Moodboard

Media Theorists

Media Pitch

Genre

• Mystery
• Drama, leaning towards a serious teen drama.

Unique Selling Point

• Close to the real world
• Real, teenage issues with modern media
• Use of Snapchat, SnapMaps, to represent current media and include new technology that young audiences will recognise. 
• Include political issues; Trump supporters and opposers. 

Narrative ideas

• Trump report on the news on TV (current affairs), …
• Messages on snapchat
• Including SnapMap, the location of the person messaging her
• Psychopath, getting closer and closer on SnapMap
• The girl is shown in isolation, nobody to turn to
• Scenes of distressed girl 
• End scene with her hiding, and the tension building

Representation

Levi Strauss and his idea of binary opposition. 

Laura Mulvey and her idea of the male gaze, the theory that woman are objectified and seen as objects. 

Propps theory that suggests that each character has a ‘type’ (villain, princess etc.).

Angela McRobbie believes that there are gender stereotypes being reinforced through the media, woman are weaker, more likely to be victims, carers and mothers. Yet, men are aggressive, strong and are natural leaders. 

Stanley Cohen believes that groups are demonise through negative representations. 

Bell Hooks (spelt lower case), wrote a book called “Ain’t I a woman?”, intersectionality and black woman being the lowest social status. Stereotypes will not die. The safety of black woman is not as important as other members of society. 

Liesbet Van Zoonen, a dutch woman. The media is full of different representations of woman’s bodies’ against men’s bodies’. Gender is performative - we construct our ideas about masculinity and femininity from “what we do” rather than “what we are”. 

Audience Theory

Richard Dyer suggested that audiences want media products that offer them Utopian Solutions to their problems (1992). They want to be offered diversions and escapism.

Blumler and Katz’s ‘Uses and Gratifications’ theory is an approach to understanding why and how people actively seek out specific media to satisfy specific needs. The theory focuses on what people do with media and this theory gives the audience power to discern what media they want to consume. 

Audiences are no longer victims of mass media, forcefully fed what production companies choose, they are now an audience to which media must appeal to and thus companies must compete with other diversions for attention.

Components of the U&G Theory:

1. The audience is conceived as active.
2. In the mass communication process, much initiative in linking gratification and media choice lies with the audience member.
3. The media compete with other sources of satisfaction.
4. Methodologically speaking, many of the goals of mass media use can be derived from data supplied by individual audience members themselves.
5. Value judgements about the cultural significance of mass communication should be suspended while audience orientations are explored on their own terms. 

According to the research, goals for media use can be grouped into five uses. The audience want to:

1. Be informed or educated,
2. Identify with characters of the situation in the media environment,
3. Simple entertainment,
4. Enhance social interaction,
5. Escape from the stress of daily life.

The hypodermic needle effect is a theory that suggests that the intended message is directly received and accepted by the receiver, however it is based on assumptions about human nature. 

Stuart Hall’s theory offers a theoretical approach of how media messages are produced, disseminated and interpreted. This model claims that media audiences are presented with messages that are decoded or interpreted in different ways depending on an individuals cultural background, economic standing and personal experiences. 

AS Reflection

Summer Work - Music Video