Media Studies - Representation Theories

Stuart Hall suggests that media generates many representations. a presumption that the consumers and masses are passive and dumb. Representations can be shown by what is absent, present or different. a representation also implicates the audience in creating a meaning. Hall suggests stopping stereotypes by going inside the stereotype, opening it up from within, and deconstruct it.

David Gauntlett suggests that the media has a complex relationship with identities. In traditional media, there are many diverse and contradictory media messages that individuals can use to think through their identities and ways of expressing themselves. e.g. the success of popular feminism led to feminism becoming open and interpretable to media. People build identities through every day. it offers a route for self-expression.

Judith Butler suggests gender is created in how we perform our gender roles - there is no gender identity within these roles. It is created within the performance. Any feminism concerned only with femininity and masculinity excludes other forms of gender and sexuality. This creates trouble for those who do not fit into the norm. Butler has importantly influenced queer theory.

Lisbet Van Zoonen suggests that we live in a patriarchal society dominated by men. Women are often seen as accessories to men, and are often objectified, rather than admired, with the male body (spectacle). Often, women's bodies are seen as their most powerful and only tool. gender is performative - our ideas of femininity and masculinity are constructed in our performances of these roles. Gender is contextual, it changes with historical and cultural contexts.

Bell Hooks suggests that our society is one that is 'white supremacist capitalist patriarchy' and that ideology dominates media representations. Hooks argues that black women should develop an 'oppositional gaze' that refuses to identify with characters - that gaze is a political for Black American's, as slaves were punished for looking at their owners.