1. Representation
By Hannah Lovejoy and Laura
Budden

2. What is it?
• “It is defined as the process of making meaning in still/ moving images and
words/sounds.” “It is used to represent or stand for someone or something, for
example a place/idea.”
• “Representation refers to the construction in any medium (especially the mass
media) of aspects of ‘reality’ such as people, places, objects, events, cultural
identities and other abstract concepts.”

3. How does it work?

4. Theories
• Strinati “The world in which we live in is a reflection of what we see in the media”
• Baudrillard “ The Disney Land imaginary is neither true nor false, it is a deterrence
machine set up in order to rejuvenate in reverse the fiction of the real.”
• Jameson “ In a world in which innovation is no longer possible, all that is left is to
imitate dead styles.”

5. Links to postmodern
• Strinati suggests:
• “the boundaries between reality and the
media representation of it have become
blurred”

6. Hyperreality
• Hyperreality “returns to the more basic idea that there is no longer a distinction
between reality and it’s representing image, or simulacra.”
• “The idea is that popular culture signs and media images increasingly dominate our
sense of reality, and the way we define ourselves and the world around us. It tries to
come to terms with, and understand, a media saturated society.”
• “A key in the study of representation concern is with the way in which
representations are made to seem ‘natural’.”

7. Realism
• General attempt to depict subjects as they are
considered in third person.

8. Stereotypes
• Gender is a key issue when discussing representations.

9. Thematically
• Representation of:
• Class
• Race
• Gender

10. Media superficiality