Old Specification Module 5 - Mass Media

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Television

Popular Music

The Internet

Magazines

We are interested in television, popular music, the Internet and magazines because they are very powerful transmitters of culture. They both reflect and affect our culture if we live within it. It is not possible to view these forms of mass media in a neutral way and we will be considering how they reflect British culture in particular, but also considering American and European popular music, television and use of the Internet, as a reflection of their culture. You will see links to these separate areas in the left-hand margin.

The Marxist perspective is deeply suspicious of the mass media and sees it as a vehicle for manipulating the masses, the mass culture theorists see television, for example, as ‘chewing gum for the eyes’ and the feminists see music videos as a perpetuation of patriarchy in both its representation of different genders and the composition of the television and popular industry!

We will be concentrating on two of the four theoretical perspectives in particular, in the work we do in class but you should pursue the others yourself when you collect examples of television which represents ethnic concerns and gender concerns. For example, how are masculinity and femininity represented within contemporary popular culture such as television and popular music? What recurring characteristics do we see appearing throughout different popular texts? Do certain cultural forms or genres give rise to certain representations of gender and not others? Is it more correct to think not of femininity and masculinity in the singular, but femininities and masculinities in the plural? What are the differences between men’s popular culture and popular culture produced for women? How is gender constructed, not only through the images of men and women within these genres, but also through the construction of their consumers’ interests, tastes and preoccupations?

National stereotypes will be considered, both of English and non-English origin, in relation to the construction of an identity based on exclusions. How does television contribute to the construction of national identity? How should we conceptually distinguish between 'race', 'ethnicity' and 'national identity'? Is it possible to identify a mobilisation of Englishness in the popular culture produced and consumed in this country? Or is the question of a clear English national identity untenable in an era of globalised postmodernity, given the significant popularity of American culture within Britain today?