LZ411 – Critical Media theory

Semiotic analysis of TV News

Aims today …•To continue using Stuart Hall’s ‘encoding and decoding’ model – specifically ‘decoding’

•To look at interpretations of TV news as ‘timely’, ‘authoritative’ and ‘believable’

The discursive practices of TV News

• What are the ways that meanings are structured in the circuit of communication?

Stuart Hall Cultural Theorist

Production of news texts

circulation

Consumption of news texts

reproduction

Encoding-Decoding model

The circuit of news communication

ProductionCultural ‘encoding’

Circulation

Consumption

Reproduction

The TV news as ‘meaningful discourse’

Cultural ‘decoding’

Knowledge of the particular TV news

channel

Knowledge of the way news works

Raw material - the natural world

(un-organised, non-discursive event)

Social knowledge ‘maps of meaning’ in the ‘reception

context’

Productionknowledge

Cultural meanings

Social knowledge ‘maps of meaning’ in the production

context

UK TV News – Political Context

Regulations (OFCOM and BBC Trust) - ‘Due impartiality’OFCOM – “To ensure that news, in whatever form, is reported with due accuracy and presented with due impartiality”.

BBC – “News in whatever form must be treated with due impartiality, giving due weight to events, opinion and main strands of argument. The approach and tone of news stories must always reflect our editorial values, including our commitment to impartiality.

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Analysing the construction of TV News

“What you about to view is important and actually happened in the way we say it happened”

1) How do producers ‘win the assent’ of the audience to try to convince them of the above?

2) How are certain definitions of reality discursively made legitimate in TV news stories? i.e. what are the specific storying techniques of TV news? 5

Mythic meanings of TV News

Myth – a mode of communication whereby particular meanings are made to appear obvious/ common-sense/natural/real whereas in fact they are cultural/constructed/social/historical

TV News ‘mythic meanings’:a)It is immediate/live/relevant now/New!b)It is believable and authoritative (our account carries weight. Things really happened the way we said they did)c)It is balanced and objective

Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe

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Screenwipe (se04 ep03 – Oct 2007)

Storying the (TV) news

Representing events through ‘narrative functions’

1) Framing2) Focusing3) Realising4) Closing

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Examples from Newswipe 2010

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The circuit of news communication

ProductionCultural ‘encoding’

Circulation

Consumption

Reproduction

The TV news as ‘meaningful discourse’

Cultural ‘decoding’

Knowledge of the particular TV news

channel

Knowledge of the way news works

Raw material - the natural world

(un-organised, non-discursive event)

Social knowledge ‘maps of meaning’ in the ‘reception

context’

Productionknowledge

Cultural meanings

Social knowledge ‘maps of meaning’ in the production

context

How cuddly is this polar bear?

Planet Earth – BBC 1 March 2006

Some reactions to the show…

Encoding/decodingthe natural world

Planet Earth (the text) (meaningful narration about the

natural world)

viewer decodes (polysemy but not pluralism)

Decoding positions1)Dominant-hegemonicbest fit between codes of encoding and decoding 2) Negotiatedagreement with dominant definitions about the world but some specific disagreements3) Oppositionalcomplete lack of equivalence between encoding and decoding codes

Decoding positions - Planet Earth

1)Dominant-hegemonic•the programme is a compelling accurate description of the world – the documentary genre informs and entertains – producers’ view?2) Negotiated•nature programmes inform and entertain but some specific inaccuracies in the way certain animals/situations were depicted. E.g. Annoying music!! – some viewers3) Oppositional•environmental porn! – article 13 environmental group

Preferred meanings

• In other words Planet Earth has been‘encoded’ according to the ‘dominant cultural order’ and therefore certain ways of decoding (‘reading’) Planet Earth are more likely than others.

• Oppositional readings are always possible.

• As analysts we may not always agree on what are preferred, negotiated and oppositional readings. Texts are polysemic (but not completely open to interpretation)

Encoding/decoding - problems

•encoding – is it actually possible to analyse the encoding of a media text to determine its preferred meaning•decoding – are there such simple ways that people ‘decode’ media texts – what about ironic readings, willing suspension of disbelief etc.•decoding variables – Morley’s study (based on Hall) presumes class/occupation as a defining sociological variable. Is it still applicable? Any other variables?

Conclusion

• TV News presents socially constructed views of events. Viewers are encouraged to read news as up-to-date, authoritative, credible, balanced and objective.

• Decodings are variable but not unlimited. Hall suggests three hypothetical ‘reading positions’

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TV News examples to discuss in seminars

• How are the mythic meanings of immediacy, authority and objectivity encoded?

• How is each story framed, focused, realised and closed?

• What are possible decoding (‘reading’) positions for the stories?

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ReferencesAllan, S. (1998) News from NowHere: Televisual news discourse and the construction of hegemony. In A. Bell and P. Garrett (eds.) Approaches to media discourse Oxford: Blackwell.

Allan, S. (2000) News culture Buckingham: Open University Press

Bignell, J. (2002) Media semiotics An introduction Manchester: Manchester university press Chapter 5

Hall, S. (1973) Encoding and Decoding in the Television Discourse. Birmingham: Centre for Cultural Studies, University of Birmingham 19