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Media effects
- 1. A2 Media Studies<br/>Postmodern Media<br />Media effects?<br />Hypodermic needle<br />The media inject messages into their audiences<br />The audience is seen as passive and unable to resist these media messages<br />Theory associated with Marxist academics, such as the Frankfurt School<br />Marxists are traditionally hostile to the media – seeing it as vehicle to enable ruling class to maintain their dominance over society<br />Frankfurt School witnessed Hitler’s rise to power in Germany in the inter-war period, partly because of how Hitler and the Nazis used the tools of mass communication to stir hatred against the Jews<br />Theory first articulated in a different era to our own – a time when the mass media was still relatively new <br />Perhaps most readily applies today to advertising, stirring up feelings of ‘I want it’ / ‘I must have it’ – but does it apply equally, to everybody, all of the time, or perhaps to certain ‘vulnerable’ groups? E.g. Children<br />Uses and gratifications<br />4 uses and gratifications that audiences / consumers make from their interactions with the media<br />A reversal of the position of hypodermic needle theory – not about what the media do to you, but what you do with the media<br />Sees the audience as active, not passive – audiences / consumers make deliberate, informed choices about the use and interaction with media texts / products<br />Halloran (1969) – We should focus on what audiences do with the media, rather than on what the media do with people – a tipping point in media effects theory<br />Blumler & Katz argue that the 4 uses and gratifications are:<br />Surveillance<br />Diversion<br />Personal identity<br />Personal relationships<br />Cultivation theory<br />A long-term effects model, offers the theory that media messages work over the long term and not simply immediately – in that sense different to both hypodermic needle theory and uses & gratifications theory<br />George Gerbner – Through repetition of media messages audiences come to take in these messages and adopt them as their own views / messages<br />The theoretical equivalent of water torture – works on a ‘drip, drip, drip’ approach – in the end you come to accept the messages and values being offered to you by the media<br />The invasion of Iraq – in the months preceding the invasion by US / UK troops, both President Bush and ex-Prime Minister Blair (amongst other world leaders) repeatedly went on TV telling us that Saddam Hussein and his government had WMDs and subsequently was a threat to global peace and stability – a possible example of cultivation theory in action<br />Also, just about any advertising campaign is too – companies advertise to drive brand awareness as well as to sell individual products<br />Ultimately sees the audience as something that can be manipulated, therefore, ultimately sees the audience as being passive in the long term<br />Reception theory<br />Focuses entirely on what users / consumers / audiences do with media texts<br />Argues that meaning lies in the hands of the readers<br />Elvis Costello (singer) – ‘You can only control what the words look like, not what they mean’<br />John Fiske – audiences / consumers act as ‘semiotic guerillas’ who configure their own meanings from the texts produced by media institutions<br />Consider how people can react differently to the same stimulus – different people have different tastes in what is funny / disgusting , acceptable / unacceptable, as the recent furore about Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross shows…<br />Web 2.0 and the melting of the line between producers and audiences – the age of YouTube and post-modern ‘mash up’ culture and blogs and the ‘anti-journalists’ who work out side the system and outside the rules – the role of Twitter and Facebook in spurring protest in Tunisia, Eqypt, Libya, Bahrain - audiences are the masters now(?)<br />As such, reception theory offers a complete rebuttal of hypodermic needle theory and challenges both the uses & gratifications model through being more audience-centred and challenges cultivation theory because of its central basis on what the media does to audiences <br />