September

Course outline

Study aids

 

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Call the Cops
Tuesday Sept 9, BBC4, 22.00
Perfect viewing for Year 13s: the story of genre-busting 1970s crime drama The Sweeney, which later inspired Life on Mars.

Medium
Wednesdays, BBC1, 22.45
One of America's highest-rated programmes, a fusion of the horror genre, crime drama and domestic soap.

The Dark Knight   12
No academic reason - it's just a very good (if flawed) film...

Representation: stereotypes explored
In our final lesson on Representation, we discussed at length the stereotypes that the students had identified using the Representation booklet. From here we identified that, while stereotypes were inevitable and useful to the media and audiences as "shortcuts to meaning", they could also be dangerous, and had been used to great effect to stir up prejudice against minorities for centuries.

We then analysed film posters for Legally Blonde and Kill Bill and used our understanding of semiotics and NVC to decode the representations and explore the elements of stere0typing in each.

Homework:

Read and annotate the Representation booklet.

Homework:

Complete the stereotyping task in the Representation booklet.

Key Concepts: Representation
Extending what the class had already learned about Semiotics with Miss Clay, we looked at two different images of an apple (one juicy and fresh, one wrinkled and rotten) and discussed the different meanings of the two. We identified a series of 'core' (sorry) questions about Representation as a concept: who/what is being represented, how, to whom, by whom and with what effect?

I then gave the class an imaginary scenario and we discussed the different ways we might recount the event to different audiences - with entertaining results!

Homework:

Create an A3 collage using images from newspapers, magazines etc. that represents you. We will use these as the basis of our next lesson.
DUE: Monday September 17

Med 1: Key Concepts - What is Genre for?
We explored the beginnings of textual analysis today, examining media images and identifying their meanings and genres using the repertoire of elements. It was interesting to see how posters for films of the same genre could share a surprising number of similarities.

This led us to discuss the purpose of genre. We realised that audiences like genre because they can easily identify the texts that they like, and appreciate the similarities between texts of the same genre. Media institutions, like film producers, also like genre, because it helps them to market their films, and produce texts they can expect to be popular.

Med 1: Key Concepts - Genre
We continued our study of Genre today, extending our use of the the Repertoire of Elements. I dared to suggest that Star Wars was not science fiction, which raised a few eyebrows, and we discussed the role that genre played in meeting producers' and audiences' needs and expectations.

Homework:

Read the booklet on Genre, annotating with your own questions and observations. Complete the tasks that are scattered through the booklet.

DUE: Monday September 10

Med 1: Key Concepts - Genre
For our first lesson on the key concepts of Media Studies, we introduced the idea of Genre, the French word which literally means category or type. We explored how we made assumptions about genres based on the the posters produced to promote a range of different films, which in turn introduced the idea of hybrids and sub-genres.

We explored genre conventions more closely using a table to represent what's called the Repertoire of Elements, and students paired up to suggest the conventions of different genres with which they were familiar.