Week 9: Cinema & Television

 Qn: Explain what is the politics of representation? 
 
Media is one of the most significant tools in transmitting and conveying messages to the audience especially television and cinema. They play a vital role in shaping people's perception about culture and the society so much so that it affects the way we see the world around us. This implies that we need the media to make sense of the reality. For example, we watch news to know what’s happening around the world. However, have we consider whether the news is telling us the truth or not? Interactionist argues that only fragments from thousands of news and information are selected every day; thus indicating that our perception on reality is restricted to a certain extent and is based on the representation by the media.

The ability of the media to construct or shape meaning of any media text is what I believed to be the politics of representation. In television and cinema, we often see the different representation of men and women, ethnicity, class and age. Van Dijik (1991) made a study on European coverage and found that black people are often portrayed as drug users and criminal. Similarly, in the movie "Slumdog Millionaire", the depiction of slum in India would make us think negatively about the country whereby in reality, this might not be the case. Therefore, these sorts of representation would result in stereotyping. For example, Asian men would be expected to be good in martial arts because the portrayal of Jackie Chan as a Kung Fu master. Furthermore, people often perceived that all Asians are Chinese. Hence, I used the following music video to show stereotypes of an Asian man as perceived by some people.

The above picture is depiction of a Muslim by one of Korea's TV programs which had sparked controversies among both local and international audience. While the intention of the producer was to introduce an Arab teenager for a singing segment, but their representation of an Arab had caused misunderstanding and was highly criticized. Nowlan (2001) maintains that 'the why in representation is the politics of representation'. In my opinion, the representation of the Muslims by the media as 'terrorists' especially after the 9/11 tragedy is the reason why such stereotype is associated with Muslims.

We as audience have to bear in mind that media contents are sometimes constructed and has been constructed by text producer. However, we should consider the fact that there are also elements of truth in the media.

Who says only Asians can do Kung Fu? Johnny English, Jackie Chan's biggest rival.

References:

Chapman, S. (2000). Mass Media: Content and representation in the media. AS Sociology Revision Notes.  London: Letts Educational

Nowlan, B. (2001). Introduction to the Art and Politics of Representation. Retrieved from http://www.uwec.edu/ranowlan/art_politics.htm

Ramham424 (2011). ‘Star King’ apologizes for distorting Muslims in its latest episode. Retrieved from http://www.allkpop.com/2011/08/star-king-apologizes-for-distorting-muslims-in-its-latest-episode#disqus_thread 

Week 10: Games & Avatars in the Information Age

Qn: Do you agree that you are cyborgian in nature?

From the invention of I-Pod to Mac book and the recent I-Phone 4s, Steve Jobs and his staffs had identified that we are cyborgs who constantly want to own the latest technology available on market. According to CNN.com, more than 4 million units of I-Phone 4s has been sold in 5 days. Even though the reasons for the purchase of latest gadgets may vary, this does not deny the fact that we are heavily depended on it in as a mean to survive. According to Donna Haraway, we live in 'technoculture' whereby it is natural for us to develop a more advance technology in order to live in a better world (Mab, 2001). For examples,  pace makers and artificial implants are useful in the medical field to help treat the patient.

Before we simply say that we are cyborgs, we have to ask ourselves: are we technoculture in nature? We often assume that we are becoming cyborgs because we live in a modern world where rely on technologies to  live. This is true, of course, because the environment itself  drives us to buy an I-phone, for example. But sometimes we are unaware that it might be due to marketing of the concept of the product itself that makes us want to believe that we should own it (constructive discontent) because advertisers have understood the cyborgian identity. For instance, Siri, the voice-activated application would attract potential customers to buy an I-phone 4s because it functions as personal assistant of its owner.

Siri application. cr: STSS

All in all, I tend to agree with the statement, although  i am initially reluctant to admit the fact that I am one of the millions or even billions existing cyborgs in this world. This brought back memories from a couple of years back when i couldn't live without technology due to my addiction towards a Korean boy-band. It was one of those days when I acted like a crazy fan-girl waiting 24/7 (not really though, i have a life too!) in front of my laptop for news and the release of their songs, praising and admiring them who oozes with smexiness who I once thought  were on par with Brad Pitt as the most handsomest men on earth. Good ol' days!

References:

Gross, D. Snide, sassy Siri has plenty to say. Retreived from http://edition.cnn.com/2011/10/18/tech/mobile/siri-answers-iphone-4s/index.html?&hpt=hp_c2

Kunzru, H. (2004). You are cyborg. Retrieved from http://www.cyberpunks.org/display/472/article/

Mab (2001). Cyborg consciousness. Retrieved fromhttp://www.wired.com/wired/archive/5.02/ffharaway_pr.html

Week 8: Photography

Week 8: Photography: Reconceptualising culture, memory and space.

Qn: How do captions and cutlines reframe the meaning of an image?

Is picture worth a thousand words?  

How can you explain the picture above? You would think that it was just a blank box or rectangle. But for me, it's  more than that, I captured this photo in my home when the electricity were cut off. Apparently, some irresponsible people stole the copper wire from the power house which caused inconvenience for us and the people in the neighborhood. It happened at times when I needed to finish off my assignments and what's more, my laptop's battery was flat at that very crucial moment. God bless whoever stole the copper wire!

Involuntary earth hour -.-

The reason why I captured that picture was to remember the moment. I uploaded it to a social  network site and added it with some caption so  that it made more sense, or at least it gives meaning to it rather than just a little black box; it would be the most randomest picture ever I took. 

In photojournalism, cutlines and captions are important factor to put into a photograph because it tells a story. As people raise question upon looking at a photograph , that cutlines and captions can help them answer their curiousity. Another thing to consider is reader's behaviour whereby good cutlines would arouse the reader's interest, and he/she might want to  further gather the information by reading the whole article. So it can be said that captions and cutlines are the key information, thus it must be readable and informative or else it would lead to confusion among the readers. 

The picture above shows pictures of artist with babies whereby captions and cutlines are provided to inform the readers the story behind the photograph. The intention for photographs was an effort by Korean Social Welfare Society in their effort to help the adoption of the babies. This however, have been manipulated by fans to create some humour by changing the caption of the photo as seen below. This is also known as macro which is popular among discourse community of an online forum which certainly have different common goals from the common public.

The caption made up by the fan has changed the entire meaning of the photograph. This shows how captions and cutlines reframe the meaning of the picture. This however, cannot be applied to photojournalism because one have to consider the ethical issues in photojournalism and be as accurate as possible so that it does not break the principles of photojournalism.

References:

Ghostwriter. G-dragon and Taeyang with babies. Retrieved from  http://www.allkpop.com/2009/11/g-dragon_and_taeyang_with_babies

Photo Captions and Cutlines. Retrieved from http://web.ku.edu/~edit/captions.html

Week 7: Visual Narrative & the Media

Why is narrative important when shaping a visual image to the audience?

Narrative refers to the concept of storytelling which involves the sequence of events, characters, time and location. Narrative can be found in any media forms, from literature to film and advertising. In this journal entry, I shall use a music video to analyse its narrative and explain its importance in conveying visual messages.  

From the video that I had chosen, the narratives I derived from the story are based on the English translation of the song, the video, reviews and comments of the music video. I tend to agree of the assumption that two sisters are in fact the same person where the portrayal of blind person and white represents the inner self of the woman, whereby the mature woman connotes her outer side, thus fitting Levi’s Strauss theory of Binary Opposition. The characters/mimesis in the video however, are not played by the artists themselves and therefore the focalization is emphasized on their story narrated by the singers. 

The narrative structure of this video begins with a glimpse of the ending and only after the brief hint did the story begins according to Aristotle’s narrative structure. The scenario starts off with a blind girl who is struggling to come out from the bathtub coinciding with repetition of the words ‘’It hurt’s” and at the side, a woman is sitting on the floor, seems regretting of what she has done to her. Assuming the two girls are the same person, the whole video represents the struggle over innocence and womanhood (Subi, Seoulbeats) whereby the blind girl in white is the connotation of purity while the makeup symbolizes adulthood and maturity. According to Barthes, the symbolic code helps to engage the audience. The mise en scene is also useful for viewers to construct meaning, for instance, red lighting used to describe the mature woman’s grief and dull colour throughout the video represents melancholy. 

The narrative of the story is based on the reality of human beings; when we’re teenagers, we want to experience what it’s like to be an adult, sometimes we’re simply searching for own identity and vice versa. This is represented by the blind girl in the video who looks up to the woman, trying on makeup, and most of all, wants to be in love which can be seen when she caresses the man. The woman in turn, frustrated with the young girl and let her egoistic side ruled her feelings and actions. The reason for this is because she doesn’t want her to come into her womanhood which is highlighted in the scene where the mature woman forces the young girl to wash off the makeup. The conflict in the end made her realize that the she’s the one who should washes off her face which is depicted by the connotation of ‘cleansing cream’ and instead be someone who she really is.

The narrative analysis of music video above shows how different elements of narrative are used to create a meaningful story via visual images to entertain the audience. On the other hand, one must take into account the limitation of narrative in music videos due to the short duration time. Furthermore, Steven Archer advocates that sometimes the plot in music videos only coincide with a portion of the song lyrics.

References: 

Mediaknowall. (n.d). Introduction to Narrative. Retrieved from: http://www.mediaknowall.com/gcse/keyconceptsgcse/keycon.php?page!D=narrative

Subi. (2011). Cleansing Cream: The Innocent Girl and The Mature Woman. Retrieved from: http://seoulbeats.com/2011/11/cleansing-cream-the-innocent-girl-and-the-mature-woman/

Music Video Narrative. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.slideshare.net/ksomel/music-video-narrative