Ideology

Ideologies are messages and values sent through to the audience through the media text, there are two kinds of ideologies: Dominant ideologies and Alternative ideologies.

Dominant ideologies are held by a society or culture, E.g. Patriotism is a dominant ideology as is 'Love conquers all' and family values in our culture, there are also ideologies for gender, E.g. 'Blue for boys and Pink for girls'.

However, Alternative ideologies appose to the dominant ideologies.

Mainstream media texts follow ideologies so the audience accepts the text, as they do not challenge beliefs and values, also, ideologies are embedded in texts to make them appear normal.
The ideologies represented by Bassline are those of people in their youth having fun, partying, very energetic livly people, a 'heavy' atmosphere.

Marxist theory and Ideology

Marxist theorist tend to emphasize the role of the mass media in the maintaining of the status quo in contrast to liberals who emphasize the role of the media in promoting freedom of speech.

( http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/marxism/marxism04.html )

'A central feature of Marxist theory is the 'materialist' stance that social being determines consciousness. According to this stance, ideological positions are a function of class positions, and the dominant ideology in society is the ideology of its dominant class. This is in contrast to the 'idealist' stance that grants priority to consciousness (as in Hegelian philosophy). Marxists differ with regard to this issue: some interpret the relationship between social being and consciousness as one of direct determination; others stress a dialectical relationship.
In fundamentalist Marxism, ideology is 'false consciousness', which results from the emulation of the dominant ideology by those whose interests it does not reflect. From this perspective the mass media disseminate the dominant ideology: the values of the class which owns and controls the media. According to adherents of Marxist political economy the mass media conceal the economic basis of class struggle; 'ideology becomes the route through which struggle is obliterated rather than the site of struggle' (Curran et al. 1982: 26).
Althusser rejected the notion of false consciousness, stressing that ideology is the medium through which we experience the world (Curran et al. 1982: 24). Althusserian Marxism stresses the irreducibility and materiality of ideology: i.e., ideology is seen as a determining force in its own right. The ideological operation of the mass media in the West contributes to the reproduction of the capitalist system.
Another Marxist theorist of ideology, Valentin Volosinov, has been influential in British cultural studies. Volosinov argued that a theory of ideology which grants the purely abstract concept of consciousness an existence prior to the material forms in which it is organized could only be metaphysical. Ideological forms are not the product of consciousness but rather produce it. As Tony Bennett notes: 'Rather than being regarded as the product of forms of consciousness whose contours are determined elsewhere, in the economic sphere, the signifying systems which constitute the sphere of ideology are themselves viewed as the vehicles through which the consciousness of social agents is produced' (Bennett 1982: 51).
Clearly, Marxist theorists agree that the mass media has ideological power, but disagree as to its nature.'



Another theory is The Encoding and Decoding Model by Stuart Hall. Stuart Hall defined this process as the encoding-decoding model of the media, he highlighted that messages/ideologies are ENCODED in media representations, then audiences DECODE these messages. All messages
have to be put together for communication, the way in which they are put together effects how they are understood, through our video we will be presenting messages through young people raving, dancing and having fun, reflecting a lively atmosphere. This is encoding, however then messages can be defined in terms of what they say and how they say it. Then how one 'unpacks' this information to get its meaning effects the understanding they get from it, also, all communication is carried out through phsical or social context. The context always effects how the communication is understood, through our video we will use various filming techniques and preformance to get the ideologies to the audience.

'Work by Stuart Hall (e.g. Hall et al. 1978) represents the Marxist culturalist approach, which sees the mass media as a powerful (if secondary) influence in shaping public consciousness (Curran et al. 1982: 28). Culturalism follows Althusserian structuralism in rejecting economism, but unlike structuralism, it emphasizes the actual experience of sub-groups in society and contextualizes the media within a society which is seen as 'a complex expressive totality' (Curran et al. 1982: 27). The culturalist approach is reflected in the work of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) at the University of Birmingham, of which Stuart Hall was once the director.' ( http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/marxism/marxism04.html )

The ideology bassline videos generally represent are youth related, apposed to the dominant ideology of being trouble, bassline shows people in their youth as fun loving, energetic and lively.

Halls reception theory focuses on the role of the audience in the interpretation of a text rather than the text itself, it suggests that the audience plays an active part in reading texts and that each person has the ability to read the same text in many different ways.
He termed these readings as:
1. The preffered reading
2. The negotiated reading
3. The oppositional reading

Hall argued that texts are polysemic and have multiple meanings.
He studied news photographs and suggested they were closed texts and therefore, captions, anchorage, etc, encourage us to take a preffered reading, howeevr he also highlighted that some people may arrive at a 'negotiated reading' this is when they may agree generally with the opinion expressed but their referential knowledge and social experiences affect their reading, Hall also suggested that some readers may take an oppositional reading, this is when the preffered reading is wholley rejected.

The preffered reading of our video would be to promote people in their youth as energetic, funloving people, rather than their stereotypical portrayal within the media.

The Uses and Gratifications Theory.
Blumer, Katz & McQuail (1940's and 1970's)
This theory again challenges the effects theory by claiming audiences are easily brain washed but actively consume media to gratify their needs.
This models argues that people 'read' texts in very different ways according to their personalities and position in the world, its not about the media does to people but what people do with media, it also argues that audiences will not change their beliefs that have been accumulated from life experiences.
James Halloran commented 'We must get away from the habit of thinking in terms of what the media does to people and substitute for it the idea of what people do with the media'.

The Uses and Gratifications Theory includes:
1. Diversion - this is a form of escape, a release from everyday pressures.
2. Personal relationships - which is companionship via personalities and characters, this supports and develops a personal relationship.
3. Personal identification - This offers comfort to the audience as they are able to compare their life with the characters and situations within the text.
4. Survailance on the world - through this audiences gain information as to whats happening in the world.