Studying media representations therefore involves interpreting the creation of new forms or ways of understanding reality. As Stuart Hall (1997) argues, this approach differs from more traditional notions of studying media representations as “false” or “misrepresentations” of some reality or experience. This concept of “misrepresentation” assumes that there is a “true” or “fixed” meaning associated with some external “reality” against which a media text can be compared as either “true” or “fixed” to that “reality.”

However, the meaning of that external “reality” itself is a construction of media. Media texts are not simply external ways of representing a reality “out there.” They themselves constitute the meaning of reality. The cultural meaning of “party time” is created by beer ads, which portray social practices that are valued by participants who believe that drinking beer constitutes “having a good time.” Click here to hear more on what Stuart Hall has to say about this.

Dan Chandler argues that this more constructivist approach moves away from analysis of stereotyping or bias — that presupposes some fixed, objective meaning to an analysis of the institutional forces or systems that use representations to construct and maintain their own ideological agendas. He therefore focuses attention on the “systems of representations” that work to create certain cultural meanings through media texts to demonstrate that certain practices are “natural” or “common sensical.” As he notes: “A key in the study of representation concern is with the way in which representations are made to seem ‘natural’. Systems of representation are the means by which the concerns of ideologies are framed; such systems ‘position’ their subjects.”

Museums, particularly anthropological or ethnographic museums that portray past cultural worlds, can construct a version of those worlds that reflect certain cultural attitudes about those worlds (Walsh, 1992). From this constructivist notion of representation, these museum exhibits are neither mirroring or reflecting past cultures; they are actually creating a version of those cultures. It is often the case that these exhibits of Asian, African, South American, and/or Third World countries often reflected a Western, colonialist discourses that positioned. For example, museums, as systems of representations, portray cultures in ways that are assumed to be “scientific.” During the 19th and early 20th century, European and American museums often exhibited “other” cultures in as inferior, primitive, or exotic. These exhibits reflected a Western political and ideological perspective of colonized sections of the world (Lidchi, 1997). For example, an exhibit at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair portrayed the Igorots, a Philippine tribe, as purchasing and eating dog meat, a representation that only served to portray them as “primitive” or “savage” (Lidchi, 1997, p. 196).

Media representations and cultural models

Hall also argues that representations reflect cultural values. He notes that cultures serve ways of making sense of the world. For example, they provide us with “maps of meaning” or frameworks for classifying the world according to some hierarchical value system — what is most versus least valued; who has power and who does not; what practices are or are not condoned or sanctioned. These “maps of meaning” or cultural models serve to order people’s lives. As Gee (2001) notes:

Cultural models tell people what is typical or normal from the perspective of a particular Discourse . . . [they] come out of and, in turn, inform the social practices in which people of a Discourse engage. Cultural models are stored in people’s minds (by no means always consciously), though they are supplemented and instantiated in the objects, texts, and
practices that are part and parcel of the Discourse (p. 720).

For example, value stances towards social practices in schools ultimately reflect cultural models. Much of American schooling revolves around cultural models of “individualism” associated with middle-class values (Bellah, et al., 1996). Within a middle-class value system, the individual is assumed to be an autonomous being who is not dependent on institutional support. Being a complete individual is equated with being independent from constraints or forces, while being an incomplete individual is equated with being dependent on institutions (Jung, 2001). Within schooling, the ability to act on one’s own or being self-disciplined is highly valued in school as a marker of individuality; lack of “self-discipline” is equated with an inability to “control one’s self” and one’s emotions. Emotional expression/outbursts are perceived as problematic and as needed to be controlled (Jung, 2001).

Module 5: Word document

What are Media Representations?

Why Study Media Representations?

Studying Media Representations

Methods for Analyzing Media Representations

Representation and Censorship

Representations and Public Relations / Promotions

Studying Representations of Social Types or Groups

Representations of Femininity

Masculinity

Masculinity and Sports

Gays / Lesbians

Racial and Ethnic Groups

Class

Representations of Different Age Groups or Occupations

Occupations

Institutions

Instructional Activity

References

Teaching Activities