Representation theory

Representation refers to the construction in any medium (especially the mass media) of aspects of 'reality' such as people, places, objects, events, cultural identities and other abstract concepts. While media representations may seem realistic, they are just constructions. Such representations may be in speech or writing as well as still or moving pictures. Representation is the ability of texts to draw upon features of the world and present them to the viewer, not simply as reflections, but more so, as contractions (O'Shaughnessy and Stadler 2002) Hence, the images do not portray reality in an unbiased way with 100% accuracy, but rather, present 'versions of reality' influenced by culture and people's habitual thoughts and action. In a world dominated by print and electronic media, our sense of reality is increasingly structured by narrative. Feature films and documentaries tell us stories about ourselves and the world we live in. Television speaks back to us and offers us 'reality' in the form of hyperbole and parody. Print journalism turns daily life into a story. Advertisements narrativise our fantasies and desires. We often analyse representations in the media according to categories such as:

• Age
• Disability
• Gender
• Socio-economic grouping
• Race
• Nationality
• Sexuality

The construction of representations can be explained through the example of taking a photograph: what is in the image must be considered, decisions about what to omit must be made and constructing  the representation by making decisions about the use of codes like camera angle, lighting, miss en scene. We must also understand the signs of construction: the denotive meaning of a sign is its literal meaning and the connotations are the cultural or individual associations a sign has for the audience. When studying representations we must think about how the media represents ideas, events and people. We must also deconstruct media representations, such as films as it is a great way to understand how the media works.

An ideology is a belief system that is constructed and presented by a media text. Media texts represent the world in order to support a dominant ideology. For example, newspapers often promote the dominant ideology of patriotism through their representation of race and nationality. Some dominant ideologies include:

• Capitalism - the production of capital and consumption of surplus value as a life goal
• Patriotism - to love, support and protect one's country and its people
• Marriage and family - the 'right way' to live is to marry an opposite-sex partner and have children
• Male superiority - men are more suited to positions of power, and more suited to decision-making at work and at home.

Dominant ideologies are central to people's belief systems. It is often difficult or impossible to challenge then effectively. Many dominant ideologies are extremely culture-specific for example:

• Christian fundamentalism as a political force in the USA
• Shariah law in some Muslim countries
• The principle of individual freedom in the Netherlands

Hegemony is the way in which those in power maintain their control. Dominant ideologies are considered hegemonic: power in society is maintained by constructing ideologies which are usually promoted by the mass media. Examples of hegemonic values include:

• the police are always right
• it is important to be slim
• a credit card is a desirable status symbol
• mass immigration is undesirable
• the poor are lazy and deserve their hardship
• men are better drivers than women
• it is important to wear fashionable clothes

Antonio Gramsci was an Italian political theorist. A founding member and onetime leader of the Communist Party of Italy, he was imprisoned by by Mussolini's Fascist regime. He is renowned for his concept of cultural hegemony as a means of maintaining the state in a capitalist society. Gramsci's theory of cultural hegemony means that a diverse culture can be ruled or dominated by one group or class. That everyday practices and shared beliefs provide the foundation for complex systems o domination. In 'advanced' industrial societies hegemonic cultural innovations such as compulsory schooling, mass media, and popular culture have indoctrinated workers to a false consciousness. 

Stereotypes are characters in a media text who are 'types' rather than complex people. Stereotypes are often defined by their role, such as 'bad cop' or 'nice old lady'. Children's media texts often use stereotypes so a young audience can identify quickly with the characters. Stereotypes are usually negative representations considered to be too reductive. Many are considered offensive, such as a 'drunken irishman' a 'fanatical muslim' or an 'over-emotional woman'.

By giving audiences information, media text extend experience of reality. Every time you see a media text, you extend your experience of life but in a second-hand way (vicarious). However, because the producers of the media text have selected and constructed the information we receive, then our experience is restricted. Representation involves not only how identities are represented (or rather constructed) within the text but also how they are constructed in the process of reception.

The gaze refers to how an audience views the way people are represented in the media. The gaze can be characterised by who is doing the looking:

• The spectator's gaze - the spectator who is viewing the text. This is often us, the audience of a certain text
• Intra-diegetic gaze - where one person depicted in the text is looking at another person or object in the text, such as another character looking at another
• Extra-diegetic gaze - where the person depicted in the text looks at the spectator, such as an aside, or an acknowledgement of the 'fourth wall'
• The camera gaze - which is the gaze of the camera, and if often equated to the director's gaze
• Intra-intra diegetic gaze - such as Bart and Lisa watching Itchy and Scratchy in The Simpsons

Analysing an image for representation:

• Tone. Friendly? Edgy?
• A positive or negative portrayal of the subject?
• Is the subject of the image the subject of the text, or merely used to accompany it?
• Connotation and symbolism
• Does the image attempt to reflect or construct reality?
• Is the image associated with a commodity or brand?
• Does the image portray a commodity or brand?
• Use of colour and lighting. Realistic or 'ideal'?
• Representations of lifestyle: realistic or aspirational about material wealth, body image/ beauty and social/personal relationships 
• Assumptions or stereotypes regarding class, race, gender, age or sexual orientation

Laura Mulvey's Male Gaze theory consists of an essay entitled Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. This essay coined the term 'Male Gaze' which soon went on to become a very well known and discussed theory. In film, the male gaze occurs when the audience is put into the perspective of a heterosexual man. A scene may focus on the curves of a woman's body, putting you the viewer in the eyes of a male. However, it is only the Male Gaze theory if these curves are highlighted with specific conventions such as slow motion, deliberate camera movements and cut aways. The theory suggests that the male gaze denies women human identity, relegating them to the status of objects to be admired for physical appearance. The theory suggests woman can more often than not only watch a film from a secondary perspective and only view themselves from a mans perspective. Only 16% of media creators are female.

The cinema apparatus of Hollywood cinema puts the audience in a masculine subject position with the woman on the screen seen as an object of desire. Film and cinematography are structures upon ideas. Protagonists tended to be men. Mulvey suggests two distinct modes of male gaze: 1) 'voyeuristic (women as whores) and 2) fetishistic - women as unreachable madonnas (also narcissistic - women watching film see themselves reflected on the screen). People who criticise her ideas say that she is ignoring the fact that all genders - male and female want to feel dominated and overwhelmed by the cinema experience. Also, she ignores the fact that men are capable of 'metaphoric transvestism' whereby they are able to view the film from the perspective of a woman.

Lacan's theory of 'the mirror' is an idea around the idea of identity. He considers the point at which a person develops a sense of self and conscious identity. He considers the point at which a child recognises their own reflection and begin to consider how other perceive them, modifying their appearance to satisfy their perceptions of how others see them. Mulvey extends this idea when she writes about 'the silver screen' which she suggest operates like a metaphorical mirror; reflecting back to the female viewer representations of female identity, but these representations are not genuine reflections of the viewer but rather male perceptions of idealised femininity.

Judith Butler's queer theory challenges the idea that gender - being male or female - is part of the essential self, that it is fixed, immovable - in other words queer theory suggest that our male or female gender does not control all aspects of our identity or how we perceive other peoples identity. In other words gender, particularly as it is represented in performance -on TV, Film etc, is fluid, flexible depending on the context in which it is seen. For example an audience can see Tom Cruise playing a 'straight' pilot in The Right Stuff and interpret his gender, although male, as having very 'queer' or 'gay' attributes. The theory developed as a way of combating negative representations of gay sexuality in the media. It combats the idea that people should be divided and categorised, indeed marginalised, due to their sexual orientation or practice and that a person' identity should not be limited to their sexual preference. It asks us to consider how the media contracts gay representation. (Apply to representation of gay sexuality in Knocked up... any others? What about Graham Norton? Alan Carr? Does Post Modern Irony regarding representation of gay characters relieve the audience of burden of moral responsibility regarding evolving attitudes a more flexible idea of gender?)

In his book, Subculture and The Meaning of Style, Dick Hebdidge said the a subculture is a group of like minded individuals who feel neglected by societal standards and who develop a sense of identity which differs to the dominant on to which they belong. Ken Gelder lists 6 ways in which a subculture can be recognised: 

1.  Often have negative relationship to work
2. Negative or ambivalent relationship to class
3. Through their associations with territory (the street, the hood, the club) rather than property
4. Through their stylistic ties to excess
5. Through their movement out of home into non-domestic forms of belongings (social groups as opposed to family)
6. Through their refusal to engage with they might see as the 'banalities' of life

Other ways of recognising a subculture might be symbolism attached to clothes, music, visual affections like tattoos etc e.g ben and his friends in Knocked Up, representing a subculture some of the values of which Alison and as such the America she initially represents might benefit from. Subcultural values are often associated with being 'cool'.

Anthony Middens addressed the differences in the traditionalist view of society with the post traditional view. Media representations of society can be seen as traditional or post traditional. Traditional societies are ones in which individual choice was limited by its dominant customs and traditions. Whereas post traditional societies are one where the ideas set by previous generations are less important than those of individuals. Post traditional societies no longer feel so dependant and limited to time and place. Giddens says ''we are living in a post traditional society where we are much less concerned with precedents set by previous generations and that our options are only limited by what the law and public opinion allows. We have replaced seen/discreet systems with remote 'expert' systems, institutions and corporations. 

Bell Hooks (pen name of Gloria Jean Watkins) first major work was written in 1981, named 'Aint I a woman? Lack, women and felinity'. Focused on the perpetuation of systems of oppression and domination in the media paying particular attention to the devaluation of black womanhood. The idea of 'lack' or 'otherness' refers to the way that women and ethnic minorities are usually represented as 'other'. Their primary purpose is simply to be other than the norm (usually a white male hero) They are therefor known more by the context of lack than by a realised or complex identity. This theory can be linked to ideas of the monstrous feminine found in feminist analysis of literature and art. 

Keys terminology/words:                       Theorists:
Representation                                       Antonio Gramsci
Construction                                           Laura Mulvey
Denotive                                                 Lacan
Connotations                                          Judith Butler
Ideology                                                 Dick Hebdidge
Hegemony                                              Ken Gelder
Stereotypes                                             Anthony Middens
The Gaze                                                Giddens
Subculture                                              Bell Hooks