'The Star is not a truth-seeking enterprise.'

The Leveson Inquiry continues to enthusistically throw up more chunks of tabloid vomit into the ever increasing lake of shame-puke lapping at the embarrassed feet of a society that pretends it wasn't eager to pay for the papers that funded this filth. 

Read this one to see the full context of the Star quote above.  Then check out this one in which ex-tabloid hack Paul McMullan tells some exciting stories, including the time he 'paid one "rent boy" £2,000, then dressed up as another to expose a priest. Having snapped the picture of the reverend in flagrante, the two ran off in their underpants "through a nunnery at midnight" to get the story safely into the paper.'  

Ethnic Identity - Ethnic variation in prison sentences

We'll be looking at ethnic identity soon, in another one of my bowel-shatteringly exciting lessons, which will include some details about how identity can be affected by the different treatment received by different groups at the hands of the merciless hounds of the law.  Here is an article relating to a study carried out by The Guardian (that's a newspaper, you may have seen it on the magazine racks when you are looking for the latest copy of 'Activities for Simpletons Monthly' or whatever drivel you like to read on the commode). It says offenders from ethnic minorities are more likely than their white counterparts to be sentenced to prison for certain categories of crimes, and this is based on analysis of more than one million court records.

Once you've digested this, take a look at this which looks at how many judges are white, middle class and Oxbridge educated.  Could these issues be related? 

Gender Identity in the Media - Female Action Roles

'Stop portraying me as a housewife!  Eat hot lead, mysoginists of the media!'

As we have seen during some of my bladder-burstingly exciting lessons, 'the laydeez' often get a raw deal in TV and Movie roles, where they are often portrayed as weak and/or flawed in some way and best relegated to the kitchen and/or whorehouse, depending on which idiot/pervert is directing the production in question. In exam questions relating to this kind of stuff it is useful to have a few examples of women being cast in strong roles to balance the many examples to the the contrary. Hence my decision to post this link to an article about 'the next wave of celluloid superheroines'.  Read it, chumps.

Why you should read journalism...

This is just to make it easier for you to find interesting things to read.  I know how busy you are, scratching your nether regions and trying to work out what you had for dinner last night by sniffing your own emissions.  This bloke has gone to the trouble of collecting about 100 interesting pieces of journalism from 2010.  I salute him!

Have a look!  There's all sorts of stuff.  Drugs, Jesus, violence, all your favourite things!

AS Class Identity - The Great British Class Survey

What social class are you?!  I don't think you're even human, I doubt you can even legitimately class yourself as a 'mammal' BUT WHY NOT PROVE ME WRONG BY TAKING THIS BBC SURVEY ON CLASS!  YEAH!

Do the Class Survey!

You can read about the survey here. You won't, you're too lazy, but the offer still stands.

Too stupid to complete a survey?  HERE'S SOME VIDEOS INSTEAD!  Let me hear you grunt your approval!

Videos! Grunt! Grunt!

Mass Media - Agenda Setting

For the A2 class...

Agenda Setting Theory    

THE AGENDA-SETTING FUNCTION OF MASS MEDIA this is one of the big studies, by MAXWELL E. McCOMBS AND DONALD L. SHAW

Agenda Setting theory



Examples of agenda setting

This site has lots of stuff you should look at in general regarding Mass Media for revision etc

And here are a couple of  links 1  2 that relate specifically to agenda setting


and also this one looks interesting!

Media Effects - Psywar - Chomsky

A loose assortment of links for you, starting with some straightforward stuff about media effects:

1   2

Here's an essay by Mr Chomsky on  What Makes Mainstream Media Mainstream

The real mass media are basically trying to divert people. Let them do something else, but don’t bother us (us being the people who run the show). Let them get interested in professional sports, for example. Let everybody be crazed about professional sports or sex scandals or the personalities and their problems or something like that. Anything, as long as it isn’t serious. Of course, the serious stuff is for the big guys. "We" take care of that.


And a documentary called PSYWAR which may or may not be made by a conspiracy theorist/911 truther.  Here are a couple of reviews discussing it 1   2

Media Effects - FILM - David Cronenberg VIDEODROME

A2 lesson - This film is almost 30 years old but it's worth a look.  Your task is to read all about it, there are links below, then watch it via the medium of youtube (link below 'Videodrome Part 1') as part of homework.

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Videodrome part 1


Reading up on Marshall McLuhan and his books such as 'The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects' (1967) might not be a bad idea, as well.

Is the Internet really good for democracy? BOOK 'The Net Delusion' by Evgeny Morozov

We've been looking at media control and power in A2 lessons and 'The Net Delusion' is a good example of the argument that the new media forms are not going to be as much as a force for freedom as we might hope.  The author argues that the internet is not as close to samizdat as we might have been led to believe.

“Where new media and the Internet truly excel is in suppressing boredom.  Previously, boredom was one of the few truly effective ways to politicize the population denied release values for channeling their discontent, but this is no longer the case.” (p. 80)  He continues on: “Those of us rooting for the further spread of democracy around the globe must stop dreaming and face reality: The Internet has provided so many cheap and easily available entertainment fixes to those living under authoritarianism that is has become considerably harder to get people to care about politics at all.” (p. 81)




Check out the links for reviews and discussion, and there's a video of the author discussing 'How the net aids dictatorships' as well. 

Book website     Excerpts from the book   Review in The Guardian   Review from Behind The Spin

More detailed review and discussion here, with more links included at end

VIDEO The Author talks

Is digital activism an effective medium for change? Malcolm Gladwell 2010


AND as an added bonus, taken from the list in the post below this one, here's ANOTHER TED TALK that seems to be taking the OPPOSING VIEW!  How cool is that?!  (answer: very).

How cellphones, twitter, facebook can make history   a TED Talk by Clay Shirky that demonstrates how emerging social tools “help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors.”

Influence of Media on Society: GOOD FOR AS AND A2 - websites and videos

This blog here is the shizzle for videos and whatnot. I've taken the really relevant stuff and posted it below to make it easier for you to access.

Influence of Media on Society:

 Killing Us Softly 3 – Jean Kilbourne’s popular presentation on women in advertising.

 Dove Evolution – This is a popular advertisement from Dove’s ‘Campaign For Real Beauty’. While the video is well done, there has since been some criticism of Dove’s ownership of Axe with it’s very contradictory style of advertising.

Dove Onslaught – Also from Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty, this video illustrates the incredible impact of advertising on adolescent girls.

Birth Control: Current – Comedian Sarah Haskins has developed an excellent series of videos that take a humorous look at ads targeting women. For a complete list of Haskins’ videos, view this previous post on the subject.

 Video Games & Sex – This is an excellent presentation by Daniel Floyd regarding the place of sex and sexuality in video games as a media genre. The video covers a brief history of sex in gaming which has been primarily exploitative and superficial. Floyd then argues, if video games are to be seen as an emerging artistic medium, the treatment of sex in video games needs to be more sophisticated and mature. (Note: this video may not be suitable for minors.)

 Boys Beware – This was an anti-homosexual propaganda film from the 1950′s. In light of recent anti-gay marriage ads, it (unfortunately) appears similar propaganda continues to be broadcast.

 How Cellphones, Twitter, Facebook Can Make History – This is an excellent TED Talk by Clay Shirky that demonstrates how emerging social tools “help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors.”

 Story of Stuff – This video doesn’t directly look at how media affects society. Rather, it takes a very critical and eye-opening look at the life cycle of goods and services. It is definitely worth watching and sharing.


There's also some related MEDIA stuff here which is probably more relevant to the A2 class:

History of Technology & Media:

The Growing Phenomenon of Internet – This is a 1993 CBC report on the emergence of the Internet. It is interesting to watch this early media account of the Internet and to think about how much has changed in only 16 years. Additionally, the techno-utopianism of this report is striking.

 A Communications Primer – The ephemeral piece is an instructional film created in 1953 for IBM by Ray & Charles Eames with music by Elmer Bernstein. The video presents communications theory that is remarkably accurate, even before the age of the Internet.

 Internet Power – This is a 1995 educational video about the entertainment value of the Internet. While parts of the video demonstrate the great technological gains we have made, other parts make me question the gains regarding the mindset of the majority of Internet users.

How the News Works – This is a short, anti-corporate explanation of how the mainstream media functions.

The Internet in 1969 – This is a late 1960′s video describing futuristic technologies that resemble today’s Internet affordances.

Television Delivers People – This video is purported as “a seminal work in the now well-established critique of popular media as an instrument of social control that asserts itself subtly on the populace through ‘entertainments’, for the benefit of those in power-the corporations that maintain and profit from the status quo.” The style of this video is just ripe to be emulated.


AND ONE MORE I PICKED OUT!...

Chomsky's 'Manufacturing Consent' documentary on Propaganda

AS Class Identity - Unpaid Internships - a barrier that stops the poor getting the best jobs?

Many of the exciting and glamorous jobs that people want to do in the Media, Industry, Fashion and Politics require you to work for free for a certain amount of time. This is called an 'internship' and some people say that it favours the rich who can afford to work for free to secure these highly sought-after jobs.

So, in terms of what we have looked at regarding the way the upper class tries to keep those from the lower classes from joining the upper class, read these articles below and have a think!

1   2   3

Media Censorship, Power and Control - DOCUMENTARY Germany's records of repression - The Stasi

Watch it here.


On August 13, 1961, 50 years ago this month, the Berlin Wall went up in Germany. This barrier divided a country, segregated families and separated friends, and its existence would cast a pall over the country for the next 20 years.

As a stark symbol of the Cold War, the wall existed in an era of fear, secrecy and heightened political tension, and those that lived in its shadow would know the painful repercussions of its hardliner policies. For what followed in the years of a divided Germany was a surveillance culture brought on by one of the largest and most feared secret service organisations in the world - the Stasi.

Founded in 1950, the Stasi was charged with keeping tabs on all the people living in East Germany, or what was then officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It compiled millions of photos, audio and video tapes, and paper files about its citizens. As a result, thousands of people were subjected to intimidation and torture by the Stasi. Many were imprisoned, while others were prevented from getting jobs or going to university. The aim was not only to thwart professional aspirations, but to destroy the personal lives of those that opposed the regime.

At its height, the Stasi had over 102,000 officers and nearly a quarter of a million of its own citizens spying on family members, neighbours and colleagues. In 1989, while the Berlin Wall crumbled, senior Stasi officials ordered the destruction of the files they had collected for over 40 years. Data gathered by the Stasi was frantically shredded to destroy evidence, but after protesters stormed the headquarters to stop the destruction, nearly 95 per cent was saved.

Censorship - Media Control - Assorted articles - A2 OCR Sociology Media

For the A2 class, relating to power and control of the media, a selection of additional reading for your perusal...

The 10 Most Censored Countries

Censorship

this one

and this

and this    and this   and this   this   this   this

Social Class Identity - News Articles and more...

Primarily for the AS class, here are a selection of articles relating to class, meritocracy and education. 

It took about ten mins on Google to collect all these, most of them were linked to each other on the Guardian website so I just followed those.  They are very useful as additional reading to broaden your knowledge for the exam and life in general.  The more you read, the more you know and the better you can do in your exams!  Of course, you are free to ignore them and remain in your present position, i.e shrouded in a thick fog of ignorance.  A really good student would read them and take notes, particularly relating to studies mentioned, statistics, examples, the author and source of the article and a general summary of what the article is about.   I know, it's a crazy idea but it just might work!

Read them here...

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Bonus Material!  Yeah!  Here is it...

These good people do a whole lotta research etc on poverty and inequality, they are very useful to know about...

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation



Full text of study by Mike Savage on:

Changing Social Class Identities in Post-War Britain: Perspectives from Mass-Observation

Workless families: a convenient untruth. A belief in inherited underclass idleness is spreading, but in reality multiple generations who have never worked is very rare

Churnalism in today's Daily Express - John Lewis Xmas Ad

I don't read the Daily Express because I have a functioning brain but I was having breakfast in a cafe this morning and someone, most likely an idiot, had left a copy on the table so I looked at it in order to avoid having to see the other patrons of the cafe who were a bit too plebeian for my taste. 

If you're looking for free biscuits, this is the newspaper for you!  If you're looking for quality journalism, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed.

Anyway, the front page featured the usual rubbish, revolving around some decision taken by the EU which the journalist had deliberately blown out of all proportion in order to produce the sort of hysterical headline that appeals to simpletons.  Once I'd delved deeper into this semi-literate dung heap masquerading as a newspaper I discovered this word-turd:

Here it is, it stinks.

It's a classic example of a PR press-release being written up as a news article. Read it and weep.

Thinking Allowed - BBC Radio 4 - Sociology

'Thinking Allowed' has lots of relevant stuff for AS and A2, you just need to dig about a bit.

This week - MIDDLE CLASS IDENTITY IN SCHOOLS (ideal for AS students) (CLASS IDENTITY UNIT)

Here's the page

Here's the index of lots of previous shows, have a look whydontcha?

And if you go to the next link you'll find a blog that has a link to a Thinking Allowed podcast about SOFT MASCULINITIES in 6th Form Students, ideal for AS students (GENDER IDENTITY UNIT)

Blog post here, you can read it or listen to it. Or ignore it entirely and face the consequences!

Glasgow Media Group - Sutton Trust - Media Control/Consensus/Agenda Setting

Mentioned in textbooks, important for the A Level course, this lot study the media and have produced many well-known studies.  Links to their website below...
Media Theory and Methods, articles index

Assorted websites of interest

Blog about distortion and general bad behaviour by the tabloid media

Sutton Trust - over 50% of journalists went to public school