Lesson Four

Wednesday 21st September 2016Media Language –

Narrative

Connect the Learning

• Review my comments on yourDesign Challenge posters

• Respond to my feedback• Make sure you write in full sentences

Preparing Minds

• What’s the story?

Death of Bay Hop• Person executed:

Viet Cong Guerrilla,killed twelve people that morning.

• His had slaughtered family of executioner’s best friend.

• Picture cropped to display just General and his victim (executioner was South Vietnam’s National Chief of Police).

• Photograph credited with helping provoke massive demonstrations against Vietnam war.

Learning Intentions

• To explore media language concepts of narrative and genre

• To learn language of narrative and genre

Success criteria

• I will– Know what narrative and genre mean– Understand how they apply to media products– Explore how they help the audience make sense

of the media

Narrative

• Stories told within media by words/ pictures/ sounds etc.

• How we interpret experience.• Basis of all human interaction/

communication (e.g. Bible stories,fairy tales etc.).

• Implicit or explicit but always there.• Can be a single sentence or a TV series lasting

for thousands of hours.

The shortest story?

• “For sale:baby shoes,never worn”

Longest Running series• US soap opera – (72 yrs,

18,262 episodes)

• UK soap opera – (53 yrs, 8040 episodes)

Only seven stories?• Overcoming the Monster • Rags to Riches• The Quest• Voyage and Return• Comedy of Identity• Tragedy • Rebirth/ Redemption• Can you think of

examples for each?

Only one story?• “Hero’s journey” (monomyth)• Are all stories about hero/ villain struggles?

Suspense

• Drives narrative• Build “enigma”• Whets the appetite• “What happens next?”– Cliff hangers– Teasers– Headlines

What’s the story?

• Man of Steel trailer

Questions

• How was suspense created?• Which story/ stories shown?

• Overcoming the Monster • Rags to Riches• The Quest• Voyage and Return• Comedy of Identity• Tragedy • Rebirth/ Redemption

Point of View

• Where are we positioned?– Goodies and baddies?

• How do know?– See what hero sees/

feel what they feel– Could be through voice-over– Could be through focus– Could be through point of view

Connect the Learning

• How many stories are there?– 7 or 1

• Can you name them?• Overcoming the Monster • Rags to Riches• The Quest• Voyage and Return• Comedy of Identity• Tragedy • Rebirth/ Redemption• Or the “monomyth” (Hero’s journey)

Positioning

• Clip from Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe(Reality TV pastiche)

Examples of positioning?• Can you think of

examples from• Reality TV?• Soap opera?• News stories?

Conflict• Central to narrative• Usually between

good and evil– Normal world/ invader– Hunter/ hunted

• Audience invited to take sides– Civil war in Syria– “Brexit”– “The power to make the innocent guilty and make

the guilty innocent…” (Malcolm X)

Other conflicts?

• In the news?• Between celebrities?• In games?

Ideology

• Belief systems– Political– Social– Religious

• Learned from the media/ society?• What is good and what is bad?

Name some ideologies

How does ideology influence narrative?

Task• Choose a story (can be from a film/ TV

programme/ news story/ book/ comic/ fairy tale)– Your choice needs to have clear

heroes and villains.– You are going to re-write the story from the

villain’s point of view.– You should aim to write at least three

paragraphs.– Complete at home (deadline 28th September)

For example

• Maleficient• Star Wars: Battlefront II• Hoodwinked

Luke’s ChangeGraham Putnam 2013