I love reaction videos on YouTube. They offer us an insight into the relationship between the media and audiences. Hey everyone.
But if you ever stop to think, why is it that one video can elicit responses such as this... Hey, fuck! But then also completely different responses such as this...
What the hell did I just watch? In this video I'm going to talk about Stuart Hall's reception theory. Reception theory has its origins in literature, but it was in the 1970s that Stuart Hall adapted this theory to apply to media communication. The idea is simple.
Media producers encode their texts with meaning. How do they do this? Well they might use... lighting to convey an emotion or a certain font to communicate themes. Perhaps the clothes the character wears identifies them as a goodie or a baddie.
The fact is there are endless ways for media producers to create layers and layers of meaning with with the hope of producing a deep, rich text. This text is then handed over to the audience, who decode it for meaning. Now, sadly for media producers, this isn't a straightforward process.
Hall points out that factors such as culture, income, will all have an impact on how an audience decodes those messages. And so, he argues that a text may be decoded in one of three ways. The first is the dominant reading. In this case, the audience decodes.
codes the message exactly as the producer intended, thereby suggesting that they share the same cultural and ideological positions. Let's look at a really obvious example of a dominant reading. In the Dark Knight, we are supposed to read the Joker as a bad guy.
How is this message conveyed? Well his greasy hair makes him look dirty and unwashed, which we read as unclean and bad. The makeup masks his real face, which we automatically flag as a danger because we can't identify him as friend or foe. or foe.
The heavy streaming black around his eyes accentuates the eye holes of the skull which we associate with death or danger. It also kind of resembles running mascara which we could associate with misery. And obviously it's not to mention the fact that he does acts like this which mean he's a bad guy.
Disappear. Da-da! It's...
it's gone. Now you don't necessarily need to think these things while you're watching the film. But if you understand enough of these messages to interpret that he is indeed bad, then you have the dominant reading. The next reading is the negotiated reading, in which you understand the meaning and the connotations of the messages of the producer, but you need to adapt them to fit with your own beliefs. Let's take the film Pineapple Express.
We are fine. Like a baby. The dominant reading of this text is that drugs such as marijuana are acceptable and usually result in high... harmless humorous fun.
This is a great example of a text which I personally view with a negotiated reading. I understand the producer's viewpoint and I still find scenes like this funny. But the whole concept of recreational drugs and partying, it conflicts with my ideology.
so I can still watch it, I can still find it funny, even if I don't necessarily agree with it. I know this sounds weird, but can we be best friends? Just us, for real? We should all be best friends. And finally we have the oppositional reading, one where the audience rejects the producer's message despite understanding the denotative and connotative meanings.
I think GTA V is a great example of a text which can very easily be read with an oppositional reading by non-gamers. Needless to say, the preferred reading of much of the game's violence prostitutes and drug taking is this is cool. I can do what I want and live life without limits like I'd never do in real life. Tell you something.
How'd you like to drive a car? This one, man. For real.
Like this? Now, I'm not saying you need to be a criminal or be a killer to have the dominant reading. But rather, you're likely to be a less mature gamer who's able to recognise that this is just a game.
A bit of fun with no regard for the morality or the acting out of crimes, even if it is in a virtual environment. The negotiated reading for GTA V is probably where I fit. I think the game is fun, it's an interesting satirical look on American society, and it's very well written. I like it! Denial!
That is the first part of the grieving process. Brothers, now let's all hold hands. But the act of killing civilians and robbing banks is unsavory to me, even if it isn't real. The excessively bad language and casual...
Violence are opposed to my ideology, but I negotiate these messages based on the fact that it is just a game so that I'm able to access it. I'd argue more adult gamers are likely to consider the moral implications of a game like this and thereby have a negotiated reason. And then finally we have the oppositional reading. Needless to say this is most likely to belong to non-gamers who may be able to identify elements of the games which are supposed to be fun, but the moral implications of the acts being carried out are so disturbing that they reject the text outright.
My teeth are perfect! They won't find the tongue-in-cheek jabs at celebrity culture funny, or the killing of an NPC as harmless fun. To them, what it represents is likely a far greater cancer to society.
Now sometimes the majority of the audience may take up an oppositional reading of a text, or even band together to try and make people realise how it can be read in an offensive way. This advert from a few years ago made the headlines when audiences protested. that its message was that if you don't look like this model then you aren't beach ready. This certainly wasn't the producer's intention but because that's the way that it was widely interpreted it was ultimately a failed campaign. So there's reception theory in a nutshell.
I think the best thing to do is when you're reading newspapers or watching adverts think how am I supposed to be feeling about this and what do I actually feel. As always if you have any questions please leave them below and I'll happily get back to you and thank you very much for watching.