1. Welcome to All S

2. Course Code: E 300 A Course Name English Language and Literacy MEDIA TEXTS: AUTHORS AND READERS CHAPTER 3: What is a Text? CHAPTER 6: Hysterical Style in the Press CHAPTER 8: Film Languages CHAPTER 9: The Visual Accomplishment of Factuality

3. CHAPTER 3: What is a Text? David Graddol In this article, Graddol discusses ways in which definitions of text have broadened in recent years. ‘Media text’ can be analysed similar to a verbal text. In recent theories of human communication, text is the focus of analysis. ‘Text’, in traditional usage, distinguish written words from other forms of communication. An advert on TV can be seen as a ‘media text.’ It refer to the whole complex sequence of speech, image, music & sound effects. A text has a concrete existence. All definitions of text share a concern with the nature of its materiality.

4. In its narrowest form, a text is a verbal, written entity, printed with ink on paper. It excludes nonverbal, rhetorical modes of the verbal (spoken) & insists on particular physical form in which written language manifest itself. Most texts are communicative artefacts. They are commodities which can enter social & economic relations. Their creation involves divisions of labour & their use involves a wide range of social, political & cultural practices. Early techniques of written text production involved axes and knives, used to inscribe marks on stone, wood or clay. Such texts were brief, monumental or matters of official record. Parchment & pen led to diff kind of artefact.

5. Printing press gave rise to diff kinds of book construction; new forms of lettering & page layout. Libraries make extensive use of microfiche to store texts in a compact way on photographic film. Electronic mail involves exchange of messages composed on keyboard & displayed on computer screen. Revival of semiotic theory in mid-1960s had increasing interest in semiotic, rather than physical form of text. At semiotic level, we deal with the immaterial; it is the level not of things, but of meanings. In semiotic theory, sign has 2 sides : Signifier: expressed in some kind of material form & Signified: refers to content or meaning. The repeated & multilayered coding of signifiers is common in human communication systems.

6. The International Standards Organisation (ISO) describes many layers for data links used in telecommunications industry. Through such processes digital communication allows entire universe of human understanding to be reduced to 2 elements of binary code. Forms of recording are referred to as expression to expression coding: a coding which gives expressive substance new form. Signifier transcends changes in existence, since its opposition to other characters in the available inventory & oppositional contrast exists at an abstract level. Semiotic material of texts is composed of signifiers. Diff b/w speech & writing manifest itself at textual level, in diff in semiotic construction. Michael Halliday regards spoken events as texts that can be analysed in similar way to written material.

7. Live speech lacks the quality of durability. This lack prevents a text from fully achieving the status of an artefact. Halliday admits that the notion of spoken text is not easily accepted. He observes that spoken events became theorised as texts only when technology of tape recording allowed them to become ‘the object of systematic study.’ Key qualities of tape recording speech: it can be edited, copied & contextualised. A simple way to textualise speech is to transcribe it – to ‘reduce it to writing.’ Within semiotic theory, nonverbal communication has become conceptualised as being like verbal language. Graeme Turner describes the ‘languages’ of film. By this he means the conventions of image composition & sequencing which can be analysed in similar ways to vocabulary & syntax of verbal language. He also draws into the definition of ‘language’ sound effects, music & any other semiotic system

8. which is employed in a structured way. Texts have structures & it occurs at many diff levels in a text. Conventional form that a text takes is referred to as its genre. Within media studies, genre implies a concern for content & the way certain themes are treated. In Halliday’s framework, a text cannot help but encode particular social relations (b/w reader & writer, & b/w third parties) as well as communicate particular ideas. Historically, modern word ‘text’ is derived from Latin word meaning ‘to weave.’ A text is created by weaving many threads. These threads were conceived to be ideas. A text is woven from several diff semiotic threads.

9. Spoken lang employs a lot of semiotic devices besides verbal lang. The most imp features are intonation, stress & rhythm which together make up prosodic system. One of the main functions of prosody in speech is an organisational one. Prosody is a complex semiotic system which serves a variety of functions besides ‘chunking.’ It helps to indicate irony or sarcasm. In various ways it modify meaning of verbal message. Prosody also conveys emotion, gender identity,sometimes other kind of social identity & attitude of a speaker. Those aspects of body movement & posture called ‘body lang’ signals attitude & attention. Gesture is mainly a speaker’s behaviour. Gesture & eye contact helps to regulate turn taking.

10. Punctuation in written text serves similar functions to prosody in spoken text. Printed texts use a lot of semiotic resources not available to speakers. A typeset page use typographic system of characters in diff fonts, diff weights & point sizes. It is used to indicate headings & other organising devices. Use of space on page is a semiotic mechanism: size of page, no: of columns, amount & arrangement of white space - all signify to reader things about generic nature of text – broadsheet or tabloid newspaper. Handwriting comes close to paralleling accent system of speech in conveying information about speaker identity. Words & images are closely related in texts. Modern writing have arisen from iconic symbols & pictograms.

11. In TV or film texts, music & sound effects can be used in similar range of ways to prosodic system in spoken texts. Sound is an imp part of affect system of film & TV, & helps set mood & indicates to viewer how to respond emotionally to images. Music serves as an identity system, indicating historical period, geographical & cultural location & so on. Interplay b/w diff semiotic threads is an imp part of textual strategy. In media texts, diff semiotic threads relate to each other in diff ways. Texts are created within particular historical & material circumstances by people who work in particular relations of power. Some of the more interesting ideological effects of text occur during its creation, rather than its consumption.

12. An imp aspect of text production is how a writer is persuaded or coerced, gently or not gently, to conform to generic conventions which serve interests of others. Creators of a text cannot predict how it will be eventually be used. Same text can be read many times & used in many diff ways by diff people. Texts can be relocated, recontextualised, plagiarised. Text may contain quotations from earlier texts & fragments from it and may appear in other future texts. Producers of media texts are concerned with how audiences respond & make use of their material, & how TV progammes are located in domestic practices & timetables. The way in which the meaning of the text emerges from its embedding in wider social practices is one of the distinctive features of recent theory.

13. Literacy is defined as the ability to produce, understand & use texts in culturally appropriate ways. Hence changes in the accepted definition of text have implications for the perceived nature of literacy. Etymologically, ‘literacy’ refers to the ability to read rather than write, to understand rather tan to produce. In modern sense, a literate person is expected to be able to read complex printed productions, but only to produce a manuscript suitable for publication, not a finished product. Literacy implies not just the ability to read, but also the knowledge which comes from reading.

14. CHAPTER 6: Hysterical Style in the Press Roger Fowler Roger Fowler provides a linguistic analysis of newspaper journalism. In this article, he focuses on one particular event which he calls ‘Salmonella in eggs’ scare. He describes the linguistic characteristics of a ‘hysterical style in the press.’ He takes account of lexical choice, grammatical processes like nominalisation & passivisation, & draws on theories of intertextuality to explain why accounts of salmonella were so terrifying for some readers. An hysterical episode of massive proportions built up in the British media in winter of 1988-9, for 3 months from late November to early March.

15. There was a panic about food poisoning & specifically about 2 types of bacterial poisoning: (1)Salmonella poisoning caused by the strain Salmonella enteritidis phage type 4, discovered to be present in eggs. (2)Listeriosis, a flu-like illness caused by Listeria monocytogenes, a bacterium occurring widely in the environment & found in precooked & chilled food, & some cheeses. These created problems in a wide range of areas, quite unrelated to the 2 bacteria & their effects. In the sphere of food, other dangerous organisms or substances were identified. There was a general concern with hygiene in shops, restaurants & kitchens, with adulteration & with production of food.

16. Concern broadened to include other kinds of ‘poisoning’ & ‘infection.’ It included contamination of water supplies, highlighted by illnesses caused in an area of North Cornwall by accidental dumping of aluminium sulphate in main supply. Numerous other specific environmental hazards were reported. Hysteria is not simply behaviour which is in excess of the events which provoked it; it is also behaviour which attains autonomy, which sustains itself as an expressive performance, independent of its causes. Hysteria requires an expressive system. a mode of discourse, &, established, exists within that mode of discourse independent of empirical reality. Listeria hysteria / the great egg scarce was not a medical phenomenon, not an epidemic; it was a construct of

17. discourse, a formation & transformation of ideas in the public lang of newspaper & TV.  This is called hysteria in the Press.  Some aspects of hysterical style shows a high level of intensity & expression of an excess negative feeling.  Terms used denote emotive reactions, always negative, clustering around concepts of fear & confusion.  A diff discursive strategy of for intensifying hysteria is the rhetoric of quantification; & this is really the dominant stylistic feature of the discourse.  This discourse appears to be constantly alarming & hyperbolic.

18. CHAPTER 8: Film Languages Graeme Turner  Turner explains how ‘film languages’ work. He provides a straightforward account of the semiotics of cinema, taking the reader through basic camera techniques, & discussing role of editing, lighting & sound in construction of film.  Film is not a lang; it generate its meanings through systems (cinematography, sound editing, etc) which work like lang.  Basic principles in film analysis: (1)To see film as communication. (2)To place film communication within a wider system for generating meaning – that of culture itself.

19. Culture is a dynamic process which produces behaviours, practices, institutions & meanings which constitute our social existence. Cultural studies theorists argued that lang is the major mechanism through which culture produces & reproduces social meanings. For Roland Barthes, ‘language’ includes all those systems from which we can select & combine elements in order to communicate. Ferdinand de Saussure, the father of European semiotics, argued that language is not a system of nomenclature. Lang system of a culture carries that culture’s system of priorities, its specific set of values, its specific composition of the physical & social world. We become members of our culture through lang, we acquire our sense of personal identity through lang, & we

20. can internalise value systems which structure our lives through language. We cannot step outside lang to produce a set of our own meanings which are totally independent of cultural system. Individual utterances are both unique & culturally determined. This apparent contradiction is explained by Saussure’s distinction b/w langue of the culture & parole. Lang constructs meanings in 2 ways: (1) Literal or denotative meaning: of a word attached to it by usage; it’s a dictionary style of meaning where relation b/w word and object it refers to is relatively fixed. (2) Connotative meaning : is interpretative & depends upon user’s cultural experience rather than on a dictionary. It is in connotation that we find social dimension of a lang.

21. Images as well as words carry connotations. A filmed image of a man have denotative dimension; it refer to the mental concept of ‘man.’ Images are culturally charged; camera angle employed, his position within frame, use of lighting to highlight certain aspects, effect achieved by colour, tinting, or processing all have potential for social meaning. While dealing with images, we are not only dealing with object or concept they represent, but also with the way in which they are represented. Lang for visual representation has sets of codes & conventions used by audience to make sense of what they see. Images reach us as ‘encoded’ messages, already represented as meaningful in particular ways.

22. One of the tasks of film analysis is to discover how this si done, both in particular films & in general. ‘Signifying practices’ of film includes various media & technologies through which film’s meanings are produced. Semiotics sees social meaning as product of relationship constructed b/w ‘signs.’ Sign is the basic unit of communication; it can be a photograph, a traffic signal, a word, a sound, an object, a smell or whatever a culture finds significant. Sign has 2 parts: Signifier: physical form of the sign; Signified: the mental concept referred to. Our social identities are also signs. Signifiers carry connotations & signifieds accure social meanings.

23. Film narratives have their own signifying systems. It has its own ‘codes’, shorthand methods of establishing social or narrative meanings, & its own conventions – set of rules which audience agree to observe & allow us to overlook the lack of realism in a typical musical sequence. Genres are composed from sets of narrative & representational conventions. Film is not one discrete system of signification as writing. Film incorporates separate technologies & discourses of the camera, lighting, editing, set design & sound – all contributing to meaning. Written & spoken lang have grammar. Film has no equivalent to syntax – no ordering system which would determine how shots should be combined in sequence. Construction of a relationship b/w shots is the initial process in understanding a narrative film.

24. This process works through constructing relationships b/w shots (montage) or through constructing relationships within shots (mise-en-scene). These are not mutually exclusive & both kinds of relationship are constructed by film-makers & interpreted by audiences.  The signifying systems: (a) Camera (b) Lighting (c) Sound (d) Mise-en-scene (e) Editing (pp:98-106)

25. (a)Camera Most complex set of practices in film production involves manipulation of camera. The film stock used, angle of camera, depth of its field of focus, format of screen size (eg: cinemascope / widescreen), movement & framing all serve specific functions. Diff meanings are attached to colour & black-&-white film. Often black-&-white film stock signify the past. Use of overhead shots or crane shots turn film into performance art. Camera can be directed squarely or obliquely towards its subject, with rotation of camera along its vertical axis (panning), its horizontal axis (tilting) or its transverse axis (rolling).

26. If camera is looking down on its subject, its position is one of power. Manipulation of camera angles – major means by which audience is informed of changing relationship b/w 2 characters. Point-of-view shots – imp for motivation & controlling aspects of audience’s identification with characters. Height of camera & distance from its subject have an effect on meaning of a shot. Conventional means of narrative closure: slowly pull camera back & subject disappears into its surroundings. Panning camera along horizontal axis imitates movement of spectator’s eyes as they survey scene around them. This movement is connected with point of view of a character.

27. Rolling camera gives illusion of the world, either actually or metaphorically, being tipped on its side. Apparent movement of camera, as in close-up, can be accomplished through manipulation of particular telephoto lenses or zoom lenses. Actual forward/ lateral movement of camera is referred to as tracking or dollying. It’s often used in action sequences or as a point-of-view shot. Point-of-view shot – very effective in enhancing audience identification with a character’s experiences. Alterations in focus have signifying function. Most films aim at a very deep field of focus in which everything from foreground to far background is clear & sharp. Soft focus on a character / background pursue a romantic or lyrical effect.

28. ‘Rack focus’ is used to direct audience’s attention from one character to another; by focusing one face while the other is blurred & using switch in focus from one to other for dynamic or symbolic effect. (b) Lighting 2 main objectives to film lighting: 1. Expressive – setting a mood, giving film a ‘look’ or contributing to narrative details like character / motivation. 2. Realism :which is the most common & least apparent aim of film lighting. Basic equipment used to light stages or film sets includes main light (key light) which is set slightly to one side of camera & directed at figure to be lit; fill lights which remove shadows caused by key light & mould the figure being lit in order to add detail & realism ; &

29. back light defines the figure’s outline & separates him/her from background, thus enhancing the illusion of a three- dimensional image. In conventional high-key lighting, there is brightly lit scene with few shadows. Expressive lighting aims at exploiting shadows & at lighting only part of the screen to give a sense of ambiguity or threat called low-key lighting. It makes less use of fill lights & has sharp, deep shadows. Low-key lighting move the key light from its conventional position & move it to one side of the figure so that half of the face is visible, or increase angle so that face is lit from below & acquires a distorted, threatening aspect. High-key lighting is realist ; while low-key lighting is expressive.

30. (c) Sound Sound is imp as it serves narrative function. It provides powerful emotional accompaniment to a film’s high points. It enhances realism by reproducing sounds normally associated with actions & events depicted visually. Music – first form of sound introduced into cinema, rather than a ‘diegetic’ use (use of sounds motivated by actions / events contained within narrative). Illusion of realism is dependent upon diegetic use of sound. Sound is used as a transitional device. Overlapping sound binds an episodic & disjoined narrative together. Music plays imp role in soundtracks. It is used as part of construction of world of film, as a source of atmosphere, or as a reference point to subcultures in teen films.

31. Music in films is non-realistic & we rarely see its source in frame or even within world of film. Simon Firth argues that the reality music ‘describes/refers to is a diff sort of reality than that described/referred to by visual images.’ He says that music amplifies mood or atmosphere & convey ‘emotional significance’ of a scene. He calls it ‘emotional reality’of film music & its aim to deepen the sense of film’s realism, to give an emotional texture otherwise lacking. Levi-Strauss says that music is only ever understood by receiver. Barthes notes that it is impossible ti describe music without adjectives – ie; it must be understood in terms of its subjective effect rather than through dictionary meanings. Its effect is profoundly personal.

32. (d) Mise-en-scene Term used to describe theory about film grammar, a shooting & production style. A shorthand term for ‘everything that is in the frame’ of a shot. Other imp aspects of image: set design, costumes, arrangement & movement of figures, spatial relations (who is obscured / who looks dominant) & placement of imp objects within narrative ( murderer’s gun, secret letter..) Much unconscious understanding is made by mise-en- scene. Film’s construction of social world is authenticated through details of mise-en-scene. Narrative is advanced through arrangement of elements within frame; characters reveal themselves to us without revealing themselves to other characters & complicate &

33. develop the story. Many historical films use mise-en-scene to celebrate the power of the medium to recreate the real so overwhelmingly & authentically. (e) Editing Editing contribute to the illusion that film was unfolding naturally, without film maker’s intervention. Editing is more or less invisible, seamlessly connecting shots to give the illusion of continuity of time & space. Edit in the camera – to shoot scenes sequentially & cut action at appropriate moment for transition to next shot, which is both difficult & unusual. In editing techniques, the 2 major ones are the fade-out & the dissolve. There is also ‘the wipe’ where one image replaces another preceded by demarcation line moving across screen.

34. Most frequent method is simple cut from one shot to next. Various transition devices are used or invented to soften cut & make it less sudden or disorientating. Sudden cuts are used for dramatic effect & produces surprise, horror & disruption. Editing conventions: One is shot-reverse shot convention. Other conventions include use of short establishing shots above a new location to place the narrative within a physical context; & observation of an imaginary line across the film set which the camera never crosses, so that viewer is given consistent representation of spatial relations b/w actors & their surroundings (called 180* rule). A cut in a moment of relative stasis slow down action, retard narrative, & open up ambiguities. A thoughtful character, considering his/her future, may be shot from several positions in order to expand the moment

35. and instil significance into it. The speed, pace, or rhythm of editing is imp. Documentary films use fewer edits than narrative films & social-realist films tend to imitate this in pacing of editing. Feature films pursue an identifiable rhythm throughout their length, & single-scenes are dramatically affected by pacing & rhythm of editing. The combination of alteration in soundtrack & skill of editor achieve dramatic effect. Film is a complex of systems of signification &its meanings are the product of combination of these systems. The combination is achieved through systems either complementing or conflicting with each other.

36.  The complexity of film production makes interpretation, the active reading of a film, essential.  The active process of interpretation is essential to film analysis & to the pleasure that film offers.  Films are not autonomous cultural events. We understand films in terms of other films, their worlds in terms of our worlds.  ‘Intertextuality’ is the term used to describe the way any one film text will be understood through our experience, or our awareness, of other film texts.  Films are produced & seen within a social, cultural context that includes more than other film texts.  Film serves a cultural function, through its narratives, that goes beyond the pleasure of story.

37. CHAPTER 9: The Visual Accomplishment of Factuality David Graddol This article examines visual & nonverbal construction of news reports. The persuasiveness of TV news as a factual account of events is commonly assumed to derive from the transparency with which images communicate. Graddol argues that apparent transparency of images in TV news reflects the extent to which realist cinematic techniques have become naturalised in visual narrative, & that there exists a constant tension in TV news b/w verbal & visual narrative & b/w objective & subjective modes of representation. Understanding semiotics of factuality – most imp literacy skill required by readers & viewers in modern industrial world.

38. Cultural imp of visual image establishes the fact that ‘Seeing is believing.’ Factuality is accomplished by words rather than pictures. Visual modalities of TV news are more complex than they first appear. Modality systems: Factuality is a complex semiotic system which provides for varying authority, certainty & appropriateness to be allocated to particular representations of world. This semiotic system is called modality system. That which has definiteness, certainty, lack of ambiguity have high modality. That which is less definite, possible rather than certain, have low modality. Verbal modality: Verbal lang uses a no:of devices to express modality.

39. Verbal modality system encodes social relations & truth value. Modality expresses power & solidarity relations b/w speaker & addressee. This need to be understood to decode factuality. TV news is both a knowledge system & a genre. Fiske describes TV news as ‘a masculine soap opera.’ Visual modality: Modality operates in visual as well as verbal. Hodge & Kress use the term ‘modality cues’ in relation to visual texts. Visual modality cues are not universal; but varies with genre. High modality in TV news is achieved by showing context in which events occur. The key to understand how TV news accomplishes factulity lies in recognising tension b/w

40. objectivity & subjectivity. It explains the complex & eclectic nature of visual modality system which TV news employs. Realist tradition: TV news tells stories about world & dominant narrative technique for storytelling is realism. Realist novels employ an omniscient narrator. A variety of narrative devices called focalisers allow readers to take up point of view of diff characters. Realist narrative provides a modality mechanism called narrative modality. In a realist film, camera provides the all-seeing narrative voice. Any event shown by camera has highest modality: it is the objective realist narrative voice. Camera provides the all-seeing narrative voice.

41. Realism in news: At the heart of TV news, there lies a realist narrative technique. The form of realism which TV news has adopted is a hybrid one, drawing on both literary realism & realist cinema. This reflects a constant tension in news b/w verbal & visual communication. Some problems with visual realism in news: It is a narrative technology designed to create fictional worlds rather than represent natural ones. Realist techniques re-creates the world in fictional form to represent it realistically. Such re-creations are rarely practicable when news gathering. Relation b/w visual & verbal: Ability to show effects & not causes creates a major weakness in visual narratives of TV news.

42. It partially explains a typical relnship b/w verbal & visual in news bulletins : verbal channel speaks of causes & visual tells of effects. Naturalism in TV news There exists a conflict b/w objective & subjective representations of reality in TV news. Naturalism means representation of world as directly experienced by viewer, drawing on modality cues which people employ in everyday interactions with world. Naturalism always represents a subjective view of the world. At the core of its modality system is a system of trust. Non-verbal communication in TV news: In face-to-face interaction, nonverbal communication plays an imp role in the way listeners make evaluations of the reliability & accuracy of a speaker’s claims.

43. A part of naturalist technique in news reporting is its exploitation of such modality cues. The news bulletin: TV news exploit a range of modality cues drawn from literate conventions of verbal lang, conventions of realist cinema & conventions of informal conversational interaction. Diversity of modality systems is exploited in actual news broadcast. The news genre: Integrity of genre is crucial to perception of factuality. Keeping news distinct requires clear boundaries to be created. The studio modality system: Studio setting is imp in creating a realist environment in which newsreaders do their work.

44. Through its design, studio connote solidarity & reliability. Studio acts as a secure visual base from which forays into the hostile & troubled world may be made. It provides rock-steady, perfectly focused & framed, high-quality pictures. The newsreader: Newsreader must have a social identity & accent which makes trust socially appropriate. The newsreader /narrator introduces reporters & other characters who tells stories. A camera/narrator appear in addition to reporter/narrator. This triple narrator structure (newsreader/narrator, reporter/narrator, camera/narrator) makes the narrative modality of TV news so complex. It introduces complexity within field news reports as the 2 modality systems (realist & naturalist) & 2 narrative systems (reporter/narrator &

45. camera/narrator) interact. Visual treatment of news shows how cinematic editing & camera techniques, sound effects & nonverbal communication are routinely used to provide an apparent transparency to representations of the world. TV news genre is heterogeneous in its techniques of editing & modality systems employed; there are tensions & contradictory needs b/w objectivity & subjectivity; b/w verbal & visual narrative structure & b/w literate & conversational modes of representing truth. 2 major visual modality systems exploited in TV news: realism & naturalism. In naturalist treatment of actuality sequences, verbal commentary takes major role of establishing modality of pictures & this aspect of news reports received most

46. analytical attention in past. Realist narrative techniques penetrate news reports more than has been acknowledged. Visual accomplishment of factuality in TV news relies extensively on a narrative modality system which is deeply entrenched in western fiction, & relies on cinematic techniques which provide realism in exactly those drama & entertainment programmes from which TV news seeks to distance itself.

47. Thank You Dr. Veena Vijaya E-mail: drveena@arabou.edu.sa