semiotics and the practices of looking (daps 6 and 7)
TRANSCRIPT
Last Week
Genre Theory
• What is it? A way of categorising film by recognising similarities.
• Why is it useful? Good way to communicate meanings in film. Makes the information in films more controllable. Makes characters more predictable. Very easy to market a ‘genre’ film. Audience knows what to expect – REPETATIVE.
Last Week
Genre Theory
Remember these…
Last Week
Auteur Theory
• Where did it originate? France!
• Who developed the idea? French film critics.
• Why? Bored with ‘dad’s cinema’ (traditional French cinema)
• What did French New Wave look like? Casual, improvised, small budget, modern, natural setting
• Example of an auteur…
Practices of Looking
Seeing:• Something we do all the time.• “Did you see John at the weekend?”• “Have you seen that new film”• “Has anybody seen my marbles”
Looking:• Involves more purpose.• Negotiate social relationships and meanings.• Relationship of power – if something makes you ‘look’ or
think a certain way, it becomes powerful.
• Do you think that films are powerful? How? Why?
Practices of Looking
Mimesis: • The concept that representations of our world (paintings,
photographs, film) are accurate imitations.
Social constructivism:• The concept that we learn about the world through
representations.
Consider this:• How do you know the Arctic is cold?• How do you think people consider Manchester?• What are Americans like?• What does the moon look like?
Practices of Looking
How do you think people consider Manchester?
Practices of LookingViewers make meaning…
• Look at the below picture. What do you see? Why might individual people look at this picture differently?
Practices of Looking
‘This is not a pipe’
Practices of LookingIdeologies
• System of beliefs that exist with in all cultures.• Shared set of values.• Inform our every day lives.• Subtle yet powerful.• Beauty, gender roles, sexuality, morality are all ideologies.
Task• You will each be allocated a word.• You must create a visual mood board for each word.• Consider the general ideas surrounding your word and find
images that you associate with that word.
Practices of LookingLOVE
Practices of LookingNAZI
Practices of LookingLIFE
Practices of LookingPOVERTY
Practices of LookingSAFETY
Practices of LookingHEART
• Think of words that you associate with the heart…
Practices of Looking
• Denotation: Accurate to what we are seeing. The literal meaning of something
• Connotation: Something that we associate with a word or image. Something that an image or a word represents.
• Think about the genres we discussed last week and the typical traits of each one.
• Horror – night time, knives, upside down crucifix• Rom Coms – Hugh Grant, flowers, holding hands• Comedy – Jim Carrey, trips, eccentric people• Action – Muscles, guns, explosions
Practices of LookingSIGNS
Signifier: Image or sound
Signified: Meaning
Sign: Thought or action
Practices of LookingSIGNS
Signifier: Yellow triangle with exclamation mark in middle
Signified: Caution / danger
Sign: Go steady!
Practices of LookingSIGNS IN FILM
Signifier (denotation): White mask and black cloak
Signified (Conotation): Horror, bad person negative
Sign: BE SCARED!
Practices of LookingTASK: Music video analysis
• Pick a music video from the list on the next slide and analyse using the theories and analysis strategies discussed this morning.
• Consider; connotations, denotations, signs, social constructivism and ideologies.
• For example, if you see a slender female in the video, consider ideologies and the way the notion of modern beauty has been socially constructed.
Practices of LookingTASK: Music video analysis
• Katy Perry – ‘Firework’• Rage Against the Machine – ‘Sleep Now in the
Fire’• Foo Fighters – ‘Learn to Fly’• Michael Jackson – ‘Stranger in Moscow’• Nirvana – ‘In Bloom’