Languages and Theories

• Media Language: denotes how media producers make meaning about a certain medium. It allows the audience to convey the meaning of the text through its signs and symbols.
• Connotative: it refers to the various interpretations that the text suggests to the audience which are often associated with their culture, value, beliefs, etc. Symbolic meaning is used.
• Denotative: The literal meaning of the media text. When words or objects are used denotative in a film there is no underlying or symbolic meaning behind the terms or the objects.
• Media codes: it commonly has an established meaning, denotation or connotation, to the target audience. Media codes include the use of camera, acting, setting, mise en scene, editing, lighting, sound,...
• Symbolic codes: audience-based. The meaning of the product is not based on the product itself but on the interpretation of the audience.
• Setting: refers to the time and place of the narrative or a specific scene.
• Mise en scene: French word for everything within the frame. It describes all the features within a frame of media products
• Acting: refers to the portrayal of the actors in creating media products.
• Color: considerations are highly connotative when it comes to interpretations. It is also usually associated with cultural aspects.
• Technical codes: refers to codes specific to a media form alone. The knowledge and connotation of different camera angles and shots make sense when looking at films and photographs but mean nothing outside those forms. How frames in visual media are presented and broad.
• Written codes: the formal written language used in creating a media product. Includes the printed language and the spoken language which includes the dialogues and even the lyrics of the song.
• Media conventions: refer to the recognized ways of using media codes. Conventions refer to the possible methods in which codes are organized in a product.
• Form conventions: ways in which the types of media codes are expected to be arranged. For example, the title and main casts are expected to appear in the beginning of the movie and the credits at the end.
• Story conventions: refers to the basic structures of narrative. Involves narrative structures, character constructions, and point of view.
• Genre conventions: common use of elements of narratives such as the characters, settings, or theme in a certain type of media.
• Media Producers: the people who initiate, plan, and produce media texts.
• Stakeholders: the people that share the same interest or intentions.
• Audience: the essential element in delivering media texts.