Representation in Media

Being judged by other people is just part of life. You get judged on what you wear, eat, say or do. This is no different in media. Over the years in media people have judged certain types of groups a particular way. Trends starts to form in how particular demographics are portrayed in media. For example, blondes in media are mainly shown to be naive, foolish and uneducated. These specific characteristics have been ingrained in our way of thinking for us to subconsciously perceive such feelings when we see a blonde in a media product. Every group that you can think of has some sort of stereotype attached to it. Representation and stereotypes almost go hand in hand in media.

The expenditure of storytelling

Many groups want proper representation but with that comes the expense of maybe a compelling story or an enthralling scene in which if you gave such characters a true to life personality, their decision making may be different leading to less captivating story lines. Story telling becomes the victim. Now I’m not saying all stereotypes are good because then we have an ethical problem on our hands. This means black males being portrayed as criminals in every modern media text or White people unleashing terror during the crusades in every biblical text. Of course these are two extremes ends of certain groups but it’s important in knowing the bar so you know how far to push it.

The question is then, how does a media text come to a conclusion on how to represent an individual group? Well producers look at Age, Gender, Race/Ethnicity, financial status, Job, Culture and nationality. More is looked at but gaining an understanding of these main points allows great freedom to really nail a precised characterisation. Media products use crafty techniques to manoeuvre our minds into thinking about a character in the way they want us to.

Old men with white hair and walking sticks are good instances to give. These tangibles don’t stretch to all old men but it’s a good start in fastracking the thinking process of audiences. Signs and Symbols is the correct media term to describe this. A blonde wearing a skirt, nerd wearing glasses, grandfather in an armchair or a British male with a top hat are some more examples to add context. It’s strange that we don’t pay closer attention to these factors because it highlights elements of our society that we overlook. Why is the blonde wearing the skirt and not something else? Why is a nerd always visually impaired and why does a British man still wear a top hat when it’s neither fashionable or practical in modern Britain?

Experiences influence common perception

Representation in Media Texts is formulated through life experiences and existing stereotypes. The blonde in the skirt exist because enough women that are blonde wear skirts often to sway that stereotype. The same applies to nerds, educated people tend to spend more time at a computer and this increases the risk of visual impairment. Finally the top hat symbol is a sign of the upper class in London. Albeit not as common now as back in the Victorian age but still remains a prominent symbol of London and British culture.Upon analysing these three representations you must look at many important questions to deem how you got to these defined representations.

Firstly, Who or what is being represented and who is the preferred audience for this representation? Let’s take the Blonde Women in the skirt as our example. This means the answer to the first question is completed, we have our talent. The next question asks about audiences. Now a blonde in a skirt isn’t going to be a renowned figure in products where the target audience is predominantly for children but on the contrary it will be a possibility for products which appeal to a teen audience. Second set of questions are, what are they doing? Is their activity presented as typical or atypical? Are they comforting to genre expectations or other conventions?

From this point our example is thread bear with information so we’re going add some on to it. First question What are they doing? Well particularly in horror films the blonde is promiscuous and devious, add on the skirt and you are left with a blonde looking for a good time. Are there the blondes actions typical? This is difficult because real life blondes aren’t dressing provocatively but, in a text, and in a media sense, yes, they’re feeding the stereotype. Are they doing what is normally expected of that group? Again yes, blondes in horror films don’t see the threat that lies before them and more often than not, going to become trapped by the antagonist or the evil force.

The cinematic pull of Blondes

Moving forward, the next sets of questions are Why are they present? What purpose do they serve? What are they communicating by their presence? What’s the preferred reading? Well, in the horror genre, the blonde is present for one reason, Sex appeal. Next is their purpose. Well if your role is to look good in the text, your primary focus and purpose is to be as sexy as possible. That is until you meet your inevitable demise. The following question is how are they communicating their presence? Words that come to mind are seduction and manipulation. They move from Male character to Male characters with hopes of gaining something from them. That something is purely based on what text it is. That something could be love or money or something entirely different, it all depends on the text. If it’s a horror text, then typically we’re going to be talking about sex or money; if it’s a drama then maybe a key prop within the plot might be the item in question. Lastly What is the preferred read of Blondes? This question is simple, it goes back to what we talked about earlier. Dumb and naïve. There aren’t many ways you can read a blonde in a horror text other than these attributes. Unless the blonde is the main protagonist you can systematically say you will find these traits in a blonde character.

So that’s just a brief look into media representations. Some fascinating information surfaced to me when researching this section of media theory. It has made me change my perception on some characters within media, has it done the same for you?

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