postmodern media general various.ppt

8/10/2019 postmodern media general various.ppt

1/40

Contemporary Media Issues

Postmodern Media Aesthetics


2/40


Lyotard, Baudrillard, and Jameson argued that recentsocial-economic changes produced particular'structures of feeling' or a 'cultural logic' .Typical assertions include claims that, mostly thanks to

television, and MTV in particular, we now live in a 'three-minute culture' (the length of most people's attentionspans, it is said, shaped by advertising and zapping ).Debord suggested that we are part of a 'society of thespectacle - a social relationship between people that ismediated by images. Baudrillard concluded we areinvolved in an overvisual ecstasy of communicationdue to our reliance on television, films and the Internet toreplace real connections with each other.


3/40


This has implications for any realist form of media, sinceour sense of reality is now said to be dominated bypopular media images;Cultural forms can no longer 'hold up the mirror to

reality (Strinati), since reality itself is saturated byadvertising, film, video games, and television images.The capacity of digital imaging makes 'truth claims' orthe reliability of all images tricky think about the use ofPhotoshop in magazine and advertising images


4/40


5/40


6/40


Advertising no longer tries seriously to convince us of itsproducts' real quality but just shows us a cool joke aboutthe product


7/40


Postmodernism suggests that weve run out of things to say. Lyotard wrote of the 'death of the metanarratives' or thedeath of the Enlightenment project' (now often called'modernity').Very broadly, this refers to movements in political thought andother ideas from the eighteenth century onwards whichproclaimed the importance of reason, and the knowability ofthe world through it.The next step was to argue that, if the world could be known,it could be changed even for the better

Postmodernism, however, describes these grand narratives - Marxism, feminism, belief in scientific progress etc - asnothing more than stories about history, naively structuredwith happy endings.Instead postmodernism offers micro-narratives which do notnecessarily add up, but which may be woven together, in a

jumble of forms and styles.


8/40


Remember that postmodernism is only a theory and you mustbe able to see all sides of these tricky ideas. For example There is some truth in the perception that large claims topolitical truth are often narratively shaped, such as Marxism'sclaim that working people acting together will eventually bringabout socialism.But however conscious we are of narratives in science andpolitics, it seems we cannot easily do without them and themeaning they give to experience.Just to confuse things, what else is postmodern theory butanother such story or grand narrative ?

Isnt it just a very cynical one, pretending to not be ametanarrative at all?


9/40


Do you believe the story of postmodernism?How closely does it correspond to yourexperiences?

What this presentation does is show you someof the key aesthetic indicators of postmodernmedia.This will help you decide if the text you areanalysing contains elements of the postmodern.Later we will look at the theory behind thesestylistic concerns but until then


10/40


This will help you spot the structures offeeling to see the cultural logic thatgives rise to Postmodern Media forms.It will allow you to spot spectacle andmicronarratives that we weave togetherto make a coherent theory ofpostmodernism.First up


11/40

1. Hybridity

Definition - something heterogeneous from more thanone source - in origin or composition.Examples include the mixing and sampling of differentkinds and levels - of music, of material in television

adverts, in films and TV Drama or comedy etc.Hybrid forms are said to level hierarchies of taste - alldistinctions between high culture and popular culture,have gone, or become blurred.Postmodern texts 'raid the image bank' which is so richlyavailable through digital technologies, recycle some oldmovies and shows on television, the Internet.Music, film and TV all provide excellent examples ofthese processes.


12/40

2. Bricolage

Similar to hybridity - bricolage is a French wordmeaning 'jumble. This is used to refer to the process of adaptationor improvisation where aspects of one style aregiven quite different meanings when mixed withstylistic features from another.For Dick Hebdige in Subculture the Meaning ofStyle (1979) - youth subcultural groups such aspunks , with their bondage gear and use ofswastikas were eclectic as they took clothesassociated with different class positions or workfunctions and converted them into fashionstatements 'empty' of their original meanings.


13/40

The Sex Pistols(circa 1976)


14/40

2. Bricolage

A more recent, feminised example wouldbe the combination of Doc Martens andsummer dresses worn by the young girlsin Ghost World and the central figure ofAmelie (both 2001).


15/40

1. Hybridity

Hybridity and bricolage can take variousforms across most media.Im going to use a couple of examples toshow you how to apply these two similar,yet distinct, terms accurately.First hip- hop


16/40

Jay-Z (2004)The Black Album

Track 4Encore

Samples John HoltsI Will

A clear example of hybridity.

A song that borrows from

an earlier source.

Jay -Z later releases aversion using the lyricsfrom Encore but the

melody from Linkin ParksNumb?

But whats this Hmmm.

Lets see - heresNumb

And heresEncore

Its another clearexample of

hybridity yetsomehow it all

seems a bit of a jumble

HANG ON!


17/40

Its almost like the attributes ofthe rap song Encore, itself a

hybrid of the earlier reggaesong I Will has itself been

given a quite different meaningwhen mixed with the stylisticfeatures of the emo-rock of

Linkin Parks Numb.

Its not a case ofbricolage is

it?

Where the eclectic nature of the hybridity taking music associated with different

ethnicities and functions (blacks/whites dancing/crying in your bedroom) and

converted them into a musical statement'empty' of its original meanings?


18/40

MIAs Paper Planes(2007) is a hip-hop

choon thatsamples

Straight to Hell (1982)by The Clash

It also samples thedreadful Wreckx-n-

Effects sleazy West Coast rap

Rumpshaker (1992)

The single was unsuccessfulon its initial release but

being featured in thetrailer for Pineapple

Express (2008)

It became ahuge hit inThe States

As a result it wasseen by DannyBoyle and used

on

Slumdog Millionaire (2009)


19/40

SO WHERE DOES HYBRIDITYBECOME BRICOLAGE?

Hybridity is all about wheresomething comes from.

MIA is a Londoner from an Asian background who records a hip-hop song in NewYork with and American producer with kids from Brixton singing the chorus

thats a hybrid record right there.

Paper Planes is a hip -hop songthat is a hybrid of punk-

reggae and West coast rap.Bricolage is about what use

you put something to.

But the song is also associated with the film Slumdog Millionaire itself a hybridof Hollywood style narrative and Bollywood style aesthetics throw in the further jumble of a hip-hop tune on the soundtrack playing over a montage of scenes

and youve got bricolage


20/40

Where the eclectic nature of the hybridity - taking music (and films) associated with different ethnicities (white British punk/black Americanrap/Anglo-Indian singer) and genres (British social realism/Bollywood stylehyperrealism) and converted them into a musical/visual statement 'empty' oftheir original meanings in the case of the film the song becomes suggestiveof a montage sequence at the heart of the narrative

But the song is also associated with the film Slumdog Millionaire itself a hybridof Hollywood style narrative and Bollywood style aesthetics throw in the further

jumble of a hip -hop tune on the soundtrack playing over a montage of scenesand youve got bricolage


21/40

The Beatles (1968)The White Album

Danger Mouse (2005)The Grey Album

Jay-Z (2004)The Black Album


22/40

Danger Mouse (2005)The Grey Album

So is the Grey AlbumHybrid?

Bricolage?Parody?

Pastiche?

Intertextual?


23/40

3. Simulation

Based on the work of Jean Baudrillard - the blurring ofreal and simulated, especially in film and reality TV orcelebrity magazines is a familiar feature of postmoderntexts.Simulation or hyperreality refers to not only theincreasing use of CGI in films like The Lord of the Ringsfilms (2001- 2004) and Avatar (2009), but also in the useof documentary style in fiction such as Michael

Winterbottoms In This World (2002) or in the narrativeenigmas of science fiction such as The Matrix (1999) orBlade Runner (1982) - 'Is it human or artificial ?


24/40


25/40

4. Intertextuality

From referencing the structure of the slasherhorror film in Scream (1996) to the Italian

American gangsters watching The Godfather

films in The Sopranos television series (2001),intertextuality is now a familiar postmodernflourish across most moving image media.Jameson also specifies pastiche and parody asbelonging to a similar idea.This self-reflexive awareness of itself as a text isalso termed hyperconsciousness .


26/40


27/40

4. Intertextuality

Pastiche, parody and intertextuality areterms that come from Fredric Jamesons(1991) theories.

Jameson saw parody as the comicintention to produce an imitation whichmocks the original that acknowledgeswhat it imitates.

Pastiche, however, is less about comedyand more about plagiarism. Pastiche is blank parody. Parody thathas lost its sense of humour.

Just copying really


28/40


29/40

5. Disjointed narrative structures

These are said to mimic the uncertainties and relativism of postmodernity in films like Pulp Fiction (1994) These contemporary narratives often wont guaranteeidentifications with characters;

Or the 'happy ending Or metanarratives like the Defeat of the Enemy , whichhave traditionally been achieved at the end of films.They often manage only a play with multiple, or heavily

ironic, perhaps 'unfinished' or even parodic endings - seeMemento (2000), Fight Club (1999), or Atonement(2007).Narratives can also be disjointed in time and space see modern / retro films like Brazil (1985) or Blade

Runner (1982).


30/40


31/40

6. The erosion of history

This is seen in non-fiction forms such astelevision news; in the deliberate blurringof time in films such as Cock and Bull

Story (2005) or the extravagant play withhistorical fact in, say, Elizabeth (1998) orSaving Private Ryan (1998) or PearlHarbor (2001) Historical facts and characters aretelescoped, merged or discarded entirely.History can be viewed nostalgically or with

suspicion.


32/40


33/40

7. The active audience

Postmodern theories suggest that there is a decodingprocess going on among audiences who no longer usethe passively media for gratification.Postmodern audiences read texts actively because they

recognise the importance of the analysis of various cluesor signs, particularly visual signs, that shape so much ofmodern media output by the audience.

At its simplest level, the audience accept or agree withthe encoded meanings sent out by a text, they acceptand refine parts of the text's meanings or they are awareof the dominant meaning of the text but reject it forcultural, political or personal reasons.


34/40

8. Blurring of boundaries

It's easy to spot how boundaries between 'high' and 'low'culture have been eroded.This idea is alluring because of the democraticimplications - there's no such thing as bad taste; you can

enjoy, consume, shop for what you like - all classhierarchies have disappeared.However, paradoxically, for there to be any thrill intransgressing boundaries, like those between 'high' and'low' forms in Baz Luhrman's Romeo + Juliet (1997) orShakespeare in Love (1998), those boundaries needstill to have some meaning and indeed they do Think of the huge industry still associated with the statusand name of Shakespeare and his continuing culturalimportance.


35/40


36/40

9. A society of spectacle

Postmodern media texts share a delight insurface style and superficiality;

A delight in trivial rather than dominant

forms - from conversations about burgersin Pulp Fiction (1994) to Lindsay Lohan orVictoria Beckham appearing in Ugly Betty(2008);

And the tone is alternative, excited andironic involving scepticism about seriousvalues.


37/40


38/40

9. A society of spectacle

Andy Medhurst (1997) points out that this approach containselements of camp a traditionally male homosexual personalitytrait - no camp man can claim the pompous authority of many whitemales, so he may as well laugh at things that are taken seriously.He continues:

Camp is a configuration of taste codes and a declaration ofeffeminate interest... It revels in exaggeration, theatricality, parodyand bitchingpostmodern aesthetics can easily be confused with

camp, but while camp grows from a specific cultural identity, postmodern discourses peddle the arrogant fiction that specific

cultural identities have ceased to exist. On the other hand Debord sees celebrities as people who havebecome role models for us to identify with to compensate for thecrumbling of directly experiencedproductive activity. Celebrities provide us with false representations of life andultimately become the reality of our everyday lives.


39/40

10. Alienation

This delight in superficiality is counteredby a different postmodern approach thatinvolves an atmosphere of decay andalienation .Structures of feeling' that find echoes inthe music of Radiohead or Aphex Twin ,the films Blade Runner and Fight Club,the music videos and advertising of ChrisCunningham.


40/40

Documents

postmodern media general various.ppt