Stuart Hall and Representation

This was actually the second time I've seen this video... we watched it in Dr. Schwarz' Media Literacy class (which I took two years ago - Spring 2004). I was anxious to go back and look at my notes from that viewing and compare them with tonight's notes (I was one of those who was writing frantically). Anyway, my notes from two years ago were icky - very basic and sketchy. That was pretty much a disappointment. I was really hoping for some insightful mix of thoughts!

On the way home tonight, I was thinking about what Jackie said about the Class Dissmissed video and Hall's thoughts from tonight, and Dana's comments about Communication Theory. I think that obviously media studies will involve basic tenets of communication theory, so the overlap there makes perfect sense to me. What is different though, is the notion of the feedback loop - when media is created, there is sometimes little feedback from viewers to producers (advertising and ratings aside). So, how do we know what message is actually being received? Is it the message that the producer intends? Or is the audience subverting the intended message, and creating meaning contrary to that "pre-determined"? This plays back into Jackie's statement about Class Dissmissed. Were the personalities we received - the characters - the stories - the stereotypes - what the producers intended? Or were these just our creations and interpretations?

As in interesting aside, last week, Nightline aired an interview with the producer/creator and actors on the show Grey's Anatomy about race in Hollywood. I found it really interesting that the producer (Shonda Rhimes) talking about watching the Cosby show, and pleased that there were people "like her" on TV, when we had just watched other African-Americans bashing it on the Class Dissmissed video. It was just a disconnect there. Anyway, it was a good piece, even if it was too short, and could have been really expanded. I would have liked to have heard much more from her and the actors, too.