Videogames - Metroid Prime 2: Echoes

Our second videogames CSP is Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (2004).

This is another in-depth CSP so will require a decent amount of work and research for an extensive blog case study.

The basics

• First-person action-adventure game produced for Nintendo GameCube (2004)
• Part of Metroid franchise – 7th game in series, sequel to Metroid Prime (original Metroid was 1986 on NES; latest release was Metroid: Samus Returns in 2017 on 3DS)
• Sold around 800,000 copies worldwide (quite low based on Nintendo franchises and previous Metroid games) 
• Game follows bounty hunter Samus Aran as she is sent to rescue Galactic Federation Marines
• She must battle the Ing (a destructive race from another dimension) and a mysterious version of herself called Dark Samus
• The game’s head-up display simulates the inside of Samus’s helmet and features map, radar, health bar, weapons and more
• Prime 2 Echoes is the first Metroid title to feature a 4-player multiplayer element

Metroid Prime 2: Echoes - blog tasks

Create a new blogpost called 'Metroid Prime 2: Echoes case study' and complete the following in-depth tasks.

Language

Analyse the game cover for Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (above).

1) How does the cover communicate the genre of the game?

2) What does the cover suggest regarding gameplay and audience pleasures?

3) Does the cover sexualise the character of Samus Aran? Why/why not?


Trailer analysis

Watch the trailer for the game:



1) What do you notice about genre?

2) How is the character introduced? Is Samus Aran's gender clear? Why?

3) How can we apply Steve Neale’s genre theory that discusses “repetition and difference”?

Gameplay analysis

Watch the following gameplay clips again:





1) What does the gameplay for Metroid Prime 2: Echoes involve?

2) Write an analysis of the media language choices in the construction of the game: e.g. genre, narrative, mise-en-scene, camera shots etc.

3) Analyse the clips for audience pleasures, applying audience theory and considering media effects. You can use bullet points here and/or type up your notes from the analysis in class.

4) Choose one other theory to evaluate using the gameplay in Metroid e.g. gender theories or postmodernism. Again, use the notes from class to help you.

Audience

Research the audience for Nintendo and specifically the Metroid franchise, including Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. You may wish to start with looking at the following pages (note: some links may be blocked on school PCs):

Reddit discussion of why people play Metroid 
Giant Bomb forum: Who exactly is Nintendo’s demographics?
Reset Era: Nintendo’s audience getting older

1) Who might the target audience be for Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, based on your research? Discuss demographics and psychographics.

2) How has Nintendo’s audience changed since the original Metroid game in 1986?

3) What audience pleasures are offered by Metroid Prime 2: Echoes or the wider Metroid franchise?

4) What effects might Metroid have on audiences? Apply media effects theories (e.g. Bandura’s social learning theory, Gerbner’s cultivation theory). 

Read this Gamesparks feature on gaming demographics and answer the following questions:

1) Who is considered to be the stereotypical gamer?

2) What has changed this?

3) What role do women play in the videogames market? Quote statistics from the article here.

4) Why are older gamers becoming a particularly important market for videogames producers? How can you link this to the Metroid franchise?

5) What does the article suggest regarding audience pleasures and expectations for different generations of gamer?


Industries

Read this Destructoid blog on the Metroid franchise. Answer the following:

1) Why has Metroid never quite fitted with the Nintendo brand?

2) What franchises have overtaken Metroid in the sci-fi hyper-realism genre in recent years?

3) Why does the writer link old boy bands from the music industry to the Metroid franchise? Do you agree with this reading of the brand?

4) What is an ‘AAA’ or ‘triple-A game’ in the videogames industry?

5) Do you think there will be further Metroid games featuring Samus Aran? Should there be?


Representations

Read this BBC3 feature on Samus Aran and answer the questions below:

1) What was notable about the original Metroid game in 1986?

2) What were the inspirations behind the gameplay and construction of Metroid?

3) Why are the endings to the original Metroid considered controversial?

4) What reaction do you think the reveal of Samus Aran in a bikini would have got when the game was first released in 1986? Have attitudes towards women changed?

5) How have later versions of the Metroid franchise sexualised the character of Samus Aran?

6) How can we apply Liesbet van Zoonen’s work to Samus Aran and Metroid?

7) What did Brianna Wu suggest regarding the character of Samus Aran?

8) Do you see Samus Aran as a feminist icon or simply another exploited female character?


Read this Houston Press feature on Samus Aran and entitled male gamers. Answer the following questions:

1) What does Anita Sarkeesian suggest regarding Samus Aran?

2) Why does Brianna Wu (and others) suggest Samus Aran may be transgender?

3) Why is Samus Aran useful for male gamers trying to argue videogames are not sexist?

4) Why are Lara Croft, Zelda and Peach not ideal examples to argue for female equality in videogames?

5) What does the ‘SJW’ in ‘SJW-gender politics’ refer to?

6) How can we apply Gerbner’s Cultivation theory to representations of women in videogames as discussed in the article? How might this lead to ‘entitled male gamers’? 

7) Does the videogame industry have a problem with gender? Explain your opinion on this question and provide evidence for your argument.


A/A* extension tasks

Read this journal article called Mapping Metroid - which looks at the Metroid franchise's use of maps and brings in elements of game construction, narrative and postmodernism. It's a great example of academic writing and university-level videogame analysis. 


Complete for homework - due date on Google Classroom.

Videogames: Tomb Raider Anniversary

Our first videogames CSP is Tomb Raider: Anniversary (2007).

This is an in-depth CSP so will require significant work and research for an extensive blog case study.

The basics

• Released in 2007 on multiple consoles, PC and Mac. 
• The Wii version had active features; on Xbox it was the first game to be offered on Xbox Live Marketplace.
• 11th version of the Tomb Raider franchise.
• Marked 10th anniversary of original 1996 Tomb Raider game.
• Sold 1.3m copies – good but nowhere near original (7m+ copies).
• Game was based on original (offering nostalgia) but with updated graphics and gameplay – faster and more agile; more realistic visuals.
• Genre: Action adventure
• Protagonist/avatar (character player controls): Lara Croft
• Quest narrative driven by enigma and action codes and culminating in a final confrontation with antagonist. Lara Croft is dispatched to New Mexico to recover part of the Scion of Atlantis
• Gameplay involves: Exploration; Overcoming physical obstacles; Puzzles; Fighting; Gunplay.

Tomb Raider Anniversary: blog tasks

Language and Audience

Analyse the game cover for Tomb Raider Anniversary (above).

1) How does the cover communicate the genre of the game?

2) How does the pose and costume of the character appeal to primarily male audiences?

3) How might the cover be read as empowering for female gamers?

Gameplay analysis

Watch the following gameplay clips again:

1) What does the gameplay for Tomb Raider Anniversary involve?

2) Write an analysis of the media language choices in the construction of the game: e.g. genre, narrative, mise-en-scene, camera shots etc.

3) Analyse the clips for audience pleasures, applying audience theory and considering media effects.


Representations

Read this NME feature on the evolution of the character of Lara Croft. Answer the following questions:

1) Note the statistics in the opening paragraph.

2) How does the article describe the cultural change in society and the media since the early 00s?

3) How was the original 1996 Lara Croft received by audiences and critics?

4) What did the 2013 re-launch do differently – and how successful was it?

5) How is ‘woke Lara’ defined in the conclusion of the feature?


Now read this feature – Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft: feminist or femme fatale? 

1) Why is Lara Croft considered a “polarising figure among gamers”?

2) How did the limitations of game construction in the 1990s help to establish the way female characters were animated?

3) Why were Lara Croft’s physical attributes emphasised in the original games?

4) How does Anita Sarkeesian describe Lara Croft?

5) Why has Lara Croft’s appearance and characterisation changed over time?

Industries

1) Why is Lara Croft such an iconic figure in the gaming industry?

2) What products and spin-offs have featured Lara Croft or the Tomb Raider brand?

3) Why might Lara Croft be considered a postmodern icon?

4) Why is Tomb Raider Anniversary a 'case study in conglomerate ownership'?


Grade A/A* extension tasks

Link Tomb Raider Anniversary to our work in the unit so far:

1) What examples from the Tomb Raider franchise are included in Anita Sarkeesian's video series 'Tropes vs Women in Video Games'?

2) How can we apply Liesbet van Zoonen's work to Lara Croft and Tomb Raider?


Complete for homework - due date on Google Classroom.

Coursework: Statement of Intent

Our coursework projects are developing well with the filming almost finished and our rough cut edits coming soon. We now need to update our Statement of Intent with our projects fully planned.

This week, we need to write and submit a second draft of our Statement of Intent that will be marked and given feedback in terms of a level and approximate grade. The Statement of Intent is worth 10 of the 60 marks so if we want A/A* we'll need something close to full marks on this component. 

 
One important point to remember is that your Statement of Intent is what you are planning to do - so it must be written in the future tense ('I will...' rather than 'I have...') This is not an evaluation but instead a written account of what you intend to produce.

You need to submit the second draft of your Statement of Intent as a NEW blog post AND email or share a version from Microsoft Word / Google Docs with your coursework teacher. Statement of Intent guidance is provided by AQA in their NEA Student Booklet but we strongly recommend you also look at our Statement of Intent questions to consider document too (you'll need to log in with your Greenford Google account to open these documents). 

Finally, here's an example Statement of Intent from a previous year (different brief - TV drama trailer) to give you some ideas on how you can use layout and bullet points to include a large amount of information while keeping close to the 500-word limit.

Statement of Intent deadline: Week commencing Monday 28 November

Mark scheme

A few of you have requested the mark scheme for the Statement of Intent. You can find it in the A Level Media specification document here - on pages 21-22 (if you keep scrolling you can also find the mark scheme for the remaining 50 marks for your productions).

If you need a recap on the brief from AQA, you can find it here - Brief Three: Music Promo.

Your statement of intent is a vital part of the project so make sure you are demonstrating your excellent knowledge of media concepts, terminology and theory.

Videogames: Further feminist theory

As part of our study of women in videogames, we need to develop a deeper understanding of feminist theory.

We have looked at a range of feminist ideas earlier in the course including Laura Mulvey, Judith Butler, Liesbet van Zoonen, the concept of post- or fourth-wave feminism and more. We now need to explore this further with a deeper understanding of bell hooks and van Zoonen.

Notes from the lesson

Watch this short extract from Orange is the New Black star Laverne Cox interviewing bell hooks at The New School in New York:



bell hooks is a highly influential radical black feminist.

She sees feminism as a struggle to end patriarchal oppression - it should be a serious political commitment rather than a fashionable lifestyle choice: “Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation and oppression”.

bell hooks also points to the importance of race and class when studying oppression.

Intersectionality

Intersectionality is defined as the common point of two forms of oppression and how they work against a particular group of people. For example, black feminism addresses both gender and race discrimination.

bell hooks suggests that race is so significant that the experiences of gender, class or sexuality-based discrimination cannot be fully understood without also considering race.

This is important when analysing power in society. For example, men generally have more power then women – but white, middle class western women generally have much more power than women from non-white backgrounds.

Liesbet van Zoonen

Liesbet van Zoonen is an influential feminist academic and linked gender roles and the media explicitly in her 1994 book Feminist Media Studies. Some of her key ideas:

• Gender is constructed through media language
• These constructions reflect cultural and historical contexts
• The objectification of the female body is a key construct of western culture (building on Mulvey – male gaze)
• If women have to be like men to be treated equally, then equality itself is repressive

You can find the further notes on van Zoonen in this Google document (you'll need your Greenford Google login to access).

Further feminist theory: blog tasks

Use our Media Factsheet archive on the M: drive Media Shared (M:\Resources\A Level\Media Factsheets) or here using your Greenford Google login. Find Media Factsheet #169 Further Feminist Theory, read the whole of the Factsheet and answer the following questions:

1) What definitions are offered by the factsheet for ‘feminism ‘and ‘patriarchy’?

2) Why did bell hooks publish her 1984 book ‘Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center’?

3) What aspects of feminism and oppression are the focus for a lot of bell hooks’s work?

4) What is intersectionality and what does hooks argue regarding this?

5) What did Liesbet van Zoonen conclude regarding the relationship between gender roles and the mass media?

6) Liesbet van Zoonen sees gender as socially constructed. What does this mean and which other media theorist we have studied does this link to?

7) How do feminists view women’s lifestyle magazines in different ways? Which view do you agree with?

8) In looking at the history of the colours pink and blue, van Zoonen suggests ideas gender ideas can evolve over time. Which other media theorist we have studied argues this and do you agree that gender roles are in a process of constant change? Can you suggest examples to support your view?

9) What are the five aspects van Zoonen suggests are significant in determining the influence of the media?

10) What other media theorist can be linked to van Zoonen’s readings of the media?

11) Van Zoonen discusses ‘transmission models of communication’. She suggests women are oppressed by the dominant culture and therefore take in representations that do not reflect their view of the world. What other theory and idea (that we have studied recently) can this be linked to?

12) Finally, van Zoonen has built on the work of bell hooks by exploring power and feminism. She suggests that power is not a binary male/female issue but reflects the “multiplicity of relations of subordination”. How does this link to bell hooks views on feminism and intersectionality?

Extension task

If you’re interested in some of these ideas, there is plenty more reading and watching you can do. For example, watch this TEDx talk by renowned Nigerian/American novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie ‘We should all be feminists’:

The Factsheet questions must be completed for homework if you don't finish in the lesson - due date on Google Classroom.

Filming window extension

With a Media trip next week giving the perfect opportunity for some additional filming or photoshoot work, we have extended the filming window by one week.

This means you now have until Monday 21 November to complete all your filming for the full three-minute promo. You may also wish to take photographs for your print work too. 

This filming deadline is critical for the overall success of the project as we will need to complete a three-minute rough cut of the video production by Christmas. In class we will also be working on our Statement of Intent too.

LED ring light

If you are filming in interior locations at home then you may wish to borrow our LED ring light. Speak to Mr Harrison to find out more.

Good luck with your filming and let's aim for professional standards!

Filming deadline: Monday 21 November

Videogames: Introduction - Women in videogames

Our final in-depth media topic is Videogames.

Our Videogames CSPs are Tomb Raider Anniversary, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes and The Sims FreePlay.

These are in-depth CSPs and need to be studied with reference to all four elements of the Theoretical Framework (Language, Representation, Industries, Audience) and all relevant contexts.

This will be tested in the Media Two exam with a 25-mark essay question.

Videogames: an introduction

The videogames industry is a huge media market – bigger than video and music combined. It is worth £3.86bn – more than double its value in 2007. Remarkably, these figures do not include mobile and free games such as Fortnite (which has over 200 million players worldwide).

With games like FIFA, Red Dead Redemption 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 each selling more than 1m copies, it is important to consider the influence games can have on audiences and society.

Women in videogames

The representation of women in videogames has long been considered sexist. Female characters are rarely playable and usually reinforce traditional gender stereotypes. Games that did feature female characters presented them as damsels in distress or sex objects.

Lara Croft of the Tomb Raider series is one of the most iconic characters in videogame history. But while she is a strong, independent playable character, her appearance and costume turned her into a digital sex object.  

Tropes vs Women in Video Games

Vlogger and gaming expert Anita Sarkeesian has produced two series of YouTube videos documenting the representation of women in videogames.

Vlogging as Feminist Frequency, the series are an important example of digital feminism (and a superb resource for Media students). However, as a result, she has been a target for online abuse and threats – most notably as part of the #gamergate controversy.

Women and videogames: blog tasks

Work through the following blog tasks to complete this introduction to women in videogames.

Part 1: Medium article - Is Female Representation in Video Games Finally Changing?

Read this short Medium feature on whether female representation in videogames is finally changing. Answer the following questions:

1) How have women traditionally been represented in videogames?

2) What percentage of the video game audience is female?

3) What recent games have signalled a change in the industry and what qualities do the female protagonists offer?

4) Do you agree with the idea that audiences reject media products if they feel they are misrepresented within them?

5) What does the writer suggest has changed regarding recent versions of Lara Croft and who does she credit for this development?


Part 2: Tropes vs Women in Video Games – further analysis

Visit Anita Sarkeesian’s ‘Tropes vs Women in Video Games Series 2’ YouTube playlist and watch ONE other video in the series (your choice - and feel free to choose a video from season 1 if you prefer). Write a 100 word summary of the video you watch:

Title of video: 

100 word summary: 


Part 3: Anita Sarkeesian Gamespot interview

Finally, read this Gamespot interview with Anita Sarkeesian of Feminist Frequency and answer the following questions:

1) What reaction did Anita Sarkeesian receive when she published her videos on women in videogames? You can find more information on this on Sarkeesian’s Kickstarter fundraising page.

2) How does Sarkeesian summarise feminism?

3) Why do stories matter?

4) How does Sarkeesian view Samus Aran and Lara Croft (the two protagonists from our upcoming CSPs)?

5) How has the videogame landscape changed with regards to the representation of women?

6) Why are Mirror’s Edge and Portal held up as examples of more progressive representations of women?

7) What are the qualities that Sarkeesian lists for developers to work on creating more positive female characters?

8) What is the impact of the videogames industry being male-dominated?

9) What did Sarkeesian hope to achieve through her ‘Tropes vs Women in Video Games’ series?

10) What media debates did Sarkeesian hope to spark with her video series?

Optional extension task
To find out more about the online backlash and #gamergate, this Guardian feature links the online abuse to the American alt-right movement also credited with electing Donald Trump.

Deadline: Complete for homework - due date on Google Classroom.

OSP: Final index

We are now at the end of our Online, Social and Participatory media unit and need to create an index to ensure we have completed all the work set. 

You'll have an assessment on this topic after half-term and need to be able to make specific reference to both OSP products in your 25-mark essay.  

Online, Social and Participatory index

This process is an excellent start to your revision for the Media Two exam in the summer as well as your January mock exams. It will also highlight if you've missed anything through absence and allow you to catch up before the assessment. 

Your index should include the following:

1) OSP: Clay Shirky - End of Audience blog tasks
2) OSP: Teen Vogue - background and textual analysis
3) OSP: Teen Vogue - audience and representation
4) OSP: Teen Vogue - industry and social media
5) OSP: Postcolonial theory - Gilroy and diasporic identity
6) Baseline Assessment learner response

7) OSP: The Voice - blog case study

For your index, the text should link to YOUR corresponding blogpost so you can access your work on each aspect of the case study quickly and easily. This also means you if you have missed anything you can catch up with the work and notes and won't underperform in the assessment due to gaps in your knowledge.

Index due date: next exam lesson.

Coursework: Pre-production planning

Pre-production is an essential part of the filmmaking process. You now need to plan your music promo video in detail to ensure you capture everything you need when filming.

There are four key elements to pre-production: music promo video script/structure, music video treatments, mise-en-scene planning and a comprehensive shot list.

Create a new blogpost on your coursework blog called 'Music promo video pre-production' and work through the following planning tasks:

1) Music promo video script/structure

This is the overall plan for your three minutes of video. What music video extracts will you include? What interviews? What behind the scenes footage? What live performance or studio sections? You may wish to do this in the form of a script. Here's an example documentary script with a column for video and a column for audio - you could use something similar.

Along similar lines, this is an excellent webpage on how to write good documentary interview questions as at least half of your promo will be similar to a music documentary.

2) Music video treatments

You may already have a finished music video treatment from your summer project and/or preliminary exercise - definitely use those if it works with your project. 

However, you may need to update your treatments or even change them completely now you have finished your preliminary exercise. The original example from the summer for music video treatments can be found here.

3) Mise-en-scene planning

Plan everything that will appear in front of the camera in your music promo video - and this will be a complex, detailed operation. 

Remember CLAMPS: Costume, Lighting, Actors (cast, placement and movement), Make-up, Props, Setting.

Costume
What will your artist wear in the different scenes/interviews/music videos? What is the costume supposed to communicate to the audience? How does this link to genre or constructing representations?

Lighting
How will you light the different scenes in your music promo video? Day or night? Interior or exterior? If outside, can you use streetlights, shadows, reflected sunlight or other creative techniques to achieve the lighting style you want? If inside, experiment with creative lighting techniques using windows, blinds, artificial lights, phone flashes and more. You may also want to use our professional lighting set-up with a white or greenscreen background depending on how you plan to conduct the interviews.

Actors/performers
The first thing you need to plan is your cast - who will be in your production? The key casting is obviously your artist but you may have other characters too (producers, fans etc.) Try and cast people who are reasonably similar to the character or performer they are playing (both in age and personality). Next, plan their placement and movement in key scenes - how will the audience get to know them? How do you plan to position the audience to connect with your artist?

Make-up
Plan any make-up you require - this can be very important for music video and promotion.

Props
What props will you require? Remember, you can't use anything that might resemble a weapon in a public or school location (this is VERY important). Well-planned props can help to communicate genre and narrative quickly - vital in a music video where you can't use dialogue.

Setting
This should already be largely planned using your script and music video treatments. However, now is the time to specify exact locations. For external locations, try and take pictures of settings or use Google Maps and Google Earth. Spending quality time planning your locations can make a huge difference to the professionalism of your film. AQA also seem to prefer external rather than school-based locations - particularly for a brief like this.

Here's a video guide to Mise-en-scene at degree or film-school level:



...And here's Darius Britt on the top 15 mistakes new filmmakers make - there are a few key aspects of Mise-en-scene in there:



4) Shot list

The final aspect of your pre-production planning is to write a comprehensive shot list for every single possible shot you plan to film for your music promo video. For three minutes of film, that is going to be a LOT of shots - quite possibly more than 200.

Remember, a shot list is a full list of all the shots in your video with information for each of them (shot type, action/movement etc.) Creative shot choices aside, it’s easy to forget that a shot list is a strategic document. Creating a shot list is essentially like creating a shooting gameplan for the day.

Here's our friend Darius with a reminder of the different shot types and angles:

 

Here are some top tips for writing a shot list:

 

Your a shot list needs to contain EVERY shot you plan to film for your whole promo video AND additional shots to create flexibility when editing. These additional shots are often close-ups, cutaways, alternative angles or similar. Cutaways are important for documentary-style scenes (e.g. interviews) while music videos generally have fast-paced editing so you'll need a LOT of shots for those sections.

We advise using a simple table on Microsoft Word or Google Docs to set out your shot list - you can find an example from a short film here. It makes sense to write your shot list by scene or location rather than a huge list of every shot in the promo video in chronological order. 

Pre-production due date - see Google Classroom.

Coursework: Pre-production and filming window

Our coursework projects are really starting to take off with some brilliant preliminary exercises. Now it's time to plan our full productions and film all the video we need.

This next stage of the project is critical - it is where the video project will stand or fall. The next tasks and deadlines are as follows:

Music promo video pre-production and filming

If you are planning to film over half-term, you'll need to plan your pre-production this week (script, treatments, mise-en-scene and shot list). 

Filming of music promo scenes

Filming window: Friday 21 October - Monday 14 November.
Deadline: Monday 14 November

Tutorials
While you work on the above deadlines, you will have another tutorial with your coursework teacher looking at your pre-production planning and checking your project is on track. For those who film early in the filming window, it will also involve checking the 'rushes' (the film clips as they come in).

If you need a recap on the brief from AQA, you can find the brief here - Brief Three: Music Promo.

This is the moment you need to step up... we're asking for professional standards to match the incredible production work Greenford Media students have produced in the past. Good luck!

Coursework: Preliminary exercise feedback and LR

The preliminary exercise is a brilliant opportunity to learn or refresh the basics of filmmaking before creating your actual coursework project.

After the screening of the preliminary exercises in class, you need to create a blogpost called 'Preliminary exercise learner response' and embed your video from YouTube. Then, complete the following tasks as your feedback and learner response:

1) Type up your teacher's feedback in full plus a summary of the comments you received from other students in the class.

2) Using a combination of your own reflection on the preliminary exercise and the feedback you were given, write three WWW bullet points and three EBI bullet points for your work.

3) How effectively did you complete the objective you laid out in your mini preliminary exercise statement of intent?

4) What have you learned from the preliminary exercise that will help you in the actual coursework project?

5) Now you have completed the preliminary exercise, will you change anything in your actual music promo video plan? This could include your selection of songs, actors and style or technical elements such as mise-en-scene, camerawork or editing.

The deadline for these feedback and learner response tasks will be set by your coursework teacher and on Google Classroom.

OSP: The Voice - blog case study

Our second Online, Social and Participatory CSP is the Voice newspaper website - a niche publication targeting the black British community.

The Voice has a significant place in the social and historical context of race relations and representation in Britain, launching in 1982 in the wake of the Brixton race riots. It is also the perfect case study to further develop our understanding of Paul Gilroy's postcolonial theory we studied last lesson.

The Voice - background and notes

The Voice, founded in 1982, is the only British national black weekly newspaper operating in the United Kingdom. It is owned by GV Media Group Limited, and is aimed at the British African-Caribbean community. The paper is based in London and is published every Thursday. 

The first issue of The Voice was printed to coincide with the Notting Hill Carnival in August 1982. Its cover price was 54 pence, and was only sold in London.

You can read more of this background from the original source - the Voice website About Us page.

The Voice: social and historical context

In 1981, the Brixton race riots shone a spotlight on race relations in Britain. 

The Voice emerged in 1982 partly as a result of these riots – both due to the need to offer a voice and representation to black Britons and also due to a business loan from Barclays Bank. The bank was keen at the time to improve their reputation with the black community due to investments in Apartheid South Africa.

Social context - The Battle for Brixton documentary

The Voice analysis: production values

The Voice offers a strong contrast to Teen Vogue with significantly lower production values across its digital operations – website design, video content and social media. However, the growth of digital technology means that the Voice can effectively compete on the same playing field as Teen Vogue, albeit targeting a niche audience.

Watch this video on influential black women in business and compare it to Teen Vogue’s video content – similar in ideology but very different in production values (note the view count too):

The Voice: representation

The Voice was launched to cater for the interests of British-born black people. Applying Gilroy’s work on “double consciousness”, it could be argued that the Voice was launched to give black audiences an opportunity to see media through their own eyes rather than through the prism of white, often-biased (or even racist) mainstream British media. This also links to Hall's work on representation and the idea of individuals having their own 'conceptual map'.

The Voice: industries

The Voice is owned by Jamaican media group the Gleaner company and published in Britain by GV Media Group. It is a significant contrast to Teen Vogue and the international giant Conde Nast.

In a similar move to The Guardian's request for donations, The Voice asks its readers to support the publication by paying donations via PayPal. This raises interesting questions regarding the financial viability of online news media and particularly niche publications such as The Voice (or indeed Oh Comely).

The Voice: case study blog tasks

Language and textual analysis

Homepage

Go to the Voice homepage and answer the following:

1) What news website key conventions can you find on the Voice homepage?

2) How does the page design differ from Teen Vogue?

3) What are some of the items in the top menu bar and what does this tell you about the content, values and ideologies of the Voice?

4) Look at the news stories on the Voice homepage. Pick two stories and explain why they might appeal to the Voice's target audience. 

5) How is narrative used to encourage audience engagement with the Voice? Apply narrative theories (e.g. Todorov equilibrium or Barthes’ enigma codes) and make specific reference to stories on the homepage and how they encourage audiences to click through to them.

Lifestyle section

Now analyse the Lifestyle section of the Voice and answer the following:

1) What are the items in the sub-menu bar for the Lifestyle section and what does this suggest about the Voice audience?

2) What are the main stories in the Lifestyle section currently?

3) How does the Lifestyle section of the Voice differ from Teen Vogue?

4) Do the sections and stories in the Voice Lifestyle section challenge or reinforce black stereotypes in British media?

5) Choose two stories featured in the Lifestyle section – how do they reflect the values and ideologies of the Voice?

Feature focus

1) Read this Voice opinion piece on black representation in the tech industry. How does this piece reflect the values and ideologies of The Voice?

2) Read this feature on Michaela Coel supporting Oxfam's Second Hand campaign. Why might this feature appeal to readers of The Voice?

3) Read this Voice news story on Grenfell tower and Doreen Lawrence. How might this story reflect the Voice’s values and ideologies? What do the comments below suggest about how readers responded to the article? Can you link this to Gilroy’s work on the ‘Black Atlantic’ identity?

Audience

1) Who do you think is the target audience for the Voice website? Consider demographics and psychographics.

2) What audience pleasures are provided by the Voice website? Apply media theory here such as Blumler and Katz (Uses & Gratifications).

3) Give examples of sections or content from the website that tells you this is aimed at a specialised or niche audience.

4) Studying the themes of politics, history and racism that feature in some of the Voice’s content, why might this resonate with the Voice’s British target audience?

5) Can you find any examples of content on the Voice website created or driven by the audience or citizen journalism? How does this reflect Clay Shirky’s work on the ‘end of audience’ and the era of ‘mass amateurisation’?

Representations

1) How is the audience positioned to respond to representations in the Voice website?

2) Are representations in the Voice an example of Gilroy’s concept of “double consciousness” NOT applying?

3) What kind of black British identity is promoted on the Voice website? Can you find any examples of Gilroy’s “liquidity of culture” or “unruly multiculturalism” here?

4) Applying Stuart Hall’s constructivist approach to representations, how might different audiences interpret the representations of black Britons in the Voice?

5) Do you notice any other interesting representations in the Voice website? For example, representations or people, places or groups (e.g. gender, age, Britishness, other countries etc.)

Industries

1) Read this Guardian report on the death of the original founder of the Voice. What does this tell you about the original values and ideologies behind the Voice brand? 

2) Read this history of the Voice’s rivals and the struggles the Voice faced back in 2001. What issues raised in the article are still relevant today? 

3) The Voice is now published by GV Media Group, a subsidiary of the Jamaican Gleaner company. What other media brands do the Gleaner company own and why might they be interested in owning the Voice? You'll need to research this using Google/Wikipedia or look at this Guardian article when Gleaner first acquired The Voice.

4) How does the Voice website make money?

5) What adverts or promotions can you find on the Voice website? Are the adverts based on the user’s ‘cookies’ or fixed adverts? What do these adverts tell you about the level of technology and sophistication of the Voice’s website?

6) Is there an element of public service to the Voice’s role in British media or is it simply a vehicle to make profit?

7) What examples of technological convergence can you find on the Voice website – e.g. video or audio content?

8) How has the growth of digital distribution through the internet changed the potential for niche products like the Voice?

9) Analyse The Voice’s Twitter feed. How does this contrast with other Twitter feeds you have studied (such as Teen Vogue)? Are there examples of ‘clickbait’ or does the Voice have a different feel?

10) Study a selection of videos from The Voice’s YouTubechannel. How does this content differ from Teen Vogue? What are the production values of their video content?


Homework and deadlines

There is plenty of work here - at least 3 to 4 hours - but this is the only blog task on the Voice and covers all four of the key concepts.

Finish for homework - due date set on Google Classroom.

OSP: Paul Gilroy - Postcolonial theory and diasporic identity

There are several important theories we need to learn and apply to our Online, Social and Participatory media unit.

These include Clay Shirky's End of Audience theories, Stuart Hall's work on representation and reality and Paul Gilroy's postcolonial theory of black diasporic identity.

Notes from the lesson

Stuart Hall: representation and reality

Stuart Hall suggests individuals each have their own conceptual map – effectively what we use to decode and understand media texts.

Building on this, Hall outlines three approaches to understanding the relationship between reality and representations: 

Reflective approach: the media simply mirrors (or reflects) the real world. This is a limited approach that minimalises the power or complexity of the media.

Intentional approach: the producer of the text constructs the world as they see it and the audience accepts those values encoded in the text. This is effectively the dominant or preferred reading (reception theory) and leaves no room for the negotiated or oppositional reading.

The constructivist approach: this was Hall’s preferred approach and closely matches reception theory with preferred and oppositional readings. This suggests concepts and signs do have some shared meanings but they are not all inherent and can be interpreted by the audience in a number of ways (dependent on their own ‘conceptual map’).

Paul Gilroy: black diasporic identity

We first explored Paul Gilroy’s theories of black diasporic identity when studying music video.

This is the idea that black identity is informed by diaspora – literally the ‘scattering of people’ across the world. He suggests this creates a “liquidity of culture” that means black identity is formed by journeys across seas, not the solid ground of a home country or culture.

Importantly, Gilroy sees this identity as impossible to reverse – there can be no return to the place of origin as the experience of slavery and displacement can never be “rewound”.

Gilroy: black British identity

The Voice newspaper was formed in 1982 to create a voice for the black British community. Gilroy wrote of the dominant representation of black Britons at that time as “external and estranged from the imagined community that is the nation”.

Gilroy suggests diaspora challenges national ideologies and creates “cultural tension”. This tension helps to create the diasporic identity but often comes with negative experiences such as exclusion and marginalisation. 

More succinctly, Gilroy sums this up as the white racist’s question to BAME people: “Why don’t you just go home?”

BBC controversy

Gilroy wrote about this in the 1970s and 1980s but it's been in the news much more recently with Brexit and Trump bringing debates about race and immigration to the fore. In 2019, the BBC found itself embroiled in a controversy regarding BBC Breakfast presenter Naga Munchetty's response to Donald Trump suggesting congresswomen should 'go home' to the countries in which they or their parents were born. The original clip and full article can be found below:




Paul Gilroy and Russell Brand

In 2017, Paul Gilroy took part in Russell Brand’s Under The Skin podcast, exploring ideas and modern culture. Watch the following two extracts and consider how Gilroy’s ideas reflect recent events and media culture.

Extract 1: 17.50 – 25.45
Extract 2: 44.30 – 48.08

Paul Gilroy - blog tasks

Go to our Media Factsheet archive on the Media Shared drive and open Factsheet 170: Gilroy – Ethnicity and Postcolonial Theory. Our Media Factsheet archive is on the Media Shared drive: M:\Resources\A Level\Media Factsheets or you can access it online here using your Greenford Google login.

Read the Factsheet and complete the following questions/tasks:

1) How does Gilroy suggest racial identities are constructed?

2) What does Gilroy suggest regarding the causes and history of racism?

3) What is ethnic absolutism and why is Gilroy opposed to it?

4) How does Gilroy view diasporic identity?

5) What did Gilroy suggest was the dominant representation of black Britons in the 1980s (when the Voice newspaper was first launched)?

6) Gilroy argues diaspora challenges national ideologies. What are some of the negative effects of this?

7) Complete the first activity on page 3: How might diasporic communities use the media to stay connected to their cultural identity? E.g. digital media - offer specific examples.

8) Why does Gilroy suggest slavery is important in diasporic identity?

9) How might representations in the media reinforce the idea of ‘double consciousness’ for black people in the UK or US?

10) Finally, complete the second activity on page 3: Watch the trailer for Hidden Figures and discuss how the film attempts to challenge ‘double consciousness’ and the stereotypical representation of black American women.

Due date: confirmed by your exam class teacher and on Google Classroom.

Reminder! Make sure you've also got the last sections of your Teen Vogue case study complete:

• Teen Vogue - audience and representation
• Teen Vogue - industry and social media