HEGEMONY:

The predominant influence, as of a state, region, or group, over another or others.
The term 'hegemony' refers to leadership, dominance or great influence that one entity or group of people has over others. Historically, this term often referred to a city-stateor country that exterted power over other city-states or countries indirectly rather tan military force. Modern uses of 'hegemony' often refer to a group in a society having power over others within the societty. For example, the wealthy class might be said to have hegemony over the poor because of its ability to use its money to influence many aspects of society and government.

SEMIOTIC AND HEGEMONY:

Hegemony is not a forced political movement, however. To use the previous example, no one is forced to watch/listen to/read about football. Its just sometimes it seems there are a few alternatives. This is how hegemonies take hold: a majority decide 'fit in' with the cultural values and ideas of their times and place and the majority keep their objections quiet. Hegemony is about consent, and one of the things it consents to is inequality - us and them.

Hegemony captures the struggle between powerful and subordinate groups in society.

Stuart Hall - The media deliver hegemonic representations of reality that serve powerful interests.
Hall set up an ''Encoding/Decoding'' model (in Culture, Media, Language 1980) as a theoretical attempt to understand hegemonic media processes in practice. He calles on semiontics to examine how the media guide the ways we make sense of the world.

SIGNIFIERS & SIGNIFIED:

SIGNIFIER = The image in the raw,the physical form - A knife is simply a metal implement
SIGNIFIED = That which carries the meaning, referring to something other than itself - In context of scene involving a murder in a shower this knife signifies death and violence.

Both a Signifier and the Signified join together to make up A SIGN.
Semiotics is able to give account for meanings that are absent as well as present in any given representation.

HALL- ENCODING & DECODING:

Encoding process occurs during the phase of media production whereas 'decoding' is what audiences do during consumption.
Encoding is guided by a professional code in  which media producers follow certain procedures in order to comply with regulations and uphold standards of economic status quo.

However, the phase of audience decoding doesn't necessarily accept what is encoded in media representations, leaving three different types of decoding.

ENCODING and DECODING: Simply is what the audience reads/makes sense of; from the text/film.

HALLS MODEL - DECODING:

THE DOMINANT CODE - Accepts the encoded meanings of media representations. Consumers adopt a 'preferred reading' of media representations as intended by producers. Therefore the ruling ideology filters down into the public conscience without challenge.

THE NEGOTIATED CODE - Accepts some aspects of encoded representations but not others. On general level, the encoded meanings may be endorsed by audiences but on a more local level these meanings may be dismissed as individuals consider themselves expectations to the general rule.

THE OPPOSITIONAL CODE - Rejects the encodings of media producers. Audiences decode media representations in a way that was not intended or foreseen at the phase of production.

MEDIA LANGUAGE:

What does it mean?
"How was media language used in your production?"
How would you answer this question?
- It will actually involve discussions on the following:
The way meaning is made using conventions of a particular medium and type of media product.

• Semiotics
• Genre
• Narrative
• Structure
• Codes
• Conventions
• Spoken, Written and Visual language
• Use of continuity
• Use of editing in a film sequence

NARRATIVE THEORY:

Valdimir Propp:

• Analysed over 100 Russian fairytales in the 1920's.
• Proposed that it was possible to cassify the characters and their actions into clearly defined roles and functions.
• Films such as Star Wars fit Propp's model precisely but a significant number of more recent films such as Pulp Fiction do not.
• The model is useful, however as it highlights the similarities between seemingly quite different stories.

Propp's Character Roles:

• The hero (seeking something e.g. Harry Potter)
• The villain (opposes hero e.g. Voldomort)
• The donor (helps the hero by providing a magic object)
• The dispatcher (sends the hero on his way e.g. Hagrid)
• The false hero (falsely assuming the role of the hero e.g. Ron)
• The helper (gives support to the hero e.g. Herminie)
• The princess ( the reward for the hero, but also needs protection from the villian)
• The princesses father