2. Q3 15minutes 20 Marks
All media texts are constructed, text producers have
made choices about how to construct their presentations
of people or groups. These choices – how people are re-
presented to them as audiences, is known as
REPRESENTATION. This often involves the use of
STEREOTYPES so that audiences can quickly recognise the
‘type’ of character. This is really important for media
texts that need to communicate messages in short
spaces of time like adverts, soap operas, music videos. It
is also true of Films that appeal to mass audiences or
younger audiences (blockbusters and Action Adventure),
so that the narrative is simple and easy to understand
quickly – Who is good? Who is bad? Etc.
3. The areas that often come up for
REPRESENTATION are:
• Gender
• Race & Nationality
• Hero & Villain
• Class – Rich & Poor
• Places – City or Location
4. Theories/Terms you can apply to
examples from the text include:
• Male Gaze – looking at females through the eyes of a heterosexual male
• Berger – ‘Men Act, Women Appear’
• Binary Opposition – simple opposites (good vs evil, Strong vs Weak)
• Propp’s Character Types – Does the representation fit either Hero,
Villain, Damsel in Distress/Princess, Father, Dispatcher (sends Hero off
on their mission) False Hero, helper/Sidekick.
• Protagonist/Antagonist – Hero and Villain
• Stereotype – exaggerated, simplistic character
• Countertype – Opposite of Stereotype
• Dominant Ideology – the values held by the mass, the dominant opinion
of groups in society
• Edward Said – Fear of Other – anyone who is different from dominant
ideology, the normal stereotype, anyone ‘Other’ than the normal
(usually American) , should be feared (aliens – Independence Day,
nationalities – German in Indiana Jones, monkeys – Planet of the Apes,
Orcs – the Hobbit. In some films like the Hunger Games, the ‘Other’ is
Katniss and other Tributes who are feared by society – the Capitol.
