Mock exam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVPRD2aKqz8&feature=youtu.be

Genre

What is Genre?
Genre’ is a critical tool that helps us study texts and audience responses to texts by dividing them into categories based on common elements.
Daniel Chandler argues that the word genre comes from the French (and originally Latin) word for 'kind' or 'class'. The term is widely used in rhetoric, literary theory, media theory to refer to a distinctive type of ‘text’.

All genres have sub genres (genre within a genre).

This means that they are divided up into more specific categories that allow audiences to identify them specifically by their familiar and what become recognisable characteristics (Barry Keith Grant)

However, Steve Neale stresses that “genres are not ‘systems’ they are processes of systematization” – i.e. They are dynamic and evolve over time.
Generic Characteristics across all texts share similar elements of the below depending on the medium...
Typical Mise-en-scène/Visual style (iconography, props, set design, lighting, temporal and geographic location, costume, shot types, camera angles, special effects).
Typical types of Narrative (plots, historical setting, set pieces).
Generic Types, i.e. typical characters

Different genres of music

• rock
• Indie/rock
• Indie/acoustic
• classical
• romantic
• jazz
• scream
• heavy metal 
• pop 
• r&b 
• hip-hop
• blues
• alternative
• opera
• country
• trance
• dance/night club

Jason Mittell argues that genres are cultural categories that surpass the boundaries of media texts and operate within industry, audience, and cultural practices as well.

In short, industries use genre to sell products to audiences. Media producers use familiar codes and conventions that very often make cultural references to their audience knowledge of society, other texts.

Genre also allows audiences to make choices about what products they want to consume through acceptance in order to fulfil a particular pleasure

Pleasure of genre for audiences

Theorist Rick Altman (1999) argues that genre offers audiences ‘a set of pleasures’.

Emotional Pleasures: The emotional pleasures offered to audiences of genre films are particularly significant when they generate a strong audience response.

Visceral Pleasures: Visceral pleasures (‘visceral’ refers to internal organs) are ‘gut’ responses and are defined by how the film’s stylistic construction elicits a physical effect upon its audience. This can be a feeling of revulsion, kinetic speed, or a ‘roller coaster ride’.

Intellectual Puzzles: Certain film genres such as the thriller or the ‘whodunit’ offer the pleasure in trying to unravel a mystery or a puzzle. Pleasure is derived from deciphering the plot and forecasting the end or the being surprised by the unexpected.

•The main strength of genre theory is that everybody uses it and understands it – media experts use it to study media texts, the media industry uses it to develop and market texts and audiences use it to decide what texts to consume.

•The potential for the same concept to be understood by producers, audiences and scholars makes genre a useful critical tool. Its accessibility as a concept also means that it can  be applied across a wide range of texts.

Over the years genres develop and change as the wider society that produce them also changes, a process that is known as generic transformation

Over the development of genre, the music artists and the media have made the narratives for music video's into short movies which tell stories that relate with the audience.

Genre themes

David Bordwell ;

Horror films, for example, are basically just modern fairy tales and often act as morality plays in which people who break society’s rules are punished.

Fear of the unknown – the monster is the ‘monstrous other’ i.e. anything that is scary because it is foreign or different.

Sex = death – in horror movies, especially Slasher movies, sex is immoral and must be punished, werewolf movies can be seen as a metaphor for puberty, vampires can be as metaphors for sexually transmitted diseases or rape etc.

The breakdown of society – post-apocalyptic movies are about our fear (or secret desire for) of the breakdown of society. The collapse of civilisation results in human kind reverting to their animal instincts.

Some music videos even reflect the troubles of a modern world society and reflect upon modern day problems we have such as bank branch shut downs, criminals, murders, suicides, war, abandonment, neglect, etc. These music videos  are more relatable to a more youthful audience, the themes are targeted towards the younger audience. These themes include;

• Teen angst
• Rebellion - Conformity verses non-conformity;
• Romance;
• Sex/losing your virginity
• Nostalgia – for the innocence of youth
• Nihilism – the belief that there is no future;
• Coming of age rituals (e.g. the prom, falling in love, losing your virginity etc.);
• Tribalism: Popularity verses unpopularity,Juvenile Delinquency: Moral panics and the teenager as a folk devil;
• The currency of ‘cool’;
• Hedonism – living purely for pleasure;
• Friendship.
• War
• Crime
• Poverty
• Capitalism
• Racism

How this theory applies to my chosen music video

The genre to Greenday ' Wake me up when September ends' is an indie/rock genre. However the narrative to the music video shows a short story of a young couple that have money problems but are enjoying each day together, despite their problems. The video takes a sudden change of events when the young man joins the army and causes the young women to worry and freak about the fact that she wouldn't be able to live without if him, if the worst was to happen. The music video jumps between the performance of the band and the narrative of the music video. The next thing to see in the music video is the young man going to the army base and preparing to go to war, which jump cuts between the young man. the girl and the band performing the song. The video shows the man in combat and then jump cuts to show you the girl sat at home waiting for him, doing everyday things. At the end of the song it shows the girl walking along and thinking back to what they used to talk about before the young man joined the army, we presume the young man is dead because she is on her own and beforehand the couple did everything together. There is a glimpse of hope that the man is still at war and when the girl looks up at the sky she is hoping, for him to return. The genre of music goes well with the genre of the short film/narrative of the music video. We can see that this music video is made relatable for more older teens/ young adults, who know people that are in the army or have problems, so the theme of the music video fits in well with the target audience. 

Audience - Stuart Hall

Stuart Hall - The reception theory
The reception theory states that media texts are encoded by the producer meaning that whoever produces the text fills the product with values and messages.
The text is then decoded by spectators.

Different spectators will decode the text in different ways, not always in the way the producer intended.

As the audience we are the spectators and depending on how view things in the media due to life experiences that have happened to us as individuals and have impacted us or not makes a difference in how we interpret/ view different media texts.

The processing of the Reception theory;

1. Producer encodes message/meaning
2. Dominant/preferred 
3. Negotiated
4. Oppositional 

The dominant/preferred

The dominant reading of a text is that the audience view the media text in the way the producer intended.The audience agree with the ideology and message behind the text and will be able to relate with the message that is being portrayed to the target audience.
The audience will view the message in the way the producer wanted them to.
The ideal consumption has been met and the institution happy.

Negotiated

This is a compromise between the dominant and oppositional readings, the audience accepts the views of the producer but also has their own input and understanding in relation to the text.
They do not agree or disagree, they however can see the point being made in relation to the reading yet still have their own opinion.
For e.g. they understand what the institution want the message to be and how they are supposed to consume the text, however they do not fully conform with the message.

Oppositional 
The audience rejects the preferred reading and create their own reading of the text.
The audience reject the meaning fully as they do not agree with the message created for the audience.
The audience reject the message fully and interoperate the text in the wrong way, they may be offended, upset and fail to see the intended message from the institution.

Parkin’s/Hall’s  Audience Readings Theory

• Dominant or Preferred Reading: The meaning they want you to have is usually accepted. 
• Negotiated Reading: The dominant reading is only partially recognised or accepted and audiences might  disagree with some of it or find their own meanings.
• Oppositional Reading: The dominant reading is refused, rejected because the reader disagrees with it or is offended by it, especially for political, religious, feminist, reasons etc.

The Frankfurt School’s Hypodermic Theory 

The "hypodermic needle theory" implied mass media had a direct, immediate and powerful effect on its audiences. The mass media in the 1940s and 1950s were perceived as a powerful influence on behaviour change.
Several factors contributed to this "strong effects" theory of communication, including:
The fast rise and popularization of radio and television
The emergence of the persuasion industries, such as advertising.

The theory suggests that the mass media could influence a very large group of people directly and uniformly by ‘shooting’ or ‘injecting’ them with appropriate messages designed to trigger a desired response.

This theory suggests a powerful and direct flow of information from the sender to the receiver. 

The hypodermic needle model suggests that media messages are injected straight into a passive audience which is immediately influenced by the message. 

It expresses the view that the media is a dangerous means of communicating an idea because the receiver or audience is powerless to resist the impact of the message. 

People are seen as passive and are seen as having a lot media material "shot" at them. People end up thinking what they are told because there is no other source of information.

The theory assumes what we see or hear we believe and consume. The theory assumes we are brainwashed in to believing the media messages.

Passive Audience Theory

  The idea that the media ‘injects’ ideas and views directly into 

   the brains of the audience like a hypodermic needle, 

   therefore, controlling the way that people think and behave.

‘Passive’ audience/hypodermic theory 

The media has a direct and powerful effect on its 

audience – current debate about the influence of 

rap/gangster videos or artists like Marilyn Manson or The Black Veil Brides

Moral Panics And FolkDevils

• Stanley Cohen in his book FolkDevils And Moral

Panics defines a ‘Moral Panic’ as:“…a mass response to a group, a person or an

attitude that becomes defined as a threat to society.”

• Cohen arguesthatthemedia, especially news

media, often create and/or reinforce moral

panicsin the public. The news are known as moral entrepreneurs, which create moral panics for the mass audience.

• The term‘Folk Devil’ isthe name given to the

object ofthemoral panic, i.e. it is another

name for a scapegoat. People who fall under the category of a Folk Devil are people such as; teenagers, criminals, 'chavs' under-class people, etc.

Criticisms Of Hypodermic Theory

• Doesn’t allow for resistance or rejection of media 

messages

• Elitist.

• Simplistic.

• Discredited by academics but often referred to by 

journalists
This theory is out dated
No one uses/consumes media in the same way
we are aware of how society works and how instituions operate

 Active Audience Theory

• This is the idea that the audience have an active role to 

play in the understanding of, and creation, of meaning 

within a media text.

• Active Audience Theory argues that there is diversity 

in society (everyone is different) and therefore there is 

also choice (we can choose what to believes)

How the Hypodermic needle and Hall's theory applies to my chosen music video

This theory applies to my chosen music theory because the band Greenday have the representation of rebellious adults, who write their songs based on things that have happened in their life's or their thoughts on society.  Some would say that those who listen to greenday are indie-like and enjoy other forms of indie/rock music. Some parents may be concerned that if their children listened to greenday and other music artists similar to greenday then their children would turn rebellious and wouldn't be afraid to speak their thoughts to their parents which creates moral panics for parents and older generations who may be weary of rebellious teenagers. However looking at the active audience argument it says that due to the variety in ethnicities and the fact that everyone is different, people choose to behave and act in the ways they want to. Which can be influenced by the media or not but we choose what to watch through media products so it's down to everyone's personal decision on how they act. The media has helped to create individualism in today's society which can be seen as an advantage because if the media had no influence on people, then everyone would be the same. Not everyone agrees with certain genre's of music but as individuals we are able to tell the media what types of music is preferred through out the country. which is how we get the top charts and why their are a lot of music channels on TV, these have been produced by the media. The dominant message of the narrative of this music video is that the young man decided the best way to help them financially is to join the army, where is well paid but he would be risking his life. The negotiation with this music video is that people may or may not relate to the couple acting for the narrative but they may also be able to relate to the lyrics of the song itself.