Medium Studied Keywords for this Topic Keyword Meaning BAME Black, Asian and Mixed-Ethnicity Connotations What an image suggests or symbolises (e.g. getting the idea of

love from looking at a picture of a rose) Hybridity Where one media product is a mixture of different types or genres

(e.g. an advert that looks like a music video). Intertextuality Where one media text draws on another or makes reference to

another (e.g. an advert for Coke also mentioning Pepsi) Messages and Values

The things the product is trying to communicate (messages) and what it thinks is important in the world (values).

Mise-en-Scene The way these visual parts of the image combine to tell a story: • Setting; costume; props; hair; make-up (and sometimes

lighting) Narrative The order in which a story is told (remember: you can always start

with the end of the story and work backwards to show how you got there)

Negotiated A meaning that is somewhere between the preferred and oppositional readings.

Oppositional When you take a meaning from a media product that is deliberate different from the ones the people who made it wanted you to take away; contrasts with preferred and negotiated.

Preferred The meaning that the people who made the product want you to take away; contrasts with oppositional and negotiated.

Product-to-the-Rescue

A common storytelling idea in adverts that the consumer’s problems can be solved if they just buy the product (e.g. bleach will kill those pesky germs in your toilet).

Stereotypes An over-simplified idea about a group of people based on a very small number of people, e.g. all football fans are hooligans; all women are bad drivers; all Asian people are good at maths and science.

Useful Theories

Theory Name Theory Explanation Reception Theory (Stuart Hall)

Media makers have a preferred interpretation, but we are free to take oppositional or negotiated ones also.

• What is the preferred reading of the first 2/3 of the advert? • What might an oppositional reading be?

ADVERTISING & MARKETING ASSESSED FOR: Text & Representation

• Does the last 1/3 (the giving blood part) change these readings at all?

Propp’s Theory of Narrative

All stories can be broken down by looking at the interactions between 8 different ideas (usually characters).

• A hero wants the princess, but a villain stands in his way; the dispatcher sets the hero on his quest; the helper goes with the hero; the donor give the hero something they might need; the father wants the hero to prove himself, so sets obstacles in the way; the false hero takes credit for the hero’s success.

• How do the hero, villain and princess interact in these adverts?

Todorov’s Theory of Narrative

All stories are structured into five sections: • In the equilibrium, all things are normal for this world;

some disruption comes along to break up normality; the disruption is recognized and an attempt is made to restore things back to normal; in the end, things go to a new equilibrium that is not quite what it was before.

Close Study Products and How to Use Them

This CSP has been included so you can talk about historical representations of women, sexism and compare these with the way the Galaxy advert represents women and the way the NHS Represent advert represents women.

• The costume, facial expression and activity of the cover model show the sexist idea that it is a woman’s job to wash the clothes.

• You might also talk about how a modern day audience could respond differently to the ad than a 1950s audience.

Audrey Hepburn Galaxy Chocolate Advert https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw-9zMEDzRM

continues over the page

This CSP has been included so you can talk about the way it draws on 1950s ideas about gender relationships and presents these to a modern (2013) audience.

• The choice of Audrey Hepburn as a classically beautiful woman reproduces 1950s ideas about what a woman is ‘supposed to’ look and act like.

• The fact that she needs to be ‘rescued’ by the handsome man in the sports car can be

complicated by the fact that she ‘summons’ him by looking at the product (the chocolate).

• The stereotype that all women like chocolate is reinforced by its use in a ‘product-to-the-rescue’ storyline.

NHS Represent https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YUbquK_OaI

This CSP has been included so you can talk about issues of Race Representation.

• One preferred reading of the video is that opportunities for BAME people are now more inclusive (you can be a scientist or a sports-person)…

• …however, an oppositional reading is that some of these jobs fall back on traditional stereotypes (Asians are good at maths and science; Black people are good at sports).

You might also analyse some of the connotations of the mise-en-scene (specific locations) and camera angles (upwards = we look up to them)

Important Issues

How might modern audiences react to adverts from the past? How do each of these three adverts use narrative to tell their story? How do these adverts use or work against stereotypes, especially where gender is concerned? How the messages and values of media products are encoded into them by the people who make them.

Likely/Practice Questions

Number of Marks

Question with command word and keywords highlighted

8 Analyse how layout and typography can be used to communicate meaning in any ONE of the close study products (Galaxy; NHS Blood; OMO).

10 Explain how TWO of the close study products (Galaxy; NHS Blood; OMO) construct their messages and values for the viewer.

12 Explain how media language is used in the adverts you have studied to target specific audiences.

12 Analyse how the adverts you have studied use intertextuality/hybridity in order to construct their messages and values.

20 Explain how the ways in which adverts construct their narratives has changed over time? Refer to media narrative theory in your response.

20 How far do the adverts that you have studied rely on traditional stereotypes about gender/race?

20 Explain how the three close study products (Galaxy; NHS Blood; OMO) represent groups like race AND gender and how this has changed over time.

How to Answer a Media Language / Representation Question Follow this basic structure (see the sample answer below for an example of this in practise). PEER:

1. Use a signal sentence that embeds the keywords of the question; 2. Make a Point that answers the question; 3. Refer to an Example from the product (if the example is a scene from moving image,

describe the relevant moment using ‘In the moment when…’); 4. Explain how the example proves the point; 5. Return to the key words of the question.

Sample Answer Explain how TWO of the close study products (Galaxy; NHS Blood; OMO) construct their messages and values for the viewer. [10] Both OMO and Galaxy construct their messages and values around gender using mise-en-scene. The OMO advert shows a stereotypical 1950s housewife hanging out the washing. Her hair and clothes help to construct this image, as do the clothes draped over her shoulder. Her facial expression indicates that she is happy about what she is doing, and might be impressed with the cleaning job OMO has done. The values here are centred around the sexist idea that it was a woman’s ‘job’ to do the clothes washing in the 1950s. The values of the Galaxy advert are also a little sexist, but the message here is that women should look a certain way. The decision to use digital technology to re-create Audrey Hepburn, a woman associated with elegance and classical beauty, as well as the choice of costume for the actress – which directly references the dress worn by Hepburn in the film Roman Holiday – construct the idea that women should look thin, young and beautiful. Ironically, the decision to eat an entire bar of Galaxy chocolate does not seem to make any difference to her figure, but – in a world of digital manipulation – it would make little difference if it did. The Galaxy advert also draws on the fairly sexist stereotype that women love chocolate in order to construct the message that Galaxy can solve all your problems. This is a fairly typical ‘product-to-the-rescue’ narrative. Hepburn is having a bad day, stuck on a hot bus involved in a crash. It is only when she opens her purse and looks at the chocolate that the handsome man in his open-top sports car arrives: Galaxy has rescued her from her bad day, just like it will rescue the consumer, if they buy it. Of course, this is only the preferred reading of the advert’s message. An oppositional reading might be that Galaxy chocolate holds some magical powers over men who will offer up their cars, hats and who-knows-what-else to anyone wielding a bar of chocolate and a smile.

Mark Scheme GCSE Media Mark Schemes are divided into FOUR BANDS. The specifics of the mark scheme changes with the question, but there are some common words used.

• Band 4 (Grade 8/9): Excellent; consistent use of “the specifics” throughout. • Band 3 (Grade 6/7): Good; mostly appropriate use of “the specifics.” • Band 2 (Grade 5/4): Satisfactory; occasional appropriate use of “the specifics.” • Band 1 (Grade 3/2/1): Basic; Limited; very little use of “the specifics.”

The definition of Excellent/Good/Satisfactory/Basic is set by the board.