Interpreting Media Messages
Meeting Two
Intertextuality and
Self-Construction
INTERTEXTUALITY
All texts contain other texts
Media discourse is qualitatively continuous
within the exposure of everyday life.
Viewers draw from their own attitudes, values
and memories for meaning
Viewers freely associate their own direct
experiences with media images
Example
• Viewers watching Wall Street Week activate
various types of knowledge drawn from
other sources.
• There is a complexity of viewer discourse
about economic news
Game Show Intertextuality:
Wheel of Fortune
SITUATIVE FRAMEWORK
• Show is situated as open and geared toward
spectator
• Defined roles of host, assistant, guest,
players, audience, viewers
Fortune is a network of 3
integrated situative frameworks
1. Located in the context of TV
2. Belongs to the genre of TV entertainment
3. Includes on-stage presentations of
individual scenes
Situative components have thematic,
interpretive and motivational importance
for participants in defining behavior roles
and communication power
Game rules define situation for
participants
• HOST focuses interactions with players on
self, structures situation, provides cuewords and instruction. Power symbol.
• ASSISTANT turns playing board letters
• VOICE OVER present products, prizes
• STUDIO AUDIENCE audible, not visible;
sealed from what is on-screen.
Context
• Show adapts situations, problems, games
from everyday life
• Everyday guessing is core of the show
• Everyday knowledge is gained through
popular media consumption
• Show success not based upon previous
specialized education
Prizes: objects of value and profit
• Consumption of objects is part of self-image
• An appeal to viewer’s socioculture class affiliation
is carried out through the selection of winnings
alone
• Products are hidden stars.
• Achievement is rewarded in competitive situations
- 1 winner, others losers
• Even if game is out of everyday life, outcome
reverts back to aspects of everyday values
Game Show Genres
•
•
•
•
Competitive games (Board Room, Survivor)
Guessing or quiz shows (Jeopardy)
Prize games (Wheel of Fortune)
Interactive games (Blind Date)
Social Semiotics of Media
Reception: Qualitative Concepts
• Discourse / language is social reality, intersubjective and represents both an analytical
object and central tool of analysis
• Subjectivity is conceived through language
and gives voice to a discursive position
• Context is a configuration of texts, which
must be read or interpreted
Social Semiotics Distilled
• Signs are primary mod of interacting with reality
and establishing meaning production.
• Signs are not what we know but how we come to
know what we say we know.
• Concept of differences imply a focus on social
uses of signs, not signs themselves
• Interpretive communities incorporate social and
discursive aspects of reception
• Qualitative studies use semiotics by analyzing
audience uses of media in cultural contexts
Encoding / Decoding
• Encoding: Message senders craft meaning a for
audiences by delivering a text with audiencespecific symbols
• Decoding: Message receivers make sense out of
the message through their symbolic associations
• Aberrant decoding occurs when the audience’s
interpretation differs from what the sender
intended
1984 Commercial
• Intended message a parody of the battle
between Apple and IBM
• Science fiction genre invoked
• No commercial message until the end
• Story told with symbols
Images and Culture-Based
Meanings
Element
Time
Setting
Woman
Soldiers
Inmates
Big Bro
Explosion
USA
Russia
Future
past
Prison
concentration camp
Heroine, Nike
athlete, freedom
SWAT, bad
police, fear, control
Clones, bald
camp inmates, skins
IBM boss/media
dictator
New generation
revolution
Questions
• How does Reader Response theory differ
from aberrant decoding?
• What can producers of TV spots do to avoid
one and positively enable the other?
Guess Commercial
• Watch w/o sound. Write a script to
accompany the visuals. What assumptions
have you made? Where to they come from?
• What differences exist among viewers?
• Watch with sound. Explain what language
contributes to understanding the message.
• From what text genres does it draw?
Readings: Wicks
• He says the more we use media, the less we
interact with other people. True?
• He blames internet discourse for halting pubic
discourse. What role does MoveOn.com play in
this debate?
• Is profit the prime motivator for today’s media
providers?
• How likely are audiences to reject mediated
messages?
Readings: Film Analysis
• Are the authors correct in concluding that
an appeal to enlightened self-interest is the
film’s most successful means of
communicating its message? Why?
• What is the role of selective perception for
film viewing?
• How serious is the boomerang effect for
film producers?
Readings: Social Problem Movie
• This study says addicts get reinforcement of
their fantasies and addictions from film.
• What are some examples from recently
released films that might accommodate
addicts?
• What audience benefits may result from
films on social problems?