SEEP ENG 4U Media Task: Glossary of Terms
Representation
It is the process of making meaning in still or moving images and words/sounds. In its simplest form, it means to present/show someone or some aspect of life. Through the use of layout, codes, and conventions ideas about the world are represented.
The process of representation constructs ideological beliefs and values.
Ideology
Ideology is often referred to as the system of ideas, values, and beliefs which an individual, group or society holds to be “true” or important; these are shared by a culture or society and they indicate how that society “should” function. These ideas and values which are seen to be shared, or perpetuated, by the most influential social agents (the churches, the law, education, government, the media etc.) may be described as the dominant ideology.
For example, ideas about such topics as work ("It is important to have a job"), money ("It is important to save money, buy insurance or a pension"), relationships ("Children should have parents, a man and a woman, who are married"), gender ("Women are naturally better at raising children") are all ideological viewpoints. These ideologies are often represented in mass media texts.
Some Ideological Representations to consider in text analysis:
Masculinity
Femininity
Sexuality
Race
National identity
Individual identity
Wealth
Power
Deconstruction
Text analysis requires a process of deconstruction. Deconstruction is the analysis of all elements of a media text by taking apart the constructed images, identifying codes and conventions. This allows the reader to consider how the message is communicated and what it represents.
Form of text
This term means the structure, or skeleton, of a text and the narrative framework that it is constructed on. The form for the SEEP ENG 4U exam is a print advertisement. Other forms of media like film contain different structures because they rely on moving images and sound to communicate messages. Print ads have a static structure which often uses both image and written text.
Open/Closed
Texts can be either OPEN or CLOSED. An image or photograph is an 'open' text which means that it can be interpreted or 'read' in many ways. Written text or words are considered to be 'closed' text which has a directed meaning. Print ads are often a combination of open and closed text.
Anchorage
Anchorage is the practice of using written captions with images to direct the meaning of the image. The elements of language can serve to 'anchor' (or direct) the preferred readings of an image. Anchorage is often seen as assisting in the ideological position of the text. For instance, 'It is a very common practice for the captions of news photographs to tell us, in words, exactly how the subject's expression ‘ought to be read'.
Intertextuality
In a broad sense, intertextuality is the reference to or the application of a literary, media, or social text within another literary, media, or social text. For example, The Simpsons has episodes with animated celebrities or makes references and allusions to literary texts. Intertextuality is important in media studies because the reading of the text relies on knowledge outside of the text, and because it can “destabilize” the reading of the original text.
Codes – technical, symbolic, and written
Codes are the symbolic units of communication. They can be categorized as technical (codes created by the technology of the media form), symbolic, or written. In print ads:
Technical codes Symbolic codes Written codes
Camera angle colour caption
Lighting shapes slogan
Framing objects product name
Conventions
Conventions are established and recognisable patterns of construction and/or patterns of codes which are characteristic of a particular genre. For example, a high angle point of view looking down on a subject creates dominance over the subject.
Layout
Layout is the precise arrangement of shapes, images, and/or words on a page.
Z Theory
Marketers know that the human eye in Western cultures tracks across a page as the reader skims from left to right, then across the page in a Z tracking pattern, so elements of print ads are frequently organized using the Z form.