Women Identity within the media

Laura Mulvey
'The Male Gaze'

 Mulvey sees the representation of woman in film & literature (and therefore society in general) as being dominated by a male point of view. Her belief is that the world is a patriarchy and that men have the ‘active’ roles and woman ‘passive’ To look is seen as active

• Traditionally Men play active roles which drive the narrative.
• Women play passive roles and are seen as erotic objects which slow the narrative
• Men far outnumber women
• Female roles are sidelined, lead roles for women scarce

Stereotypes

• 'bimbo' - physical attractions such as figure and breasts to overpower the male.
• 'housewife'
• 'easy'
• intelligent but wants a family more.

women where given two characters types - sexually active female & powerless female Films presented images of women that were produced simply for the gratification of male viewers.

Importance? Where women had important roles they were far more likely to be shown as… - frightened - in need of protection and direction - offering support to the male lead character(s) - not independent or self driven - generally weaker - still objectified sexually “ Women, in any fully human form, have almost completely been left out of film….” L Mulvey

Ellen Ripley introduced viewers to their first self-reliant and successful science-fiction heroine Ripley encounters difficult situations which challenge her femininity Still shown as sexual object to both audience and characters. She has to fight against the patriarchal ideology of the Company, different kinds of male figures and of course, against the Alien Distinctive references to gender roles, especially to women's status in the world and to motherhood .

Changes in society As women's roles change so does media representation. Still objectified but also likely to be… Career driven Intelligent Confident Empowered Able (violent) Remember changes may be made cynically and in order to make money rather than change ideologies How many female action stars who are not attractive?


A Modern Representation

Uma Thurman represented as powerful and dominant and independent Sword stands in for and castrates phallus Adopts male characteristics of aggression Not masculinised yet in masculine roles Use of low angles, and a masculine performance

Conforms to Mulvey’s theory - job of seeking revenge family is given to the female character thus conforming to stereotypes where women are seen to be possessed with family and emotional Tight outfit allows objectification Voyeuristic pleasures by watching Thurman on her killing rampage Remember male director/industry may still mean male ideologies

June 2011

In question 1a you need to write about your work for the Foundation Portfolio and Advanced Portfolio units and you may refer to other media production work you have undertaken.

1a Explain how far your understanding of the conventions of existing media influenced the way you created your own media products. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how this understanding developed over time.

In question 1b you must write about one of your media productions only.

1b Analyse one of your coursework productions in relation to the concept of audience.



Answer one question from Section B.

Whichever question you answer you must refer to examples of at least two media areas in your answer and your answer should include reference to historical, contemporary and future media.

Media and Collective Identity

6 Discuss how one or more groups of people are represented through the media.

7 Explain the role played by the media in the construction of collective identity.

http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/type/gce/amlw/media_studies/documents/

Example Essay

Describe how you developed research and planning skills for media productions and evaluate how these skills contributed to creative decision making.

1a)

Over the two year media course we had to produce both a foundation portfolio of a school magazine and music magazine as well as an advance portfolio of a horror teaser trailer, film magazine – developing foundation skills further and a poster to advertise our trailer.

In the first year we researched existing music magazines and analysed each one so that we could gain knowledge of particular layouts, fonts and key elements that need to be contained in our production to make it successful. Research and planning allowed us to recognise ‘mastheads’ on magazines as being the most important and therefore the need to focus on a font more detailed to keep continuity with the contents page and double page spread which we also had to create.

Personally I researched ‘Rock’ magazines such as Kerrang, NME and others because I had chosen after carrying out a questionnaire to use Rock music as my theme. The real life media texts allowed me to visualise my favourite parts from each magazine – wripped sticker graphics and broken font on my own work which I then attempted to recreate within Photoshop CS4. In year one we were limited to what we could research because magazines were the only theme however, in the second year I was able to develop my ability to research real life media texts much further because we had a range of products we needed to create all under the ‘horror’ genre this time. I was able to research teaser trailers analysing my favourite and least favourite parts allowing me to plan with a mood board which I produced from a range of stills from previous horror films my ideas for my own trailer which helped me to develop my production of my products in relation to real life media texts and techniques such as restricted narration and handheld camera found in the ‘Blair Witch Project’ trailer which inspired my trailer ‘Laquem’ which is also set in the woods. Research into film documentaries like the ‘American Nightmare’ inspired me to create a product which reinforced fear and went against usual horror conventions to make it more interesting. Over the second year research became so important to achieving a product which was realistic and is now like my own distributed on on youtube as a real life media text of its own.

Real life media texts like advertising film posters were able to help me develop my Photoshop skills further because I was able to push myself with the ‘colour burn’ filters and want to create the scary atmosphere of my trailer from just an image and text which I found really fun.

Research into film magazines allowed me to develop my work from AS level so much further because I was able to produce a high standard piece of work in two weeks this year when the magazines took over 3 months last year which shows how much my skills have improves just by being able to constantly refer back to real life media texts for inspiration and even colour schemes that work well together such as black and red which in the first year I just found experimenting with. Research into horror trailers allowed me to recognise different styles of film and how we like Alfred Hitchcock could be an auteur creating new angles and ideas using generic conventions as well as unconventional representations that I have picked upon when watching films and analysing certain techniques which I have then attempted to do in Final Cut Pro when editing certain shots together to create collision cutting and changes in pace which my trailer does extremely well. I was inspired initially by the hand held camera in the

trailer REC and the fact I want as an auteur to change the stereotyped representations to be able use a female psycho killer.

Research also allowed me to produce text and intertitles that shook in order to capture my audience but narrating the story slightly so the shots when together made sense. Research into types of camera movements needed were really helpful and allowed me to completely change the pace with tracking shots and handheld camera which I noticed was used in Silent Hill and American Werewolf in London which I analysed and placed on my blog for reference as some pieces of footage I wanted to recreate including the final girl representations

7+8+3

Exam

How do contemporary media represent different collective groups in different ways?

·         Diverse representations including fiction, non-fiction and self-representation: Harry Brown, Fish Tank, The Inbetweeners, Attack the Block, The London Riots news coverage, the internet and self-mediation.

How does contemporary representation compare with that of the past?

·         Examples needed for similarities and difference.

·         Examples from the past – Quadrophenia – the film representations of Mods and Rockers.

·         Have they changes? – Plato quote…

What are the social implications of different media representations of groups of people?

·         Stereotyping - what is the impact?

·         What power does the audience have to ‘resist’?

·         Propaganda, moral panic, youth as an empty categories, cultural hegemony, Stuart Hall and reading the texts and their messages.

·         Statistics on result of these representations on attitudes and beliefs vs. the reality of the issues.

To what extent is human identity increasingly ‘mediated’?

·         Increasing media = increasing mediation?

·         Representation by others/by selves (Facebook/YouTube)

·         Be critical of who is offering the representations and for what purpose.

·         Mediated: How the media shapes your world and the way you live in it.

Guidance

·         Add your own personal opinion

·         What in your opinion is the future of representations and what are you basing this on?

·         Connections must be made between the examples/contrasts are discussed.

·         You must embed the theory into what you are saying

·         Must refer to more than one media: film, TV and newspapers…

Examiners Advice

·         Introduction – start with a quote; paraphrase it and link to issues of identity, representation and the media. State your focus (social group and texts).

·         Historical example

·         Contemporary examples

·         Connect examples together (compare/contrast)

·         Conclusion – return to start. Prediction for the future.

• Mass media contract representations of youth froma  middle class, adult perspective, for the ideological purpose of maintaining hegemony.
• Impact of new media technologies/internet - more potential for self-representation, limited impact compared to mass media.

·         Use referencing – name and year of publication given after first mention e.g. (Giroux, 1997)

·         Quote – paraphrase – critique

·         One text older than 5years

·         Other texts should be from within last 5years

·         Make a prediction for the future

Discuss the contemporary representation of a nation, region or social group in the media, using specific textual examples from at least two media to support your answer.

How far does the representation of a particular social group change over time?

Analyse the the ways in which the media represent one group of people that you have studied.

'The media do not construct collective identity, they just merely reflect it' Discuss.

How have British youth been represented through different media in the London riots?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14440865

UKIP leader Nigel Farage tweets: "Seeing pictures of looting whilst the police do nothing is frankly astonishing. That's not protesting, that's stealing."

Labour MP Diane Abbott tweets: "Message needs to go out to copycat looters that it's illegal, immoral and profoundly stupid.

Metropolitan Police Commander Adrian Hanstock said: "This is not groups of people acting on behalf of communities or with any consent.

"This is individuals who are actually attacking communities, businesses, properties and houses and actually causing a huge amount of upset and criminality."

 "Obviously there are people in this city, sadly, who are intent on violence, who are looking for the opportunity to steal and set fire to buildings and create a sense of mayhem, whether they're anarchists or part of organised gangs or just feral youth frankly, who fancy a new pair of trainers."

Brand wrote that he has been trying to understand why the violence happened in the first place, agreeing that it is 'unacceptable' and 'unjustifiable,' but also added that we 'work out why so many people feel utterly disconnected from the cities they live in.'
'These young people have no sense of community because they haven't been given one. If we don't want our young people to tear apart our communities then don't let people in power tear apart the values that hold our communities together.
“Why am I surprised that these young people behave destructively, “mindlessly”, motivated only by self-interest? How should we describe the actions of the city bankers that brought our economy to it’s knees in 2010? Altruistic? mindful? Kind? But then again, they do wear suits, so they deserve to be bailed out, perhaps that’s why not one of them has been imprisoned. And they got away with a lot more than a few fucking pairs of trainers.”

Plato: “What is happening to our young people?They disrespect their elders; they disobey their parents. They ignore the law.Theyriot in the streets, inflamed with wild notions. Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?”

The Guardian - 'Broken Britain' rhetoric fuels fears about state schools

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/sep/08/broken-britain-rhetoric-fuels-fear

How can you link cultural hegemony to this article? How does the article suggest moral panic is being caused?
Due to the government rule of Conservatives, their middle class position becomes influential into creating 'moral panic' about the lower income families. In this article they are predominately targeting state schools, causing a divide between children in different education, making other institutions (normally private education) a higher power with better standards of teaching and pupil respect. The middle class becomes dominant providing fears and invoking negative perspectives of behaviour based upon the education system, therefore providing strong views that massively exaggerate the problems in state schools.

Can you link in McRobbies Symbolic Violence Theory? How?
They have created an image of crime that represents British youth, linking lower classes and state education to these claims of violence. 'They link together issues such as bad discipline, falling standards, crime and 'feral children' with educational standards in disadvantages schools'

Press Representation

Teen Trouble 2007

• 12% of crimes committed by teens, but adults see them as the biggest threat to law and order.
• Newspapers need to educate and entertain, therefore they show negative stories that stand out.
• 3000 'mosquito' alarm that just affect teens in the UK.
• 50 years ago newspapers were paying teens to start fights and would cover it in papers.
• CCTV changed people's views and teenagers by increasing level of fear, the more camera means more criminal activity covered.

Cultivation Theory applied here, the amount of proliferation coverage makes people believe what they see is true, which interest creates moral panic.
Hypodermics needle theory, we are passive consumers and believe what we're told, this exists through the moral panic creates in the press.

'Generation ASBO'  youths become desensitised and portray themselves as what they are being represented.

Representation of Youth

IPSOS MORI Survey 2005:
40% of articles focus on violence, crime, anti-social behaviour, 71% negative

Brunel University 2007:
TV News: violent crime or celebrities, young people are only 1% of sources.

Women in Journalism 2008:
72% of articles were negative. 3.4% positive. 75% about crime, drugs and police.
Boys: Yobs, thugs, feral, hoodies, scum.

Only positive stories are about boys that died young.

What role did new media technologies, particularly social networking sites play in the London riots?
Do media cause riots or revolutions?

Media and Collective Identity

'Identity is complicated - everybody thinks they've got one' David Gauntlett

'A focus on identity requires us to play closer attention to the ways in which media and technologies are used in everyday life and theories consequences for social groups' David Buckingham

David Buckingham - he classifies identity as an ambiguous and 'slippery' term:

• Identity is something unique to each of us but also implies a relationship with a broader group.
• Identity can change according to our circumstances.
• Identify is fluid and is affected by broader changes - cultural imperialism, American influence.
• Identity becomes more important to us if we feel it is threatened - social mobility, immigration.

David Gauntlett

• Identity is complicated, however, everybody feels that they have one.
• Religion and national identities are at the heart of major international conflict.
• The average teenager can create numerous identities in a short space of time - the Internet and social networking sites.
• We like to think we are unique but Gauntlett questions whether this is an illusion and we are all much more similar than we think.

5 Key Themes

1. Creativity as a process - emotions and experience.
2. Making and Sharing - in order to feel alive and to participate in a community.
3. Happiness - through creativity and being part of a community.
4. Creativity as a social glue - middle layer between individuals and society.
5. Making your mark - putting your stamp on the world.

Collective Identity: the individuals sense of belonging to a group as part of personal identity.

Media Use in Identity Construction: Katherine Hamley

In society today the construction of a personal identity can be seen to be somewhat problematic and difficult. Young people are surrounded by influential imagery, especially that of popular media. It is no longer possible for an identity to be constructed merely in a small community and only be influenced by family. Nowadays, arguably everything concerning our lives is seen to be ‘media-saturated’. Therefore, it is obvious that in constructing an identity young people would make use of imagery derived from the popular media.
However, it is fair to say that in some instances the freedom of exploring the web could be limited depending on the choice of the parents or teachers. So, if young people have such frequent access and an interest in the media, it is fair to say that their behaviour and their sense of ‘self’ will be influenced to some degree by what they see, read, hear or discover for themselves. Such an influence may include a particular way of behaving or dressing to the kind of music a person chooses to listen to. These are all aspects which go towards constructing a person’s own personal identity.
Firstly, it is important to establish what constitutes an identity, especially in young people. The dictionary definition states the following:

“State of being a specified person or thing: individuality or personality…” (Collins Gem English Dictionary. 1991).

The mass media provide a wide-ranging source of cultural opinions and standards to young people as well as differing examples of identity. Young people would be able to look at these and decide which they found most favourable and also to what they would like to aspire to be. The meanings that are gathered from the media do not have to be final but are open to reshaping and refashioning to suit an individual’s personal needs and consequently, identity. It is said that young people:

“…use media and the cultural insights provided by them to see both who they might be and how others have constructed or reconstructed themselves… individual adolescents…struggle with the dilemma of living out all the "possible selves" (Markus & Nurius, 1986), they can imagine.” (Brown et al. 1994, 814).

When considering how much time adolescents are in contact with the popular media, be it television, magazines, advertising, music or the Internet, it is clear to see that it is bound to have a marked effect on an individual’s construction of their identity. This is especially the case when the medium itself is concerned with the idea of identity and the self; self-preservation, self-understanding and self-celebration.

 “With a simple flip of the television channel or radio station, or a turn of the newspaper or magazine page, we have at our disposal an enormous array of possible identity models.” (Grodin & Lindlof 1996)

I believe the Internet is an especially interesting medium for young people to use in order to construct their identities. Not only can they make use of the imagery derived from the Internet, but also it provides a perfect backdrop for the presentation of the self, notably with personal home pages. By surfing the World Wide Web adolescents are able to gain information from the limitless sites which may interest them but they can also create sites for themselves, specifically home pages. Constructing a home page can enable someone to put all the imagery they have derived from the popular media into practice. For example:

“…constructing a personal home page can be seen as shaping not only the materials but also (in part through manipulating the various materials) one’s identity.” (Chandler 1998)

This is particularly important as not only are young people able to access such an interesting and wide ranging medium, but they are also able to utilise it to construct their own identity. In doing this, people are able to interact with others on the Internet just as they could present their identities in real life and interact with others on a day to day basis.
In conclusion it can be seen that the popular media permeates everything that we do. Consequently, the imagery in the media is bound to infiltrate into young people’s lives. This is especially the case when young people are in the process of constructing their identities. Through television, magazines, advertising, music and the Internet adolescents have a great deal of resources available to them in order for them to choose how they would like to present their ‘selves’. However, just as web pages are constantly seen to be 'under construction’, so can the identities of young people. These will change as their tastes in media change and develop. There is no such thing as one fixed identity; it is negotiable and is sometimes possible to have multiple identities. The self we present to our friends and family could be somewhat different from the self we would present on the Internet, for example. By using certain imagery portrayed in the media, be it slim fashion models, a character in a television drama or a lyric from a popular song, young people and even adults are able to construct an identity for themselves. This identity will allow them to fit in with the pressures placed on us by society, yet allow them to still be fundamentally different from the next person.


________________________________________________________________________________

Young people are surrounded by influential imagery – popular media
With television programmes such as The Only Way Is Essex it can be compared to magazines showing glamour models, providing impact upon women on how they are supposed to look. Young people are constantly involved with media products that each advertise and reveal different identities which young people look to aspire to be or take ideas to influence their own personal identity.


It is no longer possible for an identity to just be constructed in a small community and influenced by a family


Everything concerning our lives is ‘media saturated’ (What does this mean?)

Online Media

 

Keeping in touch with long distance friends relatives.
Promote yourself in a positive light, advertising/promoting
Knowledge. Entertainment.

Bullying. Stalking
Addictive. Lack of privacy.

What new forms of social interaction have media technologies enabled?

• globalisation
• sharing of information
• development of self identity/self presentation
• collective intelligence
• recirculate messages
• increased voice on influencing society/business
• awareness - band/skills
• user generated content
• increased diversity within cultures
• online media focus - identity, conversations, sharing, presence, relationships, reputation and groups. Kietzmann et al (2011)

'Online media are especially suitable to construct and develop several identities of self' Turkle, 1998.

Digital identity

• a person has not just one stable and homogenous idenity
• idenioty consists of several fragments that permanently change
• multiple, but coharent (Turkle, 1998)
• a live long developing and new conceptualized patchwork (Doring, 1999)

Social Class: Reinforcing Cultural Hegemony/Dominant Ideologies

Working class British youths are generally represented as being violent, brutal, unapologetic criminals - Harry Brown, Kidulthood, Quadrophenia and Eden Lake.
VS
Middle class British youths are generally represented as being more law abiding, conscience citizens - The Inbetweeners

• Antagonists are always the working class youths and middle class adults are positioned to be the protagonists.

Media Effect Theories

Hypodermic model

The media injecting their ideas into the consumers. Suggests we as consumers have no power in how the media influences us, passive consumers like robots believing everything we hear in the media.

Cultivation Theory

If you see enough violence and criminal behaviour among youth, the more likely you are to believe that it is realistic and occurs in society at that level.

Copy Cat Theory

Influenced by what you see in the media and copy the actions within films, TV etc. Puts an idea into youths causing them to go out and do the same.

Moral Panic

Actions within the media puts fear into society that these events happen in reality. Puts British youths as the antagonists and the public services as the hero.

Contemporary Social Realism

• Social realist films attempt to portray issues facing ordinary people in their social situations.
• try to show that society and the capitalist system leads the exploitation or the poor.
• These groups are shown as victims of the system rather than being totally responsible for their own bad behaviour.

'These places represent everywhere in Britain, where relationships are broken down and where people have isolated and disconnected. Their Britishness is their culturally specific address to audiences at home' (Murray, 2008)

Audience

• Social realist films which address social problems in this country offer a different version of 'collective identity' than British films which are also aimed at American audience. Films like Notting Hill and Love Actually reach a bigger audience than the lower budget social realist films.
• If more people see the more commercial films, consider which version of our collective identity is more powerful or has more impact.

Analysing Representation of Collective Identity

When comparing how British and our collective identity is represented in films consider these:

• Who is being represented?
• Who is representing them?
• How they are represented?
• What seems to be the intentions of these representations?
• What is the dominant discourse?
• What range of readings are there?

The media contributes to our sense of 'collective identity' but there are many different versions that change over time. Representations can cause problems for the groups represented because marginalised groups have little control over their representation/stereotyping. The social context in which the film/TV programme is made, influences the dominant discourse of the film.

Active Audience Theory
Encoding - Decoding (Stuart Hall, 1980) 

• Encoding - Decoding is an active audience theory developed by Stuart Hall which examines the relationship between a text and its audience.
• Encoding is the process by which a text is constructed by its producers.
• Decoding is the process by which the audience reads, understands and interprets a text.
• Hall states that texts are polysemic, meaning they may be read differently by different people depending on their identity, cultural knowledge and opinions.

 Preferred Reading/Dominant Hegemonic

When an audience interprets the message as it was meant to be understood, they are operating in the dominant code. The position of professional broadcasters and media producers is that messages are already signified within the hegemonic manner to which they are accustomed. Professional codes for media organisations serve to contribute to this type of industrial psychology. The producers and the audience are in harmony, understanding, communicating, and sharing mediated signs in the established mindset of framing.

 Negotiated Reading

Not all audiences may understand what media producers take for granted. There may be some acknowledgement of differences in understanding:

• Decoding within the negotiated version contains a mixture of adaptive and oppositional elements: it acknowledges the legitimacy of the hegemonic definitions to make the grand significations (abstract), while, at a more restricted, situational (situated) level, it makes its own ground rules - it operates with exceptions to the rule.
• While the hegemonic view and dominant definitions will tie events to; 'grand totalizations'; as Hall calls them, negotiated positions are the result of the audience struggling to understand the dominant position or experiencing dissonance (conflict) with those views.

Oppositional Reading/ 'counter-hegemonic'

• When media consumers understand the contextual and literary inflections of a text yet decode the message by a completely oppositional means, this is the globally contrary position/oppositional reading.
• The de-totalization of that text enables them to rework it to their preferred meaning. This requires operating with an oppositional code which can understand dominant hegemonic positions while finding frameworks to refute them. Hall feels that this position is necessary to begin a struggle in discourse or the 'politics of signification'. (communication, the way in which meaning is given through signs and signifiers)

Any representation is a mixture of:
1. The thing itself.
2. The opinions of the people doing the representation.
3. The reaction of the individual to the representation.
4. The context of the society in which the representation is taking place.

Stereotyping

The fact that we naturally see the world in this kind of shorthand way, with connections between different character traits, allows the media to create simplistic representations which we find believable. Implicit personality theory explains this process…

• As humans we use our own unique storehouse of knowledge about people when we judge them.
• Our past experience is more important than the true features of the actual personality that we are judging — traits exist more in the eye of the beholder than in reality.
• We have each a system of rules that tells us which characteristics go with other characteristics.
• We categorise people into types (e.g. workaholic, feminist etc.) to simplify the task of person perception.
• Once we have in our minds a set of linked traits which seem to us to go together, they form a pattern of connections that can be called a prototype. In other words the mix of traits that we may consider “typical” of feminists are a prototype of what a feminist is like to us.
• If we encounter someone in reality or in the media who seems to fit neatly into a prototype, we feel reassured. It confirms our stereotyped view — we do not need to think further.
• Also once a few of the traits seem to fit our prototype, we will immediately bundle onto the person the rest of the traits from the prototype even if we do not know if they fit them in reality.
• Research has shown that if we find people who do not fit into our prototypes, we will form very strong often impressions of them — it is surprising to us and disconcerting — it forces us to think more deeply.
• On the other hand, if it is at all possible, we will try to twist the truth to fit in with our prototype, often ignoring traits which do not fit into our neatly imagined pattern of characteristics. This will particularly happen as time passes and we have time to forget things that do not fit in. This can lead to enormous differences between our perceptions of people and the reality.
• All of this distortion happens naturally in our minds before the media have had their chance to simplify and distort. We do a lot of the business of stereotyping ourselves. It is almost as if we conspire with the media to misunderstand the world.

Dominant Ideology of young people

Eastenders: Martin Fowler
First character to be born in the programme. Stereotypical youth from many news stories. Anti-social behaviour with gangs. Teenage, unmarried father. Prison sentence for manslaughter. Continued criminal behaviour upon release.

Moral panic

Stanley Cohen (1972)Studied youth groups in 1960s.A moral panic occurs when society sees itself threatened by the values and activities of a group who are stigmatised as deviant and seen as threatening to mainstream society’s values, ideologies and /or way of life.Mods & Rockers (1960s), football hooligans, muggers, vandals, mobile-phone snatchers...
Working class males: Represented as yobs. Stuart Hall (1978) argues that the negative representation of young people is deliberate as it justifies social control by authority figures such as the police and government. The media has a key role in this ‘social production’ of news.
From media text to legislation: Occurrence of deviant act or social phenomenon. Act or problem widely reported in media: news outlets; internet chat rooms; fictional narratives; video games…Call for government control either from legislation/policy initiatives or the more vigilant operation of already existing social controls.
Jamie Bulger No evidence was presented that either boy had watched ‘Child’s Play 3’. The judge made the connection and this was picked up by the tabloid press. It led to a change in the law so the BBFC now has to take into account ‘the influence’ of videos as well as their content.

FISH TANK (2009)

Directed: Andrea Arnold

• Stereotypical look of the working class, with the colloquial language.
• The area in which they live is concrete, shows a sense of escapism to the country, seeing water.
• Female protagonist, fighting against males and the formality that her mother represents of single parents with an exchange of males in her life.
• Outspoken female, confidence and the ability to fight back, the background in which she lives 'dog eat dog world'.
• Represents young people in a 'broken Britain' sympathetic as she didn't choose the environment she was brought into, cultivated this identity.
• Is less exaggerated than Harry Brown, social realism with no torturing etc.
• Can reach to middle and working class, so that an understanding can be made and similarities in defending the life of the working class.
• reflect middle class anxiety, threat to working class to their hegemonic dominance. Main adult characters are seen as working class.

THE INBETWEENERS (2011)

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How are British youth represented in both Quadrophenia and Harry Brown?

How are British youth represented in both Quadrophenia and Harry Brown?

In the films of Quadrophenia and Harry Brown we look at the issues within youth subcultures, with a universal outlook even though taken from different eras in time, as Quadrophenia set in the 1960’s and Harry Brown the 21^st century, a close link can still be shown. We see a high sense of rebellion and violent acts as the youth population become more dominant as seen in Harry Brown, requesting more say in social matters or creating their own social constructs as shown in Quadrophenia with the Mods and Rockers. All youth subcultures that are depicted in these films challenges the upper/middle class, choosing to object to capitalist approach to society and not conforming to the norm, creating what they think is a unique social group. The fall of these subcultures are shown in both Harry Brown and Quadrophenia, as ‘justice’ is made, destroying the youth’s perception of freedom.

The gang ideologies (peace, Rebellion against parents, Radicalism -reactions against the post war,

Conformity and rebellion, attitude to capitalism and consumerism).

Discuss identity in both films

What role does the parent play in both films?

Have the representations changed? Discuss similarities and differences

How Does Contemporary Representation Compare to Previous Time Periods?

What is a youth subculture?

• a group of individuals whoa re united through a common value system and tastes (clothes, music, politics etc.)
• a group who are also positioned outside of the mainstream and who unify as a response to the mainstream.

What are the values of a subculture?

Link to values... how the subculture view:

• Conformity and rebellion
• Attitude to capitalism and consumerism
• 'Tribal' rivalry
• Traditional or 'neophile' (a person who loves novelty, one who likes trends; person who accept the future enthusiastically and enjoys changes and evolution)
• Ideology in 1950 and 1960s - peace, rebellion against parents, radicalism - reactions against the post war.

• Many groups are involved in protest and resistance against the mainstream.
• Teens will often move between subcultures and older youths mix and match styles/values from a mix of subcultures.
• Adults can appear to conform for most of the working week, but re-enter the subculture at a specific time (weekend, festivals)

Subculture

• In the 21st century the 'dominant meaning systems' that define the mainstream are crumbling.
• 'There is no mainstream. There are many streams' Mainstream is in continuous flux.
• Nothing for teens to react against - instead driven by other motives; and these must be understood by their own individual terms.

Teddy Boys 1950s

• Rock n Roll, kids were blown away by the new sound.
• Drainpipe trousers and velvet collars and sideburns.
• Effect was huge despite the minority.

Mods 1960s

• Ben Sherman, Parka, Royal Air Force symbol.
• Ride customised Vespas and Lambrettas
• Drugs, pills and speed etc.
• The Who, The Kinks, The Rolling Stones

Skinheads 1960s

• working class youths
• close cropped/shaven heads.
• Jamaican rude boys and British mods in terms of fashion
• attitudes towards race and skin colour became factors of their culture; neonazi.

Punks 1970s

• emerged from USA, UK and Australia
• punk rock, listening to recordings or live concerts of a loud agressive nature.
• non-conformity to politics etc.
• Sex Pistols.

The Cultural Revolution 1950s: Britain was entering an increased freedom after the war, old social strustures started to be challenged by by the youth who were previously confined. American way of life became key apsirations of the British public (deregualtion of broadcasting in 1954 and availability of colour magazines) as we reached a worldwide economic boom post-war. The Labour government was defeated by the Conservatives markign a shift in government from state control to more individual freedom 'Set the People Free' slogan.
American culture was seen by some as a symptom of cultural degeneration and offered the British a rich and desirable future. Cultural imperialism - promoting, distinguishing, separating or artificially injecting the culture of one society into another (American influence on Britain post-war)
Teenagers came a recognised social group and in turn beacme more affluent, they demanded goods that could differentiate them from the adult world and express their group identity. Manufacturers met these demands, increasing the interest in fashion and music, making brands relate to a culture.

Social Mobility: there was a general feeling of optimism but also a sense of uncertainty, through the upward movement of media, financial and cultural factors. New freedoms and liberties had been gained, but as a result society had become more fragmented and less predictable.