Media language theorists

• Jean Baudrillard - Post Modernism 


  The boundaries between the 'real' world and the media have collapsed
• What does simulacra mean according to Baudrillard 


  Copies that depict things that had no reality to begin with (dinosaurs/ aliens)
• What does simulation mean according to Baudrillard 


  Inescapable blurring of reality + representation and we live in a simulation created by the media
• What does hyperreality mean according to Baudrillard


  Media images seem more 'real' that the reality they supposedly represent
• Levi-Strauss - Structuralism


  Texts can be understood through an analysis of their underlying structure

  -Can be through binary opposition that can have ideological significance
• Steve Neale - Genre Theory


  Genres are dominated by repetition of codes and conventions and can change over time as they borrow and overlap with each other, creating hybridity and subgenres
• How can producers use Neale's theory

  They rely on audience's desire to see both repetition and change of genre conventions, so they can target both a familiar and different audience
• Todorov - Narratology 


  Narratives move from one state of equilibrium to another separated by conflict or imbalance and they way in which narratives are resolved can have ideological significance
• What is narratology according to Todorov 


  They study of narrative structure and how it affects our perception
• Roland Barthes - Semiotics 


  Texts communicate their meanings through significations (signs)
• What are the two 'levels' of semiotics (Barthes)

  Denotation - literal meaning

  Connotations - Suggested/additional meaning attached to a sign
• What does 'myths' mean according to Barthes 


  Signs reflecting the dominant ideologies of the current time, so we are more likely to discover social norms and values from the present signs