Here are the resources for your timed textual analysis essay. These have also been sent to you via Google Classroom, where you should submit the essay and notes.
Textual Analysis Question
You will be shown an extract from Nashville a total of four times. During the first screening, you should not make notes; during the second, third and fourth screenings there will be an opportunity to make notes and there will be gaps in between for further note-taking.
Your notes should be made on a piece of paper, photographed and submitted alongside your essay or typed up into the template sent you earlier this week.
Extract: Nashville (Pilot, 2012, dir. Cutler)
Discuss the ways in which the extract constructs meaning through the following:
Task 1: (Monday) Should have completed and submitted ‘What makes a media text postmodern?‘ essay to classroom for feedback – submission by Monday 25th January – 1 hour.
Task 2: (Tuesday) Listen to Screen Castify on the trickier questions – see above – 15 minutes.
Task 3: (Tues/Weds/Thursday) Complete essay plan for a trickier question – this will be in classroom on a google presentation with your name on it – submission by end of Thursday 28th January – 1 – 2 hours.
Task 4: (Friday) Redraft your Postmodern essay that will hopefully have been returned to you – 1 hour.
Task 5: (Start of next week) Listen to the screencastify when your teacher will present the best essay plans. A great resource for nearer the exam and the mock (whenever they will be) – 30 mins.
We will be revisiting TV drama next week with the aim of you completing an essay by the end of the week.
Good luck and be in touch by email if you need any help.
This episode is on Netflix. Watch it with the notes to hand.
This episode of Black Mirror, called Nosedive, really spotlights the world that we live in: the simulacra, the hypereality and the consumer culture that surrounds us.
It is made in a postmodern fashion, using intertextuality, parody, pastiche and focuses on a world of hyperreality, simulacra, consumer culture and hegemony.
Jameson and Baudrillard would applaud the fact that it is poking an accusing finger at POMO times but they would also lament the fact that it uses so many POMO devices to get the message across (then again why wouldn’t it?).
Lyotard meanwhile, would be sad that society is going this way with no enough people questioning or challenging the grand narratives but he would applaud Brooker for bringing the issue to light.
Remember to analyse the text, not just for examples of POMO media according to Jameson, Baudrillard and Lyotard but in relation to the over arching ideas of: postmodern media alters the relationship between text and audience; it plays with time and space and also challenges the conventions of representation.
Listen to the above analysis of the episode and watch it in class with your teacher.
POSTMODERN MUSIC VIDEO ESSAY Katy Perry- Chained To The Rhythm is an example of a postmodern music video, it was released February 10th 2017 and was featured on her new album ‘Witness’. The video was produced by Max Martin and Ali Payami and was directed by Mathew Cullen. Music videos can be postmodern through a number of factors which may be featured in the music video, these include irony, intertextuality, pastiche, parody and fragmentation.
There are a number of artists in the industry today who portray postmodernity throughout their videos however Katy Perry’s video to her new song stood out the most and gave me a number of postmodern factors to talk about. Firstly, postmodernism is a way of thinking about culture, philosophy, art and other meanings. However, in relation to media postmodern media rejects the idea that any media product or text is of any greater value than another and that the distinction between media and reality has collapsed and we now live in a ‘reality’ defined by images and representation. In relation to my case study, the video features intertextuality and is mainly reference the political issues currently taking place is the US.
The first scene in the music video is people walking into a theme park called ‘Oblivia’, seeing as the video is highly political it is believed ‘oblivia’ is meant to mean ‘oblivious’ and is suggesting that people are unaware of the political problems current. Another scene which stood out was a sign stating ‘The Great American Dream Drop’ which clearly has reference to the American Dream and suggests that society today has made it harder for people to achieve the Great American Dream whereas before people were able to work hard and in return receive this big dream everyone wished for. One scene also has intertextual reference to the Disney film Sleeping Beauty where the female character cuts her finger on a sharp object in this case a rose thorn, this scene is portraying a message to the audience that although something may look good it will always have a negative side effect. The next two scenes have a very obvious reference to political issues and President Trump. There is a scene featured in the video of characters being thrown over a wall into another area we do not see, to me this clearly has reference to Trumps promise policy of building a wall between two countries and may be the singers way of mocking his promise. Another scene sees a sign stating ‘bombs away’ with bombs flying all in frame of the camera, this highlights the threats beings thrown between the US and Korea and suggests the singer is trying to get these issue across to her audience to spark debates and see if any solutions can be found to resolve the problem.
To conclude, postmodern music videos like this one are good to cause debates and get opinions across to an audience although some may be seen as controversial however it allows an audience to think about issues they may not realise are a problem which could spark a positive or negative reaction.
Music Videos are often examples of postmodern media, not only because their place as a recognised art form has come about in the postmodern era but mainly because they evidence a range of ideas about what makes a text postmodern.
Intertextuality
Pastiche – use of a previous text as the basis for the whole music video – in the style of
Parody – making fun of a previous text
Homage and Quotation – sampling
Weaponised intertextuality – those deliberate Easter Eggs – we will look more closely at Ariana Grande and This is America as a detailed texts later in the term.
Bricolage – a melange, mixture of styles – cartoons, animations, dance, drama, acting, documentary, other footage.
Self-referential – this is a music video (think of Katy Perry winking at the end of xxx) – let’s draw attention to its own construction.
They manipulate time and space – flashbacks, incomplete narratives usually present and they often challenge the grand narratives (more on this later) – there is not always a happy ending, a dominant male, success after working hard for a living.
Play with the relationship between audience and text – breaking the 4th wall and there is often a presumption they are culturally competent, deliberately playing with their expectations.
Play with the distinction between reality and representation – the artist is often an actor in the narrative?
They blur the lines between high art and what is considered low art.
Examples:
See how many intertextual references you can see in this Taylor Swift video. You do have to be a bit of a Taylor Swift fan, as it refers to all her previous videos, songs – cultural competence the order of the day.
The 1975 are a really interesting band. The approach their music with a wry sense of intellectual cyncism and often end up evidencing postmodern trends in their work. Here is Matty Healy talking us through his music videos.
Here is one example in full.
This music video is self-reflexive. Draws attention to itself in a shameless way. Pokes a finger up at celebrity culture – he ‘ribs’ himself about his celebrity lifestyle. Read this Article for more background.
And this is what happened at the Brits in 2017. Not strictly a music video but it evidences a self-referential nod towards the music industry.
This is a little old now but it shows a self-referentiality but it also points the finger at a wider postmodern scope i.e. the idea that people are lost in their hypereal worlds, unaware of their real lives and surroundings. We will look more at this later.
Top 10 Music Videos inspired by Movies: they are all examples of how music videos pastiche, parody previous texts. Again, you have to be culturally competent to ‘get it’ but you could also argue it is singers being lazy and unimaginative – why not just copy someone else’s art?
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/all-movie-references-ariana-grandes-thank-u-next-video-1165490 – all the references in the video about movies and think of all the references to her various partners – all require cultural competence and a knowing nod towards all those intertextual references.
As a media art form, music videos are often conduits for various elements of postmodern culture. Sometimes they also, point a self-accusing finger at themselves for doing so and sometimes the videos and lyrics are about postmodern society too.
Andrew Goodwin, a renowned media theorist sums up the postmodernism of music videos:
Blurs high art and low art – it is media for everyone with no boundaries.
Abandons/challenges grand narratives – incomplete narratives, no sense of resolution, rejection of the overarching ideologies of society/history – love conquers all, men are the breadwinners, god is the answer etc.
Intertextuality – borrows from other texts; deliberately, unknowingly, alludes to, knowing nod to – all of which fits with Jameson’s ideas on ‘nothing new, a flatness’ or as he puts it ‘blank parody’.
Loss of Historical reality – pastiche and intertextuality blur history and chronology so that conventional notions of past, present and future are lost in a melange of images, all of which appear to be contemporary.
We will be studying in depth some current music videos, one of which you should choose to focus on as your 2nd media text in your essay (the other one will be Nosedive, Black Mirror by Charlie Brooker).
Music Videos are often examples of postmodern media, not only because their place as a recognised art form has come about in the postmodern era but mainly because they evidence a range of ideas about what makes a text postmodern.
Intertextuality
Pastiche – use of a previous text as the basis for the whole music video – in the style of
Parody – making fun of a previous text
Homage and Quotation – sampling
Weaponised intertextuality – those deliberate Easter Eggs – we will look more closely at Ariana Grande and This is America as a detailed texts later in the term.
Bricolage
a melange, mixture of styles – cartoons, animations, dance, drama, acting, documentary, other footage.
Self-referential
think of Katy Perry breaking the 4th wall at the end of Chained to the Rythmn – let’s draw attention to its own construction.
GENERAL SIGNIFICANCE relating to Music Videos and Postmodernism
They manipulate time and space – flashbacks, incomplete narratives usually present and they often challenge the grand narratives (more on this later) – there is not always a happy ending, a dominant male, success after working hard for a living.
Play with the relationship between audience and text – breaking the 4th wall and there is often a presumption they are culturally competent, deliberately playing with their expectations.
Play with the distinction between reality and representation.
They blur the lines between high art and what is considered low art.
This is a little old now but it shows a self-referentiality (this is a music video that we have constructed) but it also points the finger at a wider postmodern scope i.e. the idea that people are lost in their hypereal worlds, unaware of their real lives and surroundings. We will look more at this later.
Remember, intertextuality is apparent in a wide range of media texts, not just music videos, adverts or music.
Here are some more examples that will help evidence, and illustrate texts that Jameson would critique as being flat and unoriginal.
Try and find your own examples from your own film and TV consumption. There are loads of examples out there and the more you can evidence your ideas in the exam and support your two main texts, the better.
Are we losing our sense of historical reality as a result of postmodern media? Does blur high art and low art.
A recent mini series on BBC 3 highlights the absurdity of the Vloggers we are all so involved in on youtube. Using mockumentary (bricolage of documentary and parody) it highlights how the industry works. Lots of self-reflexivity as it shows that it is making a documentary on Vloggers but also shows how highly self-reflexive Vloggers are (shows the sound boom, shows the camera, includes the outtakes and how they bend, play with representation through editing, post production and distort time and space etc). It is subtle because you have to be in it, to get it i.e. culturally competent to get the nuance references and jokes.
A postmodern take on a postmodern phenomena! Great example of how postmodern media plays with time, space and the audience.
Have a look at it – it made me laugh, especially Episode on Health and Beauty.
And another mockumentary currently on TV, really does run the risk of completely skewing our understanding of history. It parodies the documentary tropes but also parodies the intellectuals associated with dissecting history for the ‘sheeple’.
Self reflexive? Authentic? Presenting the pretence? Some youtube vloggers reflecting on the self-reflexive nature of their presentations. Fake/Real/Authenticity – is that possible?
Weaponised intertextuality is now almost a well recognised convention of modern movies. Do you think this is a good move and how does it manipulate the relationship between text and audience?
Try and find your own examples from your own film and TV consumption. There are loads of examples out there and the more you can evidence your ideas in the exam with up to date examples to illustrate your debate, the better your mark will be.
It seems hard to escape the postmodern ‘flatness’ that Jameson argues is prevalent in postmodern media texts of today.
And finally, it’s nearly Easter so why not celebrate and see how many Easter Eggs you can see in these Pixar clips – this is now an interelated universe of ‘knowing nods’ to their brand.
There is a lot of competing ideas and concepts in Postmodernism and we have bombarded you with many of them over the last week.
It is time to review those ideas and summarise the key concepts from our three theorists:
Jameson
Lyotard
Baudrillard
You be writing you first essay soon with the title:
With examples describe what makes a media text postmodern.
You have been assigned a document in Classroom, which asks you to complete some sentence stems, which require you to describe the theories proposed by those three cultural theorists.
To help you recap your should review the following resources, from previous lessons:
