Theory research for my CI - Marxism (Dominant Ideology)

The Marxism theory was the fact that society was in a state of conflict in which class divisions were evident. This means that society was divided into hierarchy of classes with more power at the top (middle class) and less power at the bottom (working class) He stated that the rulling ideas of any period are ideas of the rulling class. Ideology forms the 'Superstructure' of ideologies that we think and believe in politics, science and religion. But this is dedicated by the rulling classes (Mass media). So breaking this down Marxist dominent ideology theory is basically about things that we all want that we will see in the media.
Therefore this theory links in with my critical investigation because what all these grime artist have, we the audience want. The things that we would want is basically the life that their living because of certain things they have in their videos. E.g. Sports cars and expensive jewlary. This means that the grime artist are representing the dominant ideology and the success they have, stating that for the audience to want the things they have, you just have to successful & it doesn't mean you have to be an artist. Therefore these UK grime artist represent the dominant ideology of success.
(Tinchy Stryder ft Dappy - Spaceship is a good example of marxisms dominant ideology because the things in this video is something that people at a lower class would want to have)

Theory research for my CI - Feminism

The feminist theory is to understand that men and woman are both affected by gender inequality. For example, men are expected to fulfil certain stereotypes such as not having a close relationship with their children. For woman it is not normal for them to enter certain professions. Men and woman are discriminated against and this is casued by their socialisation into gender roles. However more of a radical view on the feminist theory is that men are the cause of womans exploitation etc. & also the cause of female oppression is captilism.
Also there is the male gaze theory which states that male audience get a sense of power and plessure from watching woman in the media who are often represented as objects for male plessure. For feminist it can be thought in three ways. How men look at woman, how woman look at themsleves and how woman look at other woman.

This will link in with my critical investigation because the UK grime artist that i am focussing on all 'use' females in their videos because it is apart of the genre. They 'use' females mainly to attract male audiences because without females in their videos not many males would watch it and only the male fans will. Therefore by adding females into the genre even people who aren't fans will view their video because of the females init due to the male gaze theory that woman are only there as a sexual subject to attract males. Furthermore, the male to female ratio varies within the grime genre because 'grime' itself is targetted at maily males because at first when grime was about with Dizzee Rascal and Wiley. they were among the first to bring the gene to attension and their music didn't really have many females involved which means that the male gaze theory wasnt' around at the time. However, now days people such as Chipmunk, Wretch32, Tinchy Stryder and Tinie Tempah have bought something new into the genre and targetting UK grime at females aswel as males. For example the fact that they have made it big and have become well known celebrities, it is a convention that all girls go crazy for them. & also males will listen to them because 'grime' is one of their favourite genres, therefore you can see that the ratio between male and female in UK grime is slightly balanced.
(Below an image of Tinchy tryder featuring famous singer Amelle Berrabah - Male gaze because of what she's wearing)

Woman respond to these artist by showing their love that they have for them by tweeting making blogs and leaving comments on videos etc. Like i said above, its conventional for a woman to fall in love with a huge male celebrity. Moreover the feminisim theory will argue and say that the genre of UK grime along with the lyrics/music controls the female auidience because most of the artist are males and they are rulling the genre and they will say that females should fight out their oppresion and not be controlled by the males in UK grime.

Theory research for my CI - Roland Barthes

Roland Barthes, in his 1957 book Mythologies argues that no language use can be seperated from structures of ideology and power. Barthes analyses a chapter called 'Toys' from his book about the denotation and connotation of everything, and he was the first to recognise this. He says that "All the toys one commonly sees are essentially a mcrocosm of the adult world, and that for instance, a girls doll is meant to condition to her future role as a mother" Therefore if we apply this to UK grime music, we can immedietely see the semiotics that applied to its ideology and we can see how music plays in our globalised society.

Furthermore his theory leads onto ionic and indexical signs meaning anything within the media wether it is to do with music games etc, it will nbe something that we will all recognise however it will have different meanings to different people. Everything has codes and conventions which the audience have to figure out themselves.
This links in with my CI because Barthe mentions 'Enigma codes' (Detective story where audience must solve codes which then leads onto teasing the audience) If we apply this to my CI, music videos all have some sort of a story throughout the whole video which the audience will figure out themselves through the lyrics of the song.
Subsequently there is also 'Action codes' (A resolution produced through actions) Again linking this in with a music video, where the video is mainly some story being told and throughout the video we see actions with a resolution in the end. for example on Chipmunks 'Diamond rings' music video ends with him leaving a club with stolen diamonds, and this all happens in a music video.

Theory reaserch for my CI - Postmodernism

Postmodern theory is based on how every media text that is shown to us is shown in a way that we will think it is part pf our reality and we'll begin to think that these things actually exist when they only really appear and can be imagined. however when it is constructed to us, its purpose is to entertain and amuse us in some way. Postmodern text deliberately plays with meanings. It makes people to understand their own particular and personal reality.
Since this theory is about people making their own realities through media text, it relates with my critical investigation because i am focussing on how UK grime artist and their music affects and has an influence on young teenagers. Therefore teenagers will look at some of these artists music videos for example and make their own reality out of the lyrics because the lyrics of the songs are always true stories in UK grime and teenagers may build their own realities by going along with the lyrics and believe that it is also true to them. & then the actual video it self is there for entertaining them since videos maybe in very exciting places. (Chipmunks 'Flying high' video)

Chipmunk revision tips on radio 1!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxeaRHSAmzg

Chipmunk giving his advice on revising since he himself at that time was in the process of taking his A levels. Teenagers look up to him therefore they may take on aboard the advice that he gave on radio 1, and this shows he is having a positive affect on teens since they will revise now because of this.

Chipmunk Lyrics

http://www.justsomelyrics.com/1993935/Chipmunk-Chipmunk-Who-are-you-Lyrics

http://www.metrolyrics.com/champion-lyrics-chipmunk.html

omparison of song lyrics from when he first started music up until now.

E Media

Famous grime artist making a video together called 'Teardrop' for 'Children in needs charity. This show that these grime artist are doing something positive with their music by making a song for a charity which is telling other people to get ivolved.

Print text: Articles

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/music/interviews/a181268/chipmunk.html

http://www.mtv.co.uk/news/tinie-tempah/198276-tinie-tempah-interview

My Critical Investigation Idea

3 possible investigation options:

1) Does sports have a positive or negative impact on society. This interested me because sports such as football is something that i have loved from a young age. Therefore i will be able to talk about this from my own knowledge as well as my research that i do.

2) The impact that grime music has on me as a teenager. This interested me because music plays a big part in my life, whatever i'm doing i'll be listening to music since it motivates etc. For example if i am doing homework i'll be listening to grime music at the same time.

3) Whether shows like X Factor and Britain's Got Talent actually gives people the chance to chase their dream or does is does in reality just break their dreams. This interested me because shows like these is something that nearly everybody watches from each class for entertainment purposes. Therefore because nearly everyone from each class watches these show i'll be able to discuss the issue from a wide range of beliefs.

Initial idea's for my critical investigation & Linked production:


An investigation into the impact and affect that grime music has on teenagers and how the media portrays these artist of being

1) The topic that is going to be investigated in my coursework is about UK grime music and the affects it has on teenagers now days and how these artist influence and have an impact on teenagers. However i am only goin to be looking atcertain artist that have made it big in the music industry and how they are now then how they were before when they were underground. i can use textual examples such as sbtv etc.

2) A rough idea for now for my linked production piece could be me designing a poster or posters of some sort explaining how teenagers have been infulenced by these UK grime artist and the sort of things they are doing to be successful like some of the artist. And also possibly another poster showing how certain artist have grown over the years to come to where they are now. Furthermore i could add videos, pictures, questionaires etc on the side of my linked production piece.

3) Media text: Get articles from magazines/Newspapers that these UK grime artist to see how they're portrayed. Also What type of stuff these artist post on facebook and twitter (Blogs). Lastly how UK grime artist are shown on television or Youtube (Their music videos) and also on interviews such as the MOBO awards which happened recently.

4) (MIGRIAN done in book, i will copy it when iv finished it)

5)

Reflection to the mock

The mock i had recently about 'The most pivotal year of my generation' (Summer Riots) went really well. Firstly because the topic i was given was something that i was already intrested in and also something that happened recently for me to see with my own two eyes. The thing that went well with this was that during my research i was able to discuss my own experience of this and what i thought about it since it was an event that mainly involed teenagers, so therefore the research and writing a formal presentation was enjoyable for me since i already had a keen interest in the summer riots.
3 things that helped me with this mock:
1) Twitter - The fact that we use twitter for Media Studies, it actually helped me with my research on the summer riots since i started searching for more information through this and helped me have something different through e media rather than just looking at a website.
2) The sheet of paper that was given to us at the begining of the mock, because this had guidlines of what we should, and should not do.
3) General discussions about the summer riots with friends helped me a lot as it gave me a over view of what different people thought about the riots.
Even better if: The mock could have gone better if i took my research from a more wider prospective. for example rather than looking for news articles on the internet, i should have tried to gather a photomontage from newspapers of the riots, or atleast something the connotes the riots.

Mock CI

Summer Riots – “The Most Pivotal Year of my generation”

Hundreds of mourners gathered for the funeral of Mark Duggan who was shot dead by the police in North London (Tottenham). This all happened on 4^th August when two shots were fired by a firearm officer and killed Mark Duggan who was known as a drug dealer in Tottenham.  Independent police complaints commission said that “A non police handgun was recovered” meaning that the firearm police had no option but to shoot at Duggan since their lives was in danger as well. Following on from this a riot began in Tottenham and spread across England where several London Boroughs, cities and towns suffered a wide spread of rioting and looting between 6^th and 10^th August.

There are several reasons why I believe that the summer riot is ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’. Firstly comparing this to other summer events that happened such as the Arab spring and the phone hacking scandal, the media didn’t portray these events as being as important to my generation (Teenagers) as the summer riots. The media had a huge part to play for making the summer riot ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ since the summer riots was all over the news and was presented in all three media platforms (Broadcast, Print and E-Media).  For example they discussed the riots on Question Times and then also had a separate show called ‘Young voters Question time’ which was the only programme on British television to actually give young people their chance to speak publically, which proves that the summer riots was actually the most pivotal year for the teenage generation because they gave teenagers the chance to speak since they were the centre of attention of these riots.

Furthermore, Government advisor Sheldon Thomas said that about 2 years ago we’ve had over 20 teenage murderers but yet we didn’t have the same fire and impact on that than we did on the summer riots. Therefore, after hearing a couple of these facts from Sheldon, it brings me back to my point that the summer riot was ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ because of the way everyone was keen in knowing more about what is going on since this had an effect on literally everyone. For example a furniture store called house of reads got burnt down in Croydon, which therefore had an effect on someone else other than a teenager, that Is why o believe the summer riots was ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ because it had some sort of an impact on everyone. And the fact that teenagers that are my age were the main group involved and what they done affect everyone which is why it is pivotal for my generation. In addition, I think the riots is ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ because the only time we hear of teenagers is when they do something negative, and the riots is one of the most negative things teenagers have done, therefore they are the main class that everyone looks out for now because of these riot. Like Labour MP Stella Creasy said in Young voters Question time “We never dwell on the positive side of teenagers and we never embrace there intelligence/talents”. Which is another point why the summer riots is ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’  

Subsequently the summer riots links in with Vladimir Propps theory about the seven sphere’s of action. He stated in his theory that everything we watch or anything that happens to us seems like a fairy tale, and there are seven characters in the fairy tale. The first character is the hero, in which the case of the riots, the hero is the police because they are there to save the day. The second character is the villain which is the rioters because they are meant to struggle against the hero. Then comes the donor which is the government because they are the ones to prepare the hero. Next is the dispatcher who is the public because they trigger the hero to go do their task. Moreover it is the helper and father which in this case the government plays both roles because they government are the ones that give consent for every action. So as you can see this the summer riots links perfectly with Propps theory because that is how much of a big event it was that everyone had a role tp play which is why I believe it is ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’.

On the other hand some people may argue and say that the summer riot was not ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ for several reasons. The main argument against for this is that they will say it is not the biggest event that has happened during our generations because as time goes past we will eventually forget about these riots that happened. Whereas an event like 9/11 is probably ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ because even ten years from now we still talk about it and we have realised how much it has changed our lives. For example the war of terror is still going on since 9/11 has happened. Therefore that clearly shows how much 9/11 has affected us, and the summer riots won’t be the same.

In conclusion, the summer riots to me, is defined to be ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ mainly because teenagers my age were the main ones involved in all of this. Even though there are some good arguments to say likewise, I still believe that the summer riots is ‘the most pivotal year of my generation’ because ever since the riots, people have an even worse stereotypical view upon teenagers and our life’s have changed dramatically.