you a sense of belonging.

 Another theory which helps to justify why social digital media gives us a sense of belonging is Merleau Ponty, who says that anything in which we use our bodies to create new things builds our identity. This c ould be related to Mark Zuckerberg creating facebook. He had a vision that people could connect over one large network of profiles. He created facebook which was him expressing his identity and many people instantly took an interest in the website which gave him a sense of belonging.

However, social digital media has downsides aswell. It can also be used for destructive purposes - something which was proven during the London 2011 riots, where many people used social digital media such as twitter and facebook to co-ordinate attacks. This helped to create a collective identity for the young rioters who teamed up against society. Social digital media can also be seen from Micel Foucalt's theory as  being 'obtrusive'. This is because when many people can create collective identities such as groups on facebook, some of them are going to clash and disputes will emerge. 

In conclusion social digital media gives us a sense of belonging as we are able to create our own profiles and find other people who share our interests, we can join groups that we want to associate ourselves with and can share our input through commenting. It can be used for both positive and negative purposes but nonetheless they create collective identities.