Task 2

Media Ideology

Popular Music

There are two different types of music categorized as Popular and Serious music. Popular music is considered to have various levels of value which society take for granted such as social and musical values which are totally independent of one another.
Popular music has Standardized Characteristics as there are rules to follow in its production. The chorus lyrics are easy to remember and the harmony is repetitive these characteristics usually come in the form of various examples such as the 'novelty' song. This music has also simplified its ways of interaction with the listener by making it easy to understand and also has dance types creating a very repetitive listening experience overall.

Popular usic aims to be industrially standardized to become more successful in its promotion within the mass media, but that can not be done with out following the standardized pattern within production as society are conditioned to recognise these listening traits which popular music has always contained.

With Popular music there are no surprises and so the listener is prepared before he/or she listens and is conditioned to except the fact that there is no in depth meaning. With serious music on the other hand each detail be it the musical notes or the lyrics is influenced by the meaning and offers the listener complexity which is dependant on the course of the music. This gives the listener a more in depth meaningful experience.
Popular music also promotes Structural Standardization which takes away the Independence and the freedom of the individuals in society and forces all listeners to take away the same experience. This has taken away new ways of producing music which has resulted in an array of unoriginal popular music being massed produced giving the listener less choice instead of more.

If alistener is not capable of taking in the seriousness of complex music they pick up on the simplest part of the beat and accept the rest as a parodistic distortation of the simplest form.

Popular music aims to be industrially standardized to become more successful in its promotion within the mass media, but that can not be done with out following the standardized pattern within production as society are conditioned to recognise these listening traits which popular music has always contained.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzRkgtJn2is- Is this the way to Amarillo-Peter Kay

I Choose 's this the way to Amarillo'originally sung by Tony Christie, then by Peter Kay to raise money for Comic relief in 2005.

This sony was originally written by two Americans but in 1971 Tony Christie released it into the UK and it came in at no18 in the charts. Although this song wasn't particularly famous and popular at first, it was pickd up by many social groups in society and was chanted at various events such as football matches.

Thesong was originally called Amarillo because it rhymed with the word pillow, this can b linked to where Adorno suggests, the means of these particular songs are very stantardized and have very little meaning.

The song was also played in the key of A major and in a time signiture, which we can also link to where Adorno suggests that there are Musical Characteristics of this type of music to keep it musically standardised and easier for the listener to digest.

In 2005 this song became a hit when Peter Kay re-released it in one of his TV series Phoenix nights. He also did a music video and sung it at various festivals to raise money for charity.

I think this song was so successful because it is easy for the listener to digest as there are no hidden meanings within the song and the music is repetitive and so easy to remember even without the words. I also think it was successful as it has many Peter Kay being one, celebrities attached to it which added some credibility to the song. Within the video the celebrities were also walking, or doing a particular dance to this song which Adorno suggests is also a common thing with this kind of popular music.

Task 4

Annotate T.W Adorno's:How to look at television (Spring 1954), pp 2-3. [Assessed 05/02/09]

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2nd half

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The gaze lecture notes

In the book Ways of Seeing by John Berger, he suggests that a mans presence is different to that of a women and that 17th Century paintings of women were purely made to faller the male eye, assuming that the one who is ‘gazing’ is a male. This is what has influenced the idea of ‘The gaze’
He goes on to say that this is something that we have now been made aware of but yet nothing seems to have changed. This idea of the male being the gazing eye and the woman being the one looked at has filtered down into society and this is idea is being reconstructed within the media and films in particular.
In films the ‘ideals’ of the male and female figure is a common trend where the male is always the Hero, and the female is always the sexual object there to be looked at. The gaze evokes two different structures of power within film and the genders where ‘Men act and women appear’. J Berger
J .Berger says about the behaviour of a woman in today society ‘she has to survey everything she is and everything she does, because how she appears to others, and ultimately men, is of critical importance for what is normally thought of as the success of her life’. He goes on to suggest that women are conditioned from childhood to believe they are to survey themselves and that they will be surveyed by others. This in turn makes them correct themselves into being what they want to be seen as.

The Gaze within films appeal to the 3 different levels of our consciousness and unconsciousness, ego, super ego, and ID.
The Gaze appeals to our egos because this is the side of us that we show and we behave in accordance to the way we want to be seen. Hence the ‘hero’s’ within films are always men and the assumed spectator is always male. This allows the spectator to live his ‘ideal’ through a film as this appeals to his ego, and this is the way he wants to be seen.
The Gaze is also apparent in our unconsciousness super ego because this is where others don’t see us and this is a part of our true self which we don’t allow to come out. Hence this is the part where women grow up and have life experiences, they watch films with the ‘ideal’ female figure and then they watch themselves and fashion their behaviour in to becoming what they want to be seen as.
The Gaze within films also appeals to our ID, as this is where our deepest desires are about sex, pain, violence and death this is the part of us that we suppress as we are told not to enjoy it. We see it as acceptable to take enjoyment in watching others do it on a sub-conscious level as we are not doing it ourselves. But we can’t be seen to enjoy this on a conscious level. This is where we are able to watch films and satisfy our desires without the guilt which is also Mulveys theory.

'Le Vial' The Rape


The Dolce and Gabbana's advert was made an example of during the lecture of how the gaze can work. In this Ad we can identify with a set-up which could be interpertated as a gang rape, something which might appeal to the inner ego of the 'male gaze'. The media and advertising in general offers the 'male' spectator a way of thinking about desire and Sigmund Freud argues these desires stem from childhood.
'The Gaze' seems to be most apparent in classic hollywood films but have filtered down into contemporary films, but in my research I found a film which I could argue goes againsts Bergers quote to describe 'The Gaze' where he states 'Men act and women appear'.

Kill Bill Vol.1


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVam1qOmlEo&feature=related- Trailer

This film is based on an ex gang member of the Deadly viper assasination squad, who was once betrayed by her boss Bill. Before the film starts there is a flash back of the past where we find The 'Bride' who is the main Character in the film finds she is pregnant and so for a better life she decided to leave the gang and start a family off with someone else. But once Bill her boss finds out he decided to go and kill her with the rest of the female gang members on her wedding day.
Years later 'The Bride' wakes up in hospital and doesnt know what has happened to her but soon realizes what has happened. So for the rest of the movie she goes on a search for Bill which the intentions of killing him for taking her baby away which just so happened to be his.

I do think that 'The Gaze' is apparent within this film as the one who is driving the plot is a male 'Bill' and although we haven't seen him he has much presence and credibility as he is controlling all of the other females within the film.
In the beginning of the film we can identify with a set-up almost like a 'gang rape' where we see the gang moving in to spoil 'The Brides' day. In their eyes she betrayed Bill the ultimate 'male figure' within the film and as her punishment she is beaten up and finally shot. They take away her life for her make her own decisions without a 'mans' authorisation, because she is his property.
But as Berger suggests 'Men act women Appear' (p.72) is not part of this film as the main characters throughout are female and they do alot of acting and fighting, whilst the other men in the film dont have much presence.
I think the main Character The Bride is 'Fighting' for her own right as an independant woman who has been surpressed by this male for most of her life. I also think there is the idea that every woman will do anything to protect her child and will kill anyone without even thinking about it to take revenge for doing a wrong to her child.
Throughout the whole of this film we are also given a way of fullfilling our inner desires where we see violence and killing, which we are said to supress by our egos as we are told it is wrong to enjoy. But to see the Bride get her revenge after what Bill has done, as a 'female' you can relate to how she must feel and you do get a sense of enjoyment watching it.

Bibliograpy
IMDB. Normski3, beth-243, elyseface. Kill Bill Vol 1. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0266697/synopsis. [Assessed 10 months ago]
Lecture notes
Berger, J. (1972) ‘Ways 0f Seeing’, London, Penguin
J. Berger. Ways of seeing. Chapter 3. British Broadcasting Corporation and Penguin Books. 1972. London