Where does the ‘textual analysis’ tradition come from?

Broadly a response to two concerns:

-‘effects’ tradition in communication studies

-post WW2/ mid 20th century turn against a particular idea of culture

Bobo doll experiment, idea of cause and effect

What is a ‘text’?

-Vehicles for the production of cultural meaning (sign systems)

-‘texts’ in media, communications and cultural studies include cultural products, images, policy documents, social practises, institutions

-‘sites where we can see the social production of ideas and values happening before our eyes

The Semiotic Tradition of Analysis (key starting terms)

-Sign, signifier, signified (referent)

-Denotation, connotation

-Codes

-‘Myth’/ Ideology

The Affordance of Sound and Moving Image