Research

Theorists


Giroux 1997: youth as empty category


This is because media representations of young people are constructed by adults. Because of this they reflect adults concerns, anxieties, and needs. As a result of this media representations of young people do not necessarily reflect the reality of youth identity. When appling Giroux to media texts you need to think about who constructed the representation, who it is aimed at, and does the representation reflect adult anxieties or serve the purposes of adult society.
My example:


Harrys fear that all the young people are capable of killing someoone because of what happened to his friend.


Acland 1995:Ideology of protection; deviant youth and reproduction of social order


Media representations of youths out of control allows the state to have more control of them (media reports about deliquent youths led to ASBOs). The idea that young people need constant sureveillance and monitoring. This happens because youth is the time when young people learn about social roles and values, and allows the state to make sure they conform to hegemonic values.

My example:

In harry brown when the teens are fighting the police throwing fire bombs would meant that the police now think every teenager on that estate would need to be watched as they could be a risk.

Gramsci 1972 1929-1935): Cultutral hegemony

This is the idea that one social class(usually middle) is able to dominate a society by making  their way of life and values appear normal, natural, and common sense.  As a result other social classes accept these values as the normal way of life.  Gramsci does see hegemony as a site of constant struggle – societies are constantly debating what is and isn’t acceptable.  You could relate this to the more positive representations of working class youth in ‘Fish Tank’ and ‘Misfits’ as representations which challenge the perception of working class as thugs.

My example:



Cohen 1972: Moral panic

Cohen studied the media response to the mods and rockers riots in the 1960s.  He argued that from time to time ‘folk devils’ emerge in a society which reflect the anxieties of society at that time (e.g. mods and rockers reflect social anxiety about the emergence of youth culture, rock and roll, etc.).  A moral panic occurs when the media reports on these ‘folk devils’ in a sensationalised way which leads to intervention by politicians, and the police.  The effect of a moral panic is to reassert hegemony by allowing a society to make clear what values it does not accept.  The representation of working class youths suggest they have become a contemporary ‘folk devil’, perhaps tapping into economic anxieties, concern about a benefits culture, and long term unemployment.

My example:

At the end of Harry Brown when the media states that they have taken back control of the estate.
McRobbie 2004: Symbolic violence

Suggests that contemporary British TV often contains ‘symbolic violence’ against the working class, i.e. representations which emphasise middle class dominance and depict the working class in very negative ways (e.g. ‘Eden Lake’, ‘Harry Brown’.)
My example:

Eden lake the couple would not disrupt any other holidayers at the lake but as they are of a higher class than the children.
Gerbner 1986: Cultivation theory
 Gerbner studied the effect of television on people’s perception of crime.  He found
that people who watched a lot of television tended to overestimate the levels of crime.  He called this ‘mean world syndrome’.  Because news reports, TV dramas, films, contain lots of representations of crime over time this influenced people’s
perceptions of the world.  This is called ‘cultivation theory’.  You could apply this to media representations of young people.  The large numbers of representations of
young people as delinquents could, over time, influence how they are perceived by society.
My example:

In eden lake the couple think that all  the teenager who live in that area are dangerous and ask people in the restaurant what they think and pass on their opinion.