Exam Practice - Desensitisation

Desensitisation - The theory that repeated exposure to something shocking such as violence will lead an audience to be less affected by it.

"Yet, no matter how well-intentioned, the frequent broadcasting of the brutal images of war may bring about a progressive desensitisation and brutalisation of those viewing them." John Peacock The Independent.


An idea formulated by Jo and Berkowitz in 1967, which was then later revised in 1994. The revised formulation of this theory focused on the belief that media violence might prime thoughts of aggressive behavior and, consequently, make actual aggressive behavior more likely.

Exam Practice - Walt Disney

Walt Disney was founded in 1923. The Walt Disney Company and its affiliated companies produce unparalleled entertainment experiences based on the rich legacy of quality creative content and exceptional storytelling. The Walt Disney Company, together with its subsidiaries and affiliates, is a leading diversified international family entertainment and media enterprise with four business segments: media networks, parks and resorts, studio entertainment and consumer products. With the creation of Mickey Mouse and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the world's first full-length animated feature, the Disney name quickly became synonymous with quality entertainment for the whole family.

The Walt Disney Studios distributes motion pictures under Walt Disney Pictures - which includes Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar Animation Studios and DisneyToon Studios - Touchstone Pictures and Hollywood Pictures. Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures International serves as the studio's international distribution arm. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment distributes Disney and other film titles to the rental and sell-through home entertainment markets worldwide. Disney Theatrical Productions, one of the largest producers of Broadway musicals, also includes Disney Live Family Entertainment and Disney on Ice. Disney Music Group distributes original music and motion picture soundtracks under Walt Disney Records and Hollywood Records.

Advancing its strategy of developing outstanding creative content, Disney acquired renowned computer animation leader Pixar in an all-stock transaction completed in May 2006. In February 2007, The Walt Disney Studios joined forces with Academy Award-winning director Robert Zemeckis and his ImageMovers partners/producers Jack Rapke and Steve Starkey to form ImageMovers Digital, a new state of the art studio devoted exclusively to the production of performance capture projects.

Task 3

Media representations favour those with power at the expense of those without. To what extent do you think this statement is true?
In today’s society the media industry is still controlled by the dominant sex of the male. Men in media are shown to be the ones with a higher status and power. This results in women to be shown as a weaker sex and allow the male pride control.

As we look at the norms in society we have become aware of the hegemonic class who have created these acceptances in life. Simon Cowell is a prime example of power in the media industry, through his many talent shows such as the X factor and Britain’s got talent. He is a man with a lot of power which is shown through his confident speech and serious tone of voice. He represents what he thinks a popstar should be, therefore entailing the key traits for someone who wants to become a popstar. He believes a popstar is someone who conforms to a mainstream audience. This is how people with power are allowed to create general stereotypes for the people of a lower status.

In this recent time, homosexuals have become increasingly publicized in the media due to the awareness brought out by celebrities and the acceptance by the public. On the TV there has been a slightly increasing tendency to feature gay stereotypes, though they are rarely shown enjoying happy lives, stories about gays tend to reinforce conventional values. Even when gay men are portrayed the central focus tends to be on the reaction of others to this as a “problem”. The representations of homosexuals are slowly becoming accepted by society and are being shown more in the media. Celebrities such as Elton John are not afraid of their sexuality which sends messages to the public to be proud. This highlights that people with power influence other, not necessarily at their expense. On the other hand, the representation of homosexuals in newspapers and television is often wrongly constructed as those with power tend to subordinate other groups in order to remain powerful. In television shows such as “Eastenders”', homosexuals are often represented as being loud and promiscuous, for example the character Christian. By subordinating these characters, those in power would want to keep their position at the top and inject ideologies towards the audience that homosexuals are bad for society.

Lad’s mags have become increasingly popular and tend to characterize women as breasts and bottom for men to gaze at. They are seen to be misogynistic and represent women in subversive ways. They hold features such as virgin competitions, “babe” competitions and offering breast enlargements for women. Lad’s mags usually promote the aspiration in young women to become glamour models and promise fame and fortune, in the exchange of half-naked photos. These emphasize magazines only do this for the expense of women and which to only make money from showing their bodies off. The perpetual representations of women as sex objects are dangerous and are shown at the expense of these women.

The representation of women in music videos tend to favour the best, as particularly in hip hop and rap videos, women are also objectified in order to represent the lead male singer as dominant. In Rihanna's “Rude Boy” video, she is dressed in short, revealing clothing and is dancing around the man which is connoting sexual themes. As well as this, her body is fetished in order to arouse the male, as the video and others by artists such as 50 cent and Young Money feature women wearing not much clothing and being controlled by the male figure. Generally, most of these videos subordinate women to allow the dominance of the male.

To conclude, media representations do favour those with power at the expense of those without, as representations of women, homosexuals and business men are often pass judgement and make decisions in the media, as well as other platforms. By separating these two divides in the media, the leaders inject messages into the audience. However, alternative representations of these groups in the media, for example gay people in television shows do show some power and being accepted by society.

Task 5

Dominant Reading - The Simpsons is a family program shown on channel 4, which can be attracts many audiences and is aimed to entertain. The genre is mainly comedy and real life.

Negotiated Reading - In the Simpsons women are the passive characters while men are the ones who go to work. School is shown as important but still a place for misbehaviour.

Oppositional Reading - The Simpsons is a show which contains many negative stereotypes and has humour which can offend some religions and ethics. The show contains poor role models and doesn’t really educate the audience.

The reading that is closest to me is the oppositional reading because The Simpsons is mainly used to entertain rather than educate those.

Task 4

In this scene from Scarface (1983) it shows the audience that violence is acceptable. The medium shots of Tony Montana with the machine gun show power and strength, the protagonist feels in power whilst holding the gun, it also acts as a phallic symbol to emphasise his manliness. The adult audience see the text as negatively, as it shows violence. This scene also contains bad content that children may pick up and copy, referring to the copy cat theory, which believes to inject the audience with actions and then they copy those actions.

The constant sound of gunfire may result in the audience to become desensitised to violence. Yet it can be argued that the audience could watch the film in order to be educated on the consequences of drugs and power. The audience may watch the film in order to escape from real life, as the audience's feel they need to watch a film to relax and forget their own problems. As the gangsters are wealthy and represented as powerful, audiences may aspire to these characters and do things like them.

Task 1

1. The teenagers in the video game for Bully are a negative representation. The first teenage boy we see is objectified as being a child of misbehaviour and disobedience, this shown by the way he is dressed as he has with his shirt tucked out, his tie loosely hung around his neck, his shaven head and the way he talks and openly gestures. The use of a long shot as we watch him sliding down a hand rail immediately gives the sense of insolence and disrespect; this shows his character to be off-putting which therefore creates a stereotypical view upon all teenagers to act the same. The medium shots of the “bully” harassing a teacher and school kids emphasise towards the audience teenage boys are all troublesome. While children play this game they can be injected with the same ideologies of misbehaviour and disrespect and begin to believe this behaviour is suitable. Some teenagers may copy attitudes from the “Bully” and bring them to their own lives, such as sneaking around and creating fires in the classroom. Girls are also represented negatively in this game trailer as we see a young girl who is laid back whilst talking about “dirty pictures” and connoting sex references. This gives the idea that sex is fine and accepted. Teenagers are represented as creating havoc and trouble.

Similarly, in the opening for “Skins”, teenagers are seen as disobedient and mischievous. The quick montage shots show the teenagers smoking drugs, homosexual themes and a general laid back attitude. This immediately emphasises moral panics for adults as they believe all teenagers are influenced by what they see on the television and can adopt bad behaviour, also creating a negative view on society’s issues. This can highlight the theory by Stanley Cohen who speaks of when a society sees itself threatened by the values and activities of a group, in this case teenagers. On the other hand, producers of Skins may be creating such programmes to educate kids on the dangers and real life situations children face now a days.

The representation of teenagers in both texts may cause moral panics as adults may feel that teenagers are troublesome and can be injected with ideologies that drugs, causing havoc and sex are all acceptable in today’s society.

2. Both texts can be seen to show moral panics. The representation of teenagers in the trailer for “Bully” can demonstrate moral panics. The game emphasises the stereotype of teenage boys to be troublesome. The representation of the “Bully” may result in teenage boys to be injected with ideologies that negative attitudes and bad behaviour is acceptable. The game influences violence and mayhem. It can be argued that some people may believe the game is dumbing down children and lowers their achievements and goals.

Similarly, the opening for “Skins” contains negative representations of teenagers, and can also be seen as a moral panic as the teenagers involve themselves in drug taking, sex and bad attitudes. The adult audience may feel that the programme injects teenagers to be unsociable and unreasonable. The montage of teenagers creating havoc and bad ideologies may result in adults gaining negative views about all teenagers and can corrupt society. This can highlight the theory by Stanley Cohen who speaks of when a society sees itself threatened by the values and activities of a group, in this case teenagers. This programme may also be seen to dumb down children as it doesn’t teach them the dangers of smoking, alcohol and drug taking.

However, there are some representations of teenagers such as Eastenders and The Simpsons that cannot be seen as a moral panic. These alternative representations show how some teenagers are well behaved and do not take drugs or involve themselves in sexual attitudes. In the Simpsons, Lisa Simpson is seen as a clever, intelligent, well mannered girl. Therefore this representation shows the audience that teenagers can be successful and good. In Eastenders, Tamwar Masood is constructed as a stereotypical Muslim boy who is an academic boy who listens to his parents all the time. Therefore, this alternative representation shows the audience that teenagers are positive and are willing to behave well. These alternative representations, have allowed society to see some teenagers positively.


3. The appearance of new and digital media has allowed different audiences to shape their own media representations, especially the younger audience. This is because this generation is the internet era and teenagers are most likely to use e to be more plural in the way they represent themselves.

Through social networking sites teenagers can represent themselves and changes the values and ideologies teenagers are associated with. Blog making sites such as BlogSpot have given teenagers the power to speak their minds and to form their own representations. User generated content (UGC) has allowed teenagers to put up their views and own material on the internet. In some situations teenagers have put up interesting and arguable work which has allowed adults to see this and change their views on teenagers, for example Twitter and Facebook. The younger audiences can join groups and present themselves positively.

It has been said that media representations often reflect the social and political concerns of the age in which they are created. Discuss.

Over time the television still perpetuates traditional gender stereotypes because it reflects dominant social values. Our society is still dominated by men which has resulted in men dominating most TV production and influencing these stereotypes, therefore reproducing a usual “masculine” view upon things. By the 1970s, women's roles were changing form the more traditional to a freer nature. Women’s roles were often shown on the television in roles such as housewives, mothers, secretaries and nurses. Men were portrayed in employment and tend to have a higher status and are less likely to be shown at home; this is still apparent today. In recent years there has at least been a notable increase in the number of women news presenters. It was argued that women were less likely to be taken seriously by viewers but however, their physical attractiveness can be a key factor to being shown on the television. In this recent time, homosexuals have become increasingly publicized in the media due to the awareness brought out by celebrities and the acceptance by the public. On the TV there has been a slightly increasing tendency to feature gay stereotypes, though they are rarely shown enjoying happy lives Stories about gays tend to reinforce conventional values. Even when gay men are portrayed the central focus tends to be on the reaction of others to this as a “problem”. The representation of homosexuals are slowly becoming accepted by society and are being shown more in the media.