Summary - Icons in the hood - how working-class youths became chavs

Title of article: Icons in the hood - how working-class youths became chavs
Author: Pete Turner
Publisher: MediaMagazine
Date published: September 2012

Theme: Representation
Society

Summary of text:

Turner describes the term chav as a symbolic representation of David Cameron's "broken Britain". This icon represents young people as being hooded, tattooed; wearing trainers and tracksuits with gold jewellery, all of them are uneducated, poor but all in labels and logos and above all, aggressive with their hands down the front of their trousers waving guns and gangs signs around.

Turner argues that the representation of youth in the media can definitely have an impact on people's attitudes in real life. A group of school students when asked to describe a chav classified them as "causing trouble, hanging round the streets, drinking and taking drugs’ (they are) working class, they live in council houses’. Their parents' don’t care, and they don’t work." Turner questions to what extent this attitude comes from the students observing and interpreting what they see around them, and how much of it is a result of iconic representations created and perpetuated by the media?

Little Britain's Vicky Pollard and Catherine Tate's Lauren Cooper are characters that have become symbols of the laddette-ish teenage girls who are perceived to be mouthy, stupid, working class and often pregnant, Turner argues. He argues that a positive representation of young people in society did not arrive until Shameless into 2004 and Misfits in 2009, though this might represent a selfish and stupid group of people, it also shows they love and care for each other, Channel 4 describes their character Kelly (Misfits) as having "a heart of gold and is fiercely loyal."

Turner argues that this representation of young people in society may have already done its damage and audiences are getting confused between reality and fiction.  He discusses that the word "chav" has lost its mainstream media position since December 2004 when a story about a chav reached its peak with 114 stories being published in December alone. However, negative representation of young people in society has not declined, with 71% of articles from a range of tabloids, broadsheets and local papers involving young people in negative tones.

This negative representation, Turner states, has only been made worse since the London riots and with artists like Plan B creating music videos entitled "ill manors" Featuring footage from the London riots appearing to celebrate the stereotype that media portrays about council estate youths.

Turner concludes by saying "what all this current interest in the iconic chav indicates is an interesting polarisation in attitude towards the youthful members of society’s underclass. One writer suggests ‘the C-word actually denotes the mind-boggling revival of privileged people revelling in looking down their noses at the white working class’ (Harris, 2006)"

Key points of the text:

• The representations in the media can impact the lives of real people.
• This representation has already done its damage to audiences as they are now getting confused between reality and fiction.
• 71% of articles within tabloids, broadsheets and local papers involved young people being represented in a negative tone.
• This stereotype is also represented in other forms of media such as music videos and films -  portraying a negative picture of young people in society and perpetuating the stereotype created by the news.
• It can be argued that privilege people are using the word chav to look down their noses at the white working classes.

Key Quote 2-3:

"The representation of young people in the British media can definitely have an impact
on people’s attitudes in real life."

"However, there are concerns that the damage has already been done, and that audiences are getting reality and fiction confused."

"The C-word actually denotes the mind-boggling revival of privileged people revelling in looking down their noses at the white working class"


My Response:
I would argue that this representation of young people in society was once an exaggeration and construction. This can be in the form of Little Britain's Vicky Pollard to entertain society and for privileged people to laugh at the unprivileged (the haves and the have-nots). However, due to its constant representation within the media, especially the news, this representation has become the norm within reality for society and young people in society.

Therefore, as this representation has been taken from the media, who construct and manipulate the truth, and our society is using this on which to base their behaviour and attitudes, then they have become a simulation of the fictional representation, thus entering into a state of hyperreality. However, this simulation has developed and modified itself into becoming a simulacrum of the young people of society as there was no original to copy. Thus it has entered into an uninterrupted circuit without reference or exchanges with the real, but can only reference or exchange with itself. Therefore, the representation of chav for young people in society will remain until another representation takes its place.

Summary - Yes He Can – Barack Obama's Campaign Speech Analysed

Title of article: Yes. He. Can. How a speech and a video helped change the american presidency
Author: Adam Oliver
Publisher: MediaMagazine
Date published: February 2009

Theme: Hyperreality
Politics
Remixing

Summary of text:

The article explores and analyses Barack Obama's famous "Yes We Can" speech and the accompanying video by Will.I.Am, that supported and funded much of the Obama campaign for Presidentship in the USA.

Obama delivered the speech after losing the New Hampshire Primary election to Hillary Clinton in January 2008. Obama's speech was watched by many of the American citizens and the words that Barack Obama and his speech writers wrote were delivered with Obama's famous charisma and deliverance. However it was not the original speech or the original video that made internet sensations but a remix of the famous "Yes We Can" speech by Will.I.Am and accompanying artists that grew to Internet fame.

In February 2008 the musical artist Will.I.Am released a version of Barack Obama's speech onto the Internet through the use of Youtube and Dipdive. Will.I.Am put this speech to music and with the help from accompanying artists, spoke and sang the words for the speech, while Jesse Dylan directed the accompanying video. This video was not a direct production for the Barack Obama's official campaign. However, by the end of March the video reached over 17 billion hits from around the world. People were not just watching the video but also donating to Obama's campaign which lead to Obama's campaign being the richest to stand the for office that the USA has ever seen.

This video was nothing special, it was a very simple piece of work shot entirely with black-and-white, with limited range of shot types and notably lacking any special effects-driven glamour. The choice of black and white, for example, suggests a rejection of the glossy, sophisticated nature of most mainstream political broadcasts; conversely, the limited palette also cleverly implies this video, in contrast, is something rawer, with greater veracity: that this is the word on the street.

Will.I.Am is the first artist to appear in the video singing along with soft playing non-diegetic guitar music. Barack Obama is represented next in the video and he is featured alongside when I am with the use of a split screen. Obama is presented in this way through out the entire video. Oliver argues that this is a method in which to represent Obama as being equal to everyone and create unison with the audience. Oliver reinforces his argument by the fact that all the artists in the video look directly at the camera and thus engaging and connecting with the audience.

The phrase "Yes We Can" become chorus as well as core message and is repeated over and over again, Oliver argued that this is a method in which the message is shared to the audience and the sense of unison is created. Oliver also argues that Obama’s plurality is apparent in the cast: black, white, hispanic; men and women and a child as well asoOne segment of the montage is signed for the deaf, appealing to another potentially marginalised group, whilst the catchphrase Yes. We. Can is also rendered in Spanish: Si se puede.

Text is also used in the video to emphasise key elements such as "Change", "Yes We Can" & "Hope". The latter of which dissolves into the word vote, the change colour for white to red, the only colout that is use in the video. Oliver argues that this is used to emphasise the key action for the American electorate to take away from the viewing.


Key points of the text:

• Obama lost the New Hampshire Primary election.
• Obama's speech yes we can was watched by thousands.
• This speech was taken up by Will.I.Am who remix it and created an online sensation.
• This video was watched by 17 million people around the world and made Obama the richest campaign to ever stand for office.
• Oliver argues that the clever use of camera, editing, sound and mise-en-scene were used to manipulate and influence the American citizens to vote for Obama.

Key Quote 2-3:

"The memorable sound-bite, with its concise sense of positive affirmation (‘Yes’), its message of unity (‘We’) and the implied possibility of achieving change (‘Can’) is already acquiring a legendary status."

"The choice of black and white, for example, suggests a rejection of the glossy, sophisticated nature of most mainstream political broadcasts; conversely, the limited palette also cleverly implies this video, in contrast, is something rawer, with greater veracity: that this is the word on the street."


"Change, the central election message, also appears in this way, as does Hope. This latter is also repeated as the video finishes, the verbal noun Hope melting into the imperative verb Vote. That word slowly colour-shifts from white to red: the only colour in the entire sequence being used to emphasise the key action for the American electorate to take away from the viewing."

My Response:
I found this article very interesting as Oliver's interpretation of these events are similar to my own. I do believe the presentation within the media of a series of events can affect an audience in a passive or active manner. However I would argue that as Will.I.Am's video is a remix between his own creation of artists preforming and Obama's original speech therefor blurring the line between the real and the copied. This presents a hyperreal representation of Obama and his position as Obama's words were cut and reposition in the manner in which they were not spoken in the original video. This means that the message and meaning is changed along with the value and impact that it had on the audience. Also artists who are famous and in the eye of the public are presenting Obama's view, which are taken out of context and therefore do not played the original state in which they were delivered.

Therefore this leads the audience and the public into a false sense of representation and thus their decisions cannot be self decided, as other factors have introduced themselves to the audience to influence their decision. Therefore we are entering into a state in which control is taken away from the public and then are entering into a state which is similar to that of George Orwell's 1984.

Reconsidered question

After beginning to read articles, that develop my knowledge and understanding about my question and act as a bases to start my report, I have decided that my question; "To what extent is the world we live in a reflection of the world depicted by Orwell in his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four?" is too broad for investigation and I need to refine my question so I have a direct focus on a niche area.

After a discussion with my tutor about my concerns, we where able, together, to reconsidered my area for investigation and rewrote the question to reflect this change but also to create a clear focus. My final question that I will be investigating into is: "To what extent are we living in a state of ‘hyperreality’, reflective of the totalitarian state depicted in George Orwell’s ‘1984’."

I feel that this revised question is more appropriate than my previous question as it is tailored to my interests of  George Orwell’s "1984" but also creates a niche area of focus and introduces me to a new term and area to investigate with the addition of "hyperreality". From here I now need to continue reading articles that have a direct focus on my new question and also start to consider my method for primary research.

Summary - Surveillance Society

Title of article: Surveillance Society
Author: David Lyon
Publisher: festivaldeldiritto.it
Date published: September 2008

Theme:Society Control
Influence
Government

Summary of text:
David Lyon transcript's on surveillance with in society discusses; What is the surveillance society?, What is wrong with surveillance society? and Defining surveillance; tracing surveillance society.

Lyon argues that a "Surveillance Society" can no longer be discussed in a further tense, as surveillance place a key role in everyones life, with and without there knowledge. Lyon considers surveillance as a method of seeing the modern day world for what it is. However society view surveillance as an outcome of modern organisation trends in workplaces, businesses and the military than as a covert conspiracy.

Surveillance has all ways existed, Lyon proposes saying that people have all ways watched over one and another for mutual care and for moral caution. However modern citizens can expect that rights would be respected because they were protected by accurate records (obtained by surveillance) as well as by law.

The growth of the military, police departments and new technologies in the twentieth century, improved intelligence-gathering, identification and tracking techniques, meaning that surveillance grows as a part of just being modern. However it is the Impersonal and rule-centred practices that leads to a growth in surveillance. Surveillance is the outcome of bureaucratic organizational practices and the desire for efficiency, speed, control and coordination, Lyon proposes.

Lyon considers that, surveillance expansion in the twenty-first century are producing situations where distinctions of class, race, gender, geography and citizenship are currently being exacerbated and institutionalized. For example, Muslim Americans are branded as unfit for travel using no-fly lists or are otherwise subject to racial profiling. This surveillance is a direct result to the 'war on terror' showing that political, social, religious, and scientific events have an impact of how surveillance is carried out.

Where purposeful, routine, systematic and focused attention paid to personal details for the sake of control, entitlement, management, influence or protection, surveillance can be found.

In the twenty first century surveillance as according to Roger Clarke has change to dataveilance, the collection of data referring to transactions, exchanges, statuses and accounts. However modern surveillance (or dataveilance) has only existed since the 1970's due to the rise of computers , which were to make for a massive expansion in the ways in which surveillance occurs.

Key points of the text:

• Surveillance is a part of the twenty-first century and could no longer be referred to in the future tense.
• The growth of the military, police departments and technologies has led to a improvements in intelligence-gathering, identification and tracking techniques.
• Distinctions of class, race, gender, geography and citizenship are currently being exacerbated and institutionalized due to surveillance. 
• Surveillance can be found where purposeful, routine, systematic and focused attention paid to personal details, for the sake of control, entitlement, management, influence or protection.
• Dataveilance, the collection of data referring to transactions, exchanges, statuses and accounts.
• Computers led to an expansion in the ways in which surveillance occurs.
• Surveillance is bound up with what we call ‘governance.’ Governance controls access, opportunities, chances and even helps to channel choices, often using personal data to determine who gets what

Key Quote 2-3:
"Impersonal and rule-centred practices spawned surveillance."

"Interestingly, our image of state surveillance is often shaped by novels and films."

(Max Weber) "He saw this surveillance, keeping detailed records, collating information, limiting access to certain eligible persons, not only as evidence of ‘progress,’ but as deeply ambiguous. At worst, he predicted that the efficient but soulless world of new organizational methods in every sphere would become an 'iron cage'."

My Response:

After reading David Lyon's transcript, I can say that I have been opened up to some new ideas about surveillance and some old ideas, and for both I can say that I agree and disagree with each. I agree that the introduce of computer has lead to a rise is online or digital surveillance and also the idea that profiling people as a result of the growth of surveillance, widening the gap of class, race, gender, geography and citizenship for the lager powerful conglomerates. However in even day life I do not feel the a gap between people is getting wider in fact I believer that the gap between people is gapping smaller, people of different background are mixing more. I also disagree with the statement that we can no longer referred to surveillance in the future tense as we can not defiantly define the pinnacle of surveillance until we as a society have pact the era and can look back on it. 

There's a Riot Going On

First draft of notes on the David Buckingham article "There's a riot going on"

- A peaceful demonstration.

- Newspapers, TV screens and the Internet where flooded with reports and images of crowds rampaging.

Doublethink

My notes on the Wikipedia article "Doublethink"

- Act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts.

Origin and concepts 

- Know and not to know

- Complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies.

- To use logic against logic.

- Consciously to induce unconsciousness.

- To become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed.

- To understand the word 'doublethink' involved the use of doublethink.

- To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient.

- Objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality.

- Word one admits that one is tampering with reality.

- Protect its iron power without degrading its people with constant propaganda.

- Lead to the implosion of the State.

- Could be controlled and manipulated merely through the alteration of everyday thought and language.

- Doublethink is the method of directly controlling thought.

- This is demonstrated by O'Brien, during the time when Winston Smith is being tortured toward the end of the book.

- Especially true of fundamentally important words such as good and evil, right and wrong, truth and falsehood, and justice and injustice.

- Means being able to falsify public records, and then believe in the new history that they themselves have just rewritten.

- The Ministry's name is itself an example of doublethink: the Ministry of Truth is really concerned with lies.

- Self-deception allows the Party to maintain huge goals and realistic expectations.

- If one is to rule, and to continue ruling, one must be able to dislocate the sense of reality.

- Doublethink would avoid a "killing the messenger" attitude that could disturb the Command structure.

- Key tool of self-discipline for the Party.

- Without the confusion and misinformation associated with primitive totalitarian regimes.

- To let himself become consciously a loyal party member while letting his hatred of the party remain an unconscious presence deep in his mind and let it surface again at the very moment of his execution so that "the bullet would enter a free mind" which the Thought Police would not have a chance to tamper with again.

- With relieving cognitive dissonance by ignoring the contradiction between two world views.

This article has again helped me to define what doublethink really means and how it could be used in reality to manipulate the truth.  For further investigate I would like to find another article that explains doublethink in the practice of the real world and also the phase that was mentioned in the article "the bullet would enter a free mind" and if Winston died he would have a free mind. 

Newspeak

My notes on the Wikipedia article "Newspeak"

- Deliberately impoverished language promoted by the state.

- A greatly reduced and simplified vocabulary and grammar. 

- This suits the totalitarian regime of the Party.

- To make any alternative thinking "thoughtcrime", or "crime think".

- Impossible by removing any words or possible constructs which describe the ideas of freedom, rebellion.

- Citing examples of dying metaphors, pretentious diction or rhetoric, and meaningless words.

To remove synonyms and antonyms

- Remove all shades of meaning from language, leaving simple dichotomies.

- Which reinforce the total dominance of the State.

- Words served as both nouns and verbs.

- A staccato rhythm of short syllables.

- Words with negative meanings were removed as redundant.

- Comparative and superlative meanings were also simplified.

- Adjectives were formed by adding the suffix "-ful".

- An obedient word with which everyone answered affirmatively to what was asked of them.

- All definitions and words that can be used to argue against Big Brother would be eradicated from the language.

- Newspeak on Esperanto.

To control thought

- Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron—they'll exist only in Newspeak versions, not merely changed into something different, but actually contradictory of what they used to be.

- There will be no thought, as we understand it now.

- Generically, Newspeak has come to mean any attempt to restrict disapproved language by agovernment or other powerful entity.

Vocabulary

- "A" group: simple concepts entirely made up words 

- "B" group: convey more complicated ideas political implications "goodthink" roughly means "orthodoxy". 

- "C" group: technical vocabulary. Party does not want its people to be intelligent in multiple fields.

This article has helped me to understand and define Newspeak in a clear and understandable way, giving me better knowledge of Orwell's message and purpose of the novel. I would like to further investigate Esperanto, as from what the article has told me Esperanto is the real world equivalent of Newspeak.