Selective:....

Selective exposure is when we try to expose ourselves only to information that seems to confirm our behaviour and attitudes.

Selective perception might refer to the number of cognitive biases in psychology, related to the way expectations affect perception. Process in which people perceive what they want to in media messages while ignoring opposing viewpoints.                                                                                    

Is censorship a way to control a mass audience

Is censorship a way to control a mass audience?

Censorship is the practice of officially examining the media and suppressing unacceptable parts.

In the 1920’s, I believe that censorship was a way to control a mass audience because of the Hay’s code which was put in place. The Hay’s code censored films so they weren’t allowed to show things such as: a woman’s leg above the knee, saying God, Lord or Christ in an offensive or rude way and showing scenes of actual child birth. However, I think that some things such as not showing leg above the knee was a but silly and harsh not to show as today we see much more than that, but in the 1920’s it was just as bad as us seeing complete nudity today.

Censorship now comes in many forms and one of them is watershed, which is not showing violence, sex ect before 9pm. The reason watershed was introduced was so young children up to the age of 15 didnt see certain things, as they presumed children would be asleep by this time. However, ‘presuming’ children would be asleep isn’t good enough as most 10-15 year olds go to sleep after9pm. When children do see programs or films after 9pm and witness certain things, this might encourage imitation as if they see things like it on television, they might assume it is acceptable to do.

Music and music videos played over the radio and television also have censorship as images and or bad language get edited out , or in some cases they will only be played after 9pm. Personally, i don’t think there is much point in bleeping bad language as the audience will most likely to guess what is supposed to be said. On internet websites such as youtube, nothing is censored and so young children are able to see and hear music such as “talk dirty to me” and miley cyrus’ song called wrecking ball where she is shown nude in the video. As a passive audience we have become so desensitised that we don’t really give it a second thought if we hear or see things that we know is not morally correct. This is because things like this have been exploited so much that we have become used to seeing it. to conclude, I do think that censorship is a way to control a mass audience, but only if it is seriously improved as it is not strong or strict enough. 

Censorship continued....

Censorship

Censorship is the practice of officially examining books, films, etc., and suppressing unacceptable parts. Censorship was introduced back before the 1920’s when Hay’s code was in place. At the time, things we see in films today were censored for audiences and would be considered completely unacceptable. Some of these things include: showing actual childbirth, white slavery, misusing the American flag, ridicule of the clergy, showing leg above the knee and using words such as Christ, Lord and God in a rude way. However, now a days, the only censorship we have is age limits on films which go from U to 18. Even though we have censorship some of the things show are still not good and some things shown on a rated 12 film I believe are not suitable for a 12 year old to see such as: sexual scenes, violence and back language, (for example in the Twilight saga). Censorship also takes the form of water shed which is the time that certain programs are allowed to be shown on television. A lot of programs shown after9pm will have sex, bad language, violence etc in as television people believe young children will be in bed by this time and won’t see the programs. On channels which show music videos, also have to consider when the videos are allowed to be aired as some songs or aspects of the videos are not suitable to be shown at certain times. For example, most videos include nudity and or swearing. As time has changed, the things we consider acceptable have also changed as young people are always being presented with ideas of sex things that they shouldn’t have to see at such a young age. As a passive audience, we are constantly being injected with messages portrayed by the media such as stereotypes, ideas of gender and what we should consider to be acceptable to witness. To conclude, the purpose of censorship is to help defend the audience from bad ideas and messages. 

Passive audience

The Hays code:

In the 1920's, the following were considered to be not suitable to show in films and thus film audiences:

- white slavary

- scenes of actual child birth

- showing leg above the knee

- using christ, lord or god in a rude way

- ridicule of the clergy

- misusing the american flag

They didnt show certain things to audiences as it might have created conflict by inflicting other ideas on the audience and therefore influencing them to think things were ok to do when traditionally they werent. Things we see in the media allow us a the audience to think in positive or negative way. This is done by society injecting us with messages passively. 

We were given this list of words and asked to use one to describe the image being shown. We found that our gender and stereotypes played a part in how we each described the image which is alsk because of what we have see in the media. 

Audience theory

- Target audience

- age

- gender

- experience

- race/ethnicity

- hobbies/interests

- class

- regional identity

- disability

- culture

There are three theories to help us understand the relationship between texts and audience. 

1) the effects model

2) uses and gratification

3) reception theory

We will also be learning about 2 step model and agenda setting theory. 

Primary: actually engaging with the media

Secondary: seeing the media but doing something else at the same time

Tertiary: when you know of it but havent payed attention to it. 

Primary and secondary are examples of an active audience while tertiary is an example of a passive audience. 

Ideologies are a set of values and or beliefs - for example, the idea that blondes are dumb is a dominent stereotype. 

Effects model:

Imitaion - copy what you see

Cartharsis - like soap operas

Desensitisation - negative things

Uses and gratification:

. Personal identity

. Surveillance

. Pleasure/entertainment

. Diversion/escapism

. Learning/understanding

Links

During todays lesson we made links between everything we have been learning in the past few weeks in both classes. I found that everything starts with either genre, narrative or representation. For example, camera angles links to representation as different camera angles represent different things such as: long angle shot could represent isolation as we might be able to see the character on their own in a large space or area. Another example is a high angle shot which could suggest that the character is inferior as the angle couls represent other characters or the audience looking down on them. 

Another example of links is between editing and narrative. This is because the way that films or television series are edited creates narrative. For example, the series big brother tells the audience it is a live show but it is really shown 15-20 minutes behind so they have time to edit it to make it most appealing to the audience. Also, in films they used editing to get from one scene to the other using different ways. For example, if they use a jump effect then it creates a scary tension for the audience which also creates narrative and therefore meaning. 

changing the narrative

During todays lesson we used our "terror in the night" story boards to see what happens if the narrative changes and what effects it would have. We started by putting our second to last scene first. This automatically changed the meaning and narrative to the story. Our story started off in the narrative off as Todorov's theory and with a linear structure, but as soon as we put the last scene first, it changed to Levi Strauss' theory as we found it had binary opposites such as: life and death, day and night and man and woman. We also found it took a different structure as it is now a circular structure as it starts in the ending events. Changing the narrative also changes the way the audience can identify and understand the characters. This is because the audience now start off thinking the character is strange and a killer as before they didnt find that out until the end. This is a good example of a film called Psycho as at the beginning the audience think the story is about the woman but the half way through she dies and the audience realize that the story isnt actually about her and is about a man who has mental disabilities and the people he ends up killing.