Muslim representation in media

Anti-Muslim Media

Spoof Articles 

This article is relevant due to the fact that the word "Jihadis" was never mentioned in the original survey (questions above) and the questions which were used were phrases in an emotive way.  This emotive wording of "young Muslims" urges the interviewed party to feel sorry and sympathy for the vulnerable young Muslim youth.  The result of this misleading article is the growth of hatred for Muslims throughout the Western world as they are now associated with sympathy for terrorists.

Charlie Hebdo

The following satirical comics were created by Charlie Hebdo magazine in an attempt to critique the immigration crisis facing both the Eastern and Western world.

The above image features the text "Welcome migrants, So Close but" as well as "Promotion 2 children's meals for the price of 1".  The aim of the above image and encoded message was to raise awareness of the dangers of immigration specially after a young migrant washed up dead on a beach in Greece.  The Mc Donalds sign features in an attempt to critique the heartless consumerism in the Western world in the face of the atrocities faced by many in other countries.  The bright coloration of the sign also highlights the fact that the Western world is the hope which the migrants are attempting to reach in order to start a new life.  Sadly due to the deep levels of satirical humour the image has been consumed by the public and decoded as an attack on migrants and a display of Orientalism and the idea that the West are superior to the Eastern nations whom are seen as less civilised and more barbaric according to Orientalism.

The above image is more shocking as it blatantly focuses on race an religion opposed to the migrant crisis.  The image states "Proof that Europe is Christian, Christians walk on water, Muslim children sink". This is an offensive message for a number of reasons firstly it erases non-Christian people who live in Europe and secondly it makes light of the death of a young muslim child who was trying to make a better life for himself in Europe.  The encoded meaning of this piece would be to make satirical joke however when decoded by the public it comes across as offensive and cruel.

Charlie Hebdo to Chapel Hill

http://harvardpolitics.com/world/portrayals-violence-abroad-dehumanization-home/

This is an example of the erasure of hate crimes against Muslims by White American's due to the fact that they do not wish to make folk devils of themselves.

Youth Newspaper- Analysis

Context




















Planning

• The above papers suggest the way in which youth can be violent and aggressive.  
• They are presented as rebellious "YOB"s and founders of "Anarchy".  
• This is not an accurate repersetnaion of youth and supports Cohen's Moral Panic Code which leads to negative events creating a lasting stereotype.

Essay

The newspapers above are examples of youth displayed as public villains by media outlets.  The purpose of these newspaper articles is to display youth a dangerous and rebellious which sparks Cohen's Moral Panic Theory in which one events used to spark hatred to an individual cultural subgroup.  

Both of the newspapers featured above are guided by right-wing views however are in fact targeted to the working classes whom are generally left-wing supporters.  This is an example of the hypodermic syringe theory in which the public are "injected" injected with views which they may not normally support, through media consumption.

The Sun has a front page created predominately from image opposed with limited information.  This design is employed to spark interest in the article without actually providing extensive detail in order to make the reader make a snap judgement without knowing all of the facts.  This kind of snap judgement is important to note as it leads to a mob mentality against an entire race and is a prime example of Cohen's Moral Panic Theory, this states that a stereotype about a culture or subgroup is formed from the media coverage of single shocking event.  The fact that "ANARCHY" is shown as the main title of the piece with a large level of contrast between the white of the text and black and red of the fire draws the reader in and imprints the idea that youth are dangerous and anarchists (ideas which are supported by theorist Ann Gould).

The second Newspaper article from the Daily Mirror has a busier front page however roughly 1/3 of the page space is again taken up by an image of flames and chaos with youth's silhouetted against the flames.  The symbolism of this image shows youth as being dark and chaotic due to the connotations between hell and sining and flames.  This symbolism implants the idea that youth are dangerous before the reader has started to delve deeper into the story and again the title "YOB RULE" (a play on words of mob rule) is shown with high levels of contrast in order to make it stand out.  The use of "YOB" shows the fact that youth are viewed as an angry mob which links to Ann Gould's theory of youth as rebellious and the artificial tribe.

For the reasons listed above both newspapers are attacking youth and shaping them into folk devils who are to blame for the riots however youths were not the only people to blame for the 2011 riots.

My expectations of youth

Youth are conscious of our future.

Youth are stressed.

Youth are calm.

Youth enjoy adventures.

Critical Perspectives in media

Section A: Theoretical evaluation of production.
•Question 1(a) requires candidates to describe and evaluate their skills development over the course of their production work, from Foundation Portfolio to Advanced Portfolio. The focus of this evaluation must be on skills development, and the question will require them to adapt this to one or two specific production practices. The list of practices to which questions will relate is as follows:
•Digital Technology
•Creativity
•Research and planning
•Post-production
•Using conventions from real media texts

Section A: Theoretical evaluation of production.
•Question 1(b) requires candidates to select one production and evaluate it in relation to a media concept. The list of concepts to which questions will relate is as follows:
•Genre
•Narrative
•Representation
•Audience
•Media language

Section B: Contemporary Media Issues
•One question to be answered from a choice of six topic areas offered by OCR.
–There will be two questions from each topic area.

Section B: Contemporary Media Issues
• You will be investigating
•Media and Collective identity

Media and Collective Identity
–How do the contemporary media represent: nations, regions and ethnic / social / collective groups of people in different ways?
–How does contemporary representation compare to previous time periods?
–What are the social implications of different media representations of groups of people?
–To what extent is human identity increasingly ‘mediated’?

Candidates may analyse the representation of and / or the collective identity of one or more group(s) of people.
•National cinema, television representations, magazines and… gender, representations of youth and youth culture, post-9/11 representations of Islam, absence / presence of people with disability in two media.

Glossary- Critical perspectives in media

Definitions
Collective identity: the individuals sense of belonging to a group who share a set of traditions and values, (part of personal identity).
Hegemony: leadership or dominance, especially by one state or social group over others.
Mediation: Is the process of selection and shaping, creating meaning from an original event.
Representation: Representation means the way ideas , objects , people, groups and life forms are depicted by the mass media.
Structuration: the process in which human agency and social structure are in a constant relationship ± the social structure is reproduced by the repetition of acts by individual people (and can therefore change)

Theories
Encoding and Decoding: A the intended meaning of a text and the perceived meaning of a text.



Hypodermic syringe model/Magic bullet theory: The hypodermic needle model (also known as the hypodermic-syringe model, transmission-belt model, or magic bullet theory) is a model of communications suggesting that an intended message is directly received and wholly accepted by the receiver.



Two-step flow theory: The two-step flow of communication model hypothesizes that ideas flow from mass media to opinion leaders, and from them to a wider population. It was first introduced by sociologist Paul Lazarsfeld et al. in 1944 and elaborated by Elihu Katz and Lazarsfeld in 1955 and subsequent publications.



Theorists:

David Gauntlet:

•  identity is now consciously constructed, and the media provides some of the tools to help us construct our identities. The media contains a huge number of messages about identity and acceptable lifestyles.
• At the same time the public have their own diverse set of feelings. The media and media consumers are engaged in a dialogue in which neither overpowers the other.

Anthony Giddens

•There is a social structure which shapes our lives (traditions, institutions, moral codes, established ways of doing things), but it relies on individuals following these structures.

•When they act differently the social structure can change. Structuration is the process in which human agency and social structure are in a constant relationship ± the social structure is reproduced by the repetition of acts by individual people (and can therefore change)