SUGGESTED THEORISTS

You have requested a shortlist of theorists for the Media Texts and Contexts exam.

You will also no doubt recall the lesson on theorists on 8 March on this blog.

By the time you sit the exam, you will have covered a unit on Media Ecology and studied additional theorists, which will be also be relevant to your AS exam work

Theories of Media Language:

·       Semiotics: Barthes  - (denotation, connotation), representation

·       narratology, including Todorov   

..      Propp - narrative theory 

        genre theory, including Neale.

·       structuralism, including Lévi-Strauss - binary opposition

Theories of Industries:

·       power and media industries, including Curran and Seaton.

·       theories of regulation including those of Livingstone and Lunt

·       theories of cultural industries including those of Hesmondhalgh.

 

Theories of Representation:

·       theories of representation, stereotyping including Hall

·       theories of identity including Gauntlett

L      the male gaze - Laura Mulvey

·

 Theories of Industries:

·       power and media industries, including Curran and Seaton.

·       theories of regulation including those of Livingstone and Lunt

·       theories of cultural industries including those of Hesmondhalgh.

 

Shirky -

argues that ‘everybody make media and that the industry is increasingly driven by audience feedback systems'

 

 

Theories of Audience:

·       media effects, including Gauntlett

·       cultivation theory, including Gerbner

·       reception theory, including Hall - (how audiences decode texts) - active / passive audiences

·       theories of fandom, including Jenkins

·       theories of ‘end of audience’, including Shirky 

      Blumler and Katz - audiences use media to gratify needs (= democratization / active audiences) 

Henry Jenkins - participatory culture Prosumers / prosumerism 

Dan Gillmor - the audience is now the producer.  We are a nation of Netizens and prosumers