STARTER
Let's start with a few quick quizzes;
- Revision from last week: Semiotics Key Language
- Revision from last week: Shot Distances
- Media Theories Summary Quiz
You will now have 5 minutes to review the feedback from last week's assignment. Use the feedback to improve future responses, maintaining an academic lexis.
EXPLAIN & MODEL
KEY THEORY: NARRATIVE THEORY
Key Language:
KEY THEORY: GENRE THEORY
Key Points:
- Each genre has a repertoire of elements that are recognisable to audiences due to repetition over time.
- However, some contemporary media products may be less easy to categorise; they may belong to sub-genres or hybrid genres.
- The typical codes and conventions may also be subverted by the creator of the product in order to challenge audience expectations while still including familiar elements.
- Steve Neale's Genre Theory:
- Suggests that genres may be dominated by repetition, but they are also marked by difference, variation and change.
- Suggests that genres change, develop and vary as they borrow from and overlap with one another.
- Suggests that genres exist within specific economic, institutional and industrial contexts (broadcaster ethos, existing audiences, revenue & market).
Key Language:
- Conventions
- Repetition
- Difference
- Sub-Genre
- Hybrid
Key Points:
- All media products, both audio-visual and print, have a structure or narrative.
- Narratives are important to construct meaning. The narrative is a way of organising a text so that it makes sense to the audience.
- Narratology is the study of narrative.
- Tzvetan Todorov's Narrative Theory:
- Suggests that all narratives share a basic structure that involves movement from one state of equilibrium to another (Equilibrium, Disruption, Recognition, Repair, New Equilibrium)
- Suggests that the two states of equilibrium are separated by a period of imbalance or disequilibrium.
- Suggests that the way in which narratives are resolved can have a particular ideological significance.
Key Language:
- Equilibrium
- Disruption
- Enigma Codes
- Flexi-Narratives
- Linear
- Manipulation of Time and Space
- Non-Linear
- Privileged Spectator Position
- Three-Strand Narrative (E.g. Casualty)
- Cliffhanger
PRACTISE
Genre Theory:
Examine the media text below and answer the question that follows (Google Assignment).
- How does this film poster illustrate elements of Steve Neale's Theory? Consider the following;
- What are the typical codes and conventions of the film genre used in the poster?
- What elements of hybridity are evident?
- How is the repertoire of elements subverted in order to appeal to a specific audience demographic?
Narrative Theory
Click on this link and suggest captions for the image to anchor meaning, constructing two opposing narratives. Screenshot your suggestions and post in your blog.
Click on this link and complete the narrative structure summary for a media text you know well. Screenshot your response and post in your blog.
