Theories

Question 1

Livingstone and Lunt - Regulation theory

Answer 1

. Think regulation is hard

. Protecting the audience from harm

Question 2

Hesmondhalgh - Cultural industries theory

Answer 2

. Companies need to minimise risk and maximise audiences to be successful

1. Vertically and horizontally integrated
2. Work across a variety of media platforms and technologies
3. Controlling the release schedule of your project
4. Detailed marketing campaign

Question 3

Blumler and Katz - Uses and gratifications theory

Answer 3

. Surveillance
. Personal identity
. Personal relationships
. Diversion

Question 4

Hall - Reception theory

Answer 4

He believes that media products are encoded with ideas. Preferred, negotiated and oppositional reading

Question 5

Hypodermic needle theory

Answer 5

The media transmits messages to the audience and they accept the message and react to it

Question 6

Bandura - Media effects theory

Answer 6

‘Deviant’ behaviour encourages copycat behaviour in the reader

Question 7

Jenkins - Fandom theory

Answer 7

Fans play a key role in the media

Question 8

Curran and Seaton - Profit and power

Answer 8

The media is controlled by a small number of companies primarily driven by the logic of profit and power

Question 9

Neale - Genre theory

Answer 9

He thinks genres are made up of repetition and difference

Question 10

Butler - Gender performativity theory

Answer 10

She believes gender is constructed through performance, so performing certain activities makes you feel more feminine/masculine

Question 11

Baudrillard - Postmodernism theory

Answer 11

Modern audiences are so immersed in the media that it is no longer possible to tell reality from ‘simulacra’

Question 12

Shirky - End of audience theory

Answer 12

Due to technological advances, audiences can no longer be thought of as passive consumers

Question 13

Gerbner - Cultivation theory

Answer 13

Repeated representations in the media lead people to change the way they view the world around them
‘Mean World Syndrome’

Question 14

Alvarado - representations of the black community

Answer 14

The humorous
The exotic
The pitied
The dangerous

Question 15

Barthes - Semiotics theory

Answer 15

All texts communicate meaning through a set of signs encoded by the producer that needs to be decoded by the audience

Question 16

Todorov - Narrative theory

Answer 16

All narratives follow a similar structure (equilibrium, disruption, new equilibrium)

Question 17

Levi Strauss - Binary opposition theory

Answer 17

Most texts can be considered as simple conflicts which drive the narrative forward and position the audience to support a particular ideological standpoint (good vs evil)

Question 18

Van Zoonen - Feminist theory

Answer 18

Men and women are represented in different ways by the media. Female objectification is linked to historical, patriarchal culture

Question 19

Hall - Representation theory (stereotypes)

Answer 19

He believes that stereotypes are often negative. They are used in the media to often represent minority groups

Question 20

Gauntlett - Pick and mix theory

Answer 20

We build our sense of identity partly through media representations. Media representations are becoming increasingly more diverse

Question 21

bell hooks - gender, race and class

Answer 21

She believes that feminism is a political aim rather than an individual lifestyle

Question 22

Gilroy - Ethnicity and postcolonial theory

Answer 22

Modern ideas about race and ethnicity are bound upon the historical idea of colonialism. Gilroy believes we can still see the effects of this in the media now