- You must present your arguments within the context of Collective Identity.
- You must reference a range of texts using accurate citations.
- You must reference theorists.
- You must compare historical.
Hoddies and gangs are two examples of the stereotypical collective identities given to teenagers through the bias form of mediation. Collective Identity is A set of individuals sense of belonging to the group or collective. The individuals sense of belonging to a group who share a set of traditions and values. Stereotypical, teenagers are presented to have a violent collective identity- as suggested and claim by theorist Ann Gould who has developed 6 key stereotypes in the media- one of which being Rebellious.
Acland (1995) has suggested the idea of media being a form of ideology of protection as media representations of anti-social youth reinforces hegemony. An example of this is the media during the riots. Newspapers such as the sun published several different headlined stories of teenagers and them being violent and dangerous- to which everyone should be scared of. This would thus lead to maintaing social order and hegemony because it would teach parents what teenagers are doing and for them to stop their children from becoming delinquent as well, they may stop them from leaving the house, or giving them a curfew- so they aren't out late enough to cause this danger. This is an example of age hegemony because parents are controlling their child as a way to stop the destruction from these "yobs"- their collective identity values causing harm to others. The hypodermic needle theory (1930) is an explanation of why people may be lead to believe such stereotypes. This is the argument that if people are given such representations of youth, enough times, and they don't look further into it, they may then whollyingly believe it- which is what the media wants from their audience.
In May 2016, ITV news published an article headlining "Teenager jailed for nine years for stabbing police officer". This as a headline is very mush shocking and disturbing to an audience and reader. Later on in 2016- in June, another headline reads "Brutal attack by gang of youths on teenager outside east London McDonald's burger shop caught on CCTV". Both of these example are just the mere couple of thousands of different articles on youth- both displaying and forming a destructive stereotype of labeling youth as a collective identity and culture in general. This can be argued by a sociologist Merton as having a leading effect known as the self-fulfilling prophecy- this is when longer enough labelled as the negative stereotypes, they internally start to believe in this way, for example, if someone is always labelled as someone who goes out looking for trouble and causes violence, when they do not, if given this labeled long enough, this teenager may start to think that maybe they are just another violent teen and start behaving in this way anyway- because they might as well if they are already given this label.
An article was publishes by The Independent- by Richard Garner- with the headline "Hoodie, Louts, Scum": how the media demonises teenagers. This article goes on to talk about different figures revealing how mediation negatively displays youth. Collecting example such as- 4,374/8,629 newspapers about teenagers in the past year were about crime. Furthermore showing how fewer than one in 10 articles about young people actually quoted young people or included their perspective in the debate- this shows how mediation has taken place into describing teenagers. It is one sided and can be argued as bias, thus being an unreliable source of evidence. However, as the newspaper "The Sun", is the most popular read newspaper, it is easy for Rupert Murdoch to spread his right winged ideology of teenagers being troublesome very easily. This is further supported by theorist Greg Philo who argues that contemporary "hoodie cinema" reflects middle class anxiety about the threat of teenagers dominance posed by the working class.
Leading on from this, theorist Angela McRobbie suggests that contemporary British Tv normally containts "symbolic violence" against the working class, in the modern day, an example of this is the popular TV show "Waterloo Road", this is a TV programme showing a destructive school- with students all mainly from the working class background, it is able to form a strong stereotype of all youths being this destructive and not listening to the teachers.
An "older" example of representations of youth is the film Quadrophenia. This film is about the different groups around the 60s- the confrontation between collective identity groups; the Mods, and the Rockers. This film goes on to show the difference between the two groups and the battle "of the cults". This film shows how youth isn't just one collective identity, there are many sub groups within youth- such as Mods, Rockers, Punks, Hippies, Emos, Hoodies... and so on. This film shows the meeting of the two groups in Brighton and the police acting as a deterant have to break up this "war" and it shows them breaking shop windows, running into peoples gardens and hurting each other. This example is an example of Hedbrige's claim that media representations of young people is portrayed as either fun or trouble, there is no in between; for this film, it is all trouble, even when it could be argued they are having fun- at the establishing scene in a party, they are still doing illegal things such as taking drugs- thus suggesting that in the 60s the creators of this film wanted to show teenagers as violent and destructive.
A more modern version of a movie which portrays teenagers is the film St. Trinians. This movie has similarities to the idea of Quadrophenia as a way of showing the different subcultures of youth. However St. Trinian leads to show the audience how even though teenagers may be the emos, the geeks, the CHAVS, the posh totties, the odds and the Eco freaks (the groups displayed in the movie) they can still all work together in order to get what they want- to complete a robbery. Thus showing how teenagers all together are troublesome.
Through the use of movies, across the years different stereotypes of youth have been taught and portrayed to audiences across the world. Starting with older films, such as the British view of youth in the film Bullet Boy; made in 2004, by BBC films in London. This film starting with a teenager within a police center, he has just been let out, the audience are unsure what for, but it appears he is "on bail", if he does wrong again he will be back there. This automatically gives a negative stereotype of representing youth. Through the examples of Ann Gould's stereotypes, this establishing shot conveys a rebellion stereotype- even 2 minutes into the film. This rebellion stereotype is portrayed across the film through various ways, for example, the speech between the friends is "their own" as a way to break away from everyone else, not speaking "properly", examples of this is them "kissing their teeth" when they don't like something, or the words used such as "what's g'urning blud"- showing their collective identity. On the other hand, this movie portrays the negative sides of youth, but it also portrays how they can be rude to "outsiders" but really care for their friends and family- reinforcing the collective identity perspective. Furthermore, this British film includes hegemony, it is the Middle Class who are making these films in order to suppress the working class in a negative light- as always looking for trouble, putting them in a bad light, thus linking to the use of ideology of protection, parents may see this movie and try to keep their child not to be like this.
Across the years, Americanisation has occured- where the majority of the media we are presented with it from the American perspective. Another example of representations of youth in modern media is the movie- Perks Of Being A Wallflower, made in 2014, with world known actors such as Emma Watson, making this movie "one to watch". It portrays youth in a much less violent way than the Bullet Boy movie did. This may be an across of how representations of youth over time have lessened on how harshly they exaggerate the youth identity. This movie is an example of theorist Hedbridge- youth either being fun or trouble. We were shown a small section of the movie, starting with a couple of friends in a car, driving late at night dropping friends home, they are shown with the music on really loudly with the windows down, this shows the lack of consideration they have as they are driving through a housing estate where people would have been more than likely sleeping. However, some may look at this and say they aren't doing any real harm as they would drive past a house and seconds later would be quite again- they are just having fun. The clip we were shown ended with them introducing the "new kid" into their group calling it "the island of misfits"- this is their collective identiy, they don't feel as if they fit in anywhere, yet they all fit in together- the irony is shown here into representing youth that nothings ever enough- they fit in together, yet they still class themselves as outcasts because they don't fit in with the "norm", yet who's to say what the "norm" is. Thus representing youth as peer pressure confound.
Through the use of movies, across the years different stereotypes of youth have been taught and portrayed to audiences across the world. Starting with older films, such as the British view of youth in the film Bullet Boy; made in 2004, by BBC films in London. This film starting with a teenager within a police center, he has just been let out, the audience are unsure what for, but it appears he is "on bail", if he does wrong again he will be back there. This automatically gives a negative stereotype of representing youth. Through the examples of Ann Gould's stereotypes, this establishing shot conveys a rebellion stereotype- even 2 minutes into the film. This rebellion stereotype is portrayed across the film through various ways, for example, the speech between the friends is "their own" as a way to break away from everyone else, not speaking "properly", examples of this is them "kissing their teeth" when they don't like something, or the words used such as "what's g'urning blud"- showing their collective identity. On the other hand, this movie portrays the negative sides of youth, but it also portrays how they can be rude to "outsiders" but really care for their friends and family- reinforcing the collective identity perspective. Furthermore, this British film includes hegemony, it is the Middle Class who are making these films in order to suppress the working class in a negative light- as always looking for trouble, putting them in a bad light, thus linking to the use of ideology of protection, parents may see this movie and try to keep their child not to be like this.
Across the years, Americanisation has occured- where the majority of the media we are presented with it from the American perspective. Another example of representations of youth in modern media is the movie- Perks Of Being A Wallflower, made in 2014, with world known actors such as Emma Watson, making this movie "one to watch". It portrays youth in a much less violent way than the Bullet Boy movie did. This may be an across of how representations of youth over time have lessened on how harshly they exaggerate the youth identity. This movie is an example of theorist Hedbridge- youth either being fun or trouble. We were shown a small section of the movie, starting with a couple of friends in a car, driving late at night dropping friends home, they are shown with the music on really loudly with the windows down, this shows the lack of consideration they have as they are driving through a housing estate where people would have been more than likely sleeping. However, some may look at this and say they aren't doing any real harm as they would drive past a house and seconds later would be quite again- they are just having fun. The clip we were shown ended with them introducing the "new kid" into their group calling it "the island of misfits"- this is their collective identiy, they don't feel as if they fit in anywhere, yet they all fit in together- the irony is shown here into representing youth that nothings ever enough- they fit in together, yet they still class themselves as outcasts because they don't fit in with the "norm", yet who's to say what the "norm" is. Thus representing youth as peer pressure confound.
No comments:
Post a Comment