Theories of Media & Communication & Web Production

Written By Mehwish Ahmed

Culture & Hegemony

This week’s lecture has to be one of my favourites. I have not discovered the term hegemony before, which is why I found it intriguing to learn about this topic. In this lecture, I have learned about culture and how the definition of culture has changed over time. Additionally, I have learned how hegemony dominates one’s mind through the use of education, politics, architecture and even the name of the streets.  

When a designer is creating a website/app, they are provided with specific guidelines that the designer is required to meet, for example following a consistent design for each webpage this in itself is hegemony. Here is an example of a game named ‘My New Baby store’ targeted at the ages of 12 plus, based on the aesthetics such as the colour scheme that utilises the colour pink implies the designer of the app only considered targeting girls which suggests the ideas of girls aspiring to be mothers is more likely than boys aspiring to be fathers which visit the theory of hegemony through gender stereotypes. Additionally, an observation I made is that the app does not permit the user to change the character's skin tone, which highlights the theory of normalising inequality in which the upper classes dominate over other classes. The subordinate classes are made to believe this is how norms are and take this as a way of living (Antonio Gramsci).

A designer also has to adhere to the Entertainment Software Rating Board in which the characters, actions, gameplay, strong language and other game content are examined. Moreover, hegemony is used within the level of language when companies announce a change without a real change. For example, the Dutch multinational consumer goods company Unilever had branded a product using the name ‘Fair and Lovely’ this branding technique had received backlash for many years now resulting in them recently rebranding this product and renaming it ‘Glow and Lovely.’ This, for me, is hegemony because the product itself has not changed and still has the same performance; the branding is the solitary change that does not make a meaningful difference. Stuart Hall was a Jamaican-born British Marxist sociologist, cultural theorist and political activist who believed ‘media producers create a story, and the audience interprets it differently.’ It was visible that Stuart Hall's concepts were accurate in 2017 when the brand received backlash for feeling insulted by the brand's real beauty message. The brands wanted to display a message about body diversity; however, some consumers interpreted this as insulting whilst other consumers thought it was an amusing matter suggesting the representation is ‘ the production of meaning through language'(Hall,1997:16).

To conclude, hegemony exists in web production and design work. There are guidelines that a designer must adhere to whilst designing work. This is the nature of a valid designer. When designing work, one has to take into consideration how the consumer may interpret their design, keeping in mind cultural and spiritual values.

References:

  • Marda, M. (2020) Week 5: Game Design for Kids [Lecture notes]. Web Production and Design [Accessed 7 November 2020].

  • Denisova, A. (2020) Week 7: culture and hegemony [Lecture notes] Theories of Media and Communication [Accessed 11 November 2020].

Feminism & Gender Studies

Last week’s lecture was on feminism theory and gender studies. I have discovered the various waves of feminism and learnt how women are displayed in film and advertisements. The website I have decided to analyse is ‘the love magazine’ the website is a magazine website combining fashion, style and culture. The website displays women's positivity with the type of images and articles that have been used.
The website incorporates images that suggest the dismissal of gender roles which relates to the fourth wave, which took place from the years 1980 to 1990 biological sex did not determine the person. In the first image, the famous footballer David Beckham who is seen as handsome is wearing eye-makeup, which is considered exclusively for women’s use only. Similarly, the man in the second image is wearing jewellery with ‘pink’ hair which is known as a colour that is perceived as feminine. In the final image, Bella Hadid, a leading American model, is carrying a suit that is recognised as manly without revealing skin. The composition of the website consists of a basic clean layout with the use of a couple of colours, black and silver are used for most text, along with white used as the background colour these colours are gender-neutral and give a contemporary look. The two navigation bars allow the user to access them efficiently directing them to their desired page.

The website arranges through large images positioned at the centre of the page with a scroll down feature used to explore more of the website. Moreover, the content of the website consists of interviews, fashion, news and videos; this content adheres to what women selectively engage in. The text applied to this website is wholly sans serif; this typeface is bold and confident and appears strongly on websites in comparison to serif, which does not resize without distortion. The headers on the navigation systems and pages are entire uppercase combining sans serif draws the text to appear dominant and bold. The text is in a classical style which all together ties in the attempt to present the text as powerful and meaningful representing feminism. A representational issue the website had faced in the past was while model Emily Ratajkowski claimed to empower in the name of feminism and expressed how feminism is all about freedom and choice for women across the world. But then received backlash from journalist Piers Morgan who claimed this is not feminism and ‘past feminists would be ashamed of her’.The website holds multiple images of women of colour which opposes the oppositional gaze issued by the social activist Bell Hooks that implied white supremacy existed. Black women were not shown as beautiful but were there to increase white beauty.

Overall, from my analysis, I believe this website is feminist appropriate and does not go off any gender roles and shows women and men as both equals, which is what being a feminist is all about.

References: 

Social Networking and the ‘Network Society’

This week’s lecture was exciting. When reviewing Web 2.O., it reminded me of my past module Internet cultures. From this lecture, we learn about Manuel Castell’s theory of the network society and the criticism that castells received. Manuel Castells describes the network society as ‘a society whose social structure is made up of networks powered by micro-electronics-based information and communications technologies (Castells, 2004). Castells argued that time and place have both become less relevant, which I find is evident through social networking, for example, ‘Instagram Live’ this feature allows one to engage face-to-face whilst being anywhere in the world without the need to consider the time difference. The popular social networking app ‘Snapchat’ enables users to post their current videos and photos as they go on with their day which gives off the impression to their friends that they are there at that very moment too which supports the idea of the timeless time which infers the ability to be several places at the same time participating in more than one activity.

Web 2. O operates on the architecture of participation, and each moment we use the internet, it becomes further meaningful, the more data builds as the consumer uses it. (Graham,2019) Everybody is a consumer and producer on social networking sites it is remarkably effortless to establish an opinion online within a couple of seconds. Holding the ability to post whatever the user desires hold great responsibility and can be regarded as unfavourable but also seen as accurate because this is an opportunity to showcase their views.The social theorist Zygmunt Bauman found faults with Castells’ theories he observed that these ideas were too idealistic and ignored the issues in the world and sensed a lack of connection. Nicholas Garman believed the network society is an extension of industrial capitalism and should not overlook the continuity and be blinded by the novelty of the digital. Andy Carvin believed there to be a gap between access to digital technologies, literacy skills of the ability to use and accessibility of high quality and relevant content. (Specht,2020)

In conclusion, I do believe social networking sites have a big play in today’s society and can often sway people into believing everything is perfect, yet this may not be the reality. Although social media has a few negatives points, there are far too many positive points social media.

References:


Mehwish Ahmed
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