Media Theory for A Level

Mark Dixon is an Eduqas A Level examiner and Head of Media and Film at Durham Sixth Form Centre. He is also a freelance author, and has written for The Guardian, TES, Media Magazine and Teach Secondary as well as authoring a range of digital resources for Eduqas Media.

Media language

1. Semiotics: Roland Barthes

Concept 1: Denotation and connotation

Concept 2: The media’s ideological effect

2. Structuralism: Claude Lévi-Strauss

Concept 1:Binary oppositions

Concept 2: Binary oppositions and ideological significance

3. Narratology: Tzvetan Todorov

Concept 1: The three-act ideal

Concept 2: The ideological effects of story structure

4. Genre theory: Steve Neale

Concept 1: Repetition and difference

Concept 2: Industry effects on genre-driven content

5. Postmodernism: Jean Baudrillard

Key concept: The real and the hyperreal

Media representation

6. Representation: Stuart Hall

Concept 1: Media representation processes

Concept 2: Stereotypes and power

7. Postcolonial theory: Paul Gilroy

Concept 1: Racial binaries, otherness and civilisationism

Concept 2: The legacy of empire and British identity

8. Feminist theory: Liesbet van Zoonen

Concept 1: The female body as spectacle

Concept 2: Masculinity in the media

9. Intersectionality: bell hooks

Concept 1: Interconnected oppression

Concept 2: hooks’ call to action

10. Gender as performance: Judith Butler

Concept 1: Gendered identities are constructed through repetition and ritual

Concept 2: Gender subversion and gendered hierarchies

11. Media and identity: David Gauntlett

Concept 1: Traditional and post-traditional media consumption

Concept 2: Reflexive identity construction

Media industries

12. Ownership effects: James Curran and Jean Seaton

Concept 1: Media concentration

Concept 2: Effects of concentration on media content

Concept 3: Diverse ownership creates diverse products

13. Regulation: Sonia Livingstone and Peter Lunt

Concept 1: Citizen and consumer models of media regulation

Concept 2: Regulation in the globalised media age

14. The culture industry: David Hesmondhalgh

Concept 1: Maximising profits and minimising risks

Concept 2: The effects of the internet revolution are difficult to diagnose

Media audiences

15. Media modelling effects: Albert Bandura

Concept 1: Violent behaviours are learned through modelling

Concept 2: Audiences copy media modelling

16. Cultivation theory: George Gerbner

Concept 1: Fear cultivation

Concept 2: Media consumption leads audiences to accept mainstream ideologies

17. Reception theory: Stuart Hall

Concept 1: Encoding and decoding

Concept 2: Dominant, negotiated and oppositional decoding

18. Fandom: Henry Jenkins

Concept 1: Fan appropriation

Concept 2: Audience–producer convergence in the digital age

Concept 3: Fans use participatory culture to effect wider social change

19. The end of audience: Clay Shirky

Concept 1: Everybody makes the media

Concept 2: Everyday communities of practice

Bibliography

Index