Shadow Stabbing

I love to think about things from a critical lens. I often play devil’s advocate simply to bring more perspectives to a discussion or debate, even if I do not buy into the position I offer. Often in holding discourse in this way, I am able to sort out my personal feelings about any given topic. I find it incredibly fascinating in class discussions of any kind to hear the interpretation and analysis of my peers. Nearly always, a perspective is offered that I hadn’t previously considered and my own analysis is enriched or even changed by critically viewing the topic in another way. That is why I found chapter 4 so important—and challenging.

In all my school experiences, I have spent a lot of time analyzing text and media, but without considering the specific type of critical approach I was using—and also without ever being asked to use a specific critical approach. When I started reading chapter 4, I had a hard time getting familiar with what Beach was trying to say and how the different approaches would be used. My first reaction was dismissive, as if knowing all the different approaches was trivial. Analysis is analysis, right? Wrong. Media, literature, and texts of all kinds are multi-faceted and many layered, making them ripe for many different approaches to critical analysis. When students learn how to examine text or media from different angles and approaches, it has the potential to lead to a much richer appreciation and understanding of the media.

For this week’s assignment, I chose Poststructuralist and Critical Discourse to be my areas of expertise. Though the section on Poststructuralism was brief, I found it very important. In short, the idea of Poststructuralist analysis draws on the idea that binaries are often portrayed in text and media. To analyze media in a Poststructuralist way is to identify, define, and analyze the language categories that make the dichotomies present. In discussing this approach, Beach again discussed the Coors Light beer commercials, pointing to the male/female binary, which plays into stereotypes of gender behavior and interests. The virile, beer drinking males are juxtaposed with the voluptuous females, existing in the commercials for the pleasure and satisfaction of the males.

It is important for students to be aware of the either/or presentations frequently portrayed in text and media—good/evil, male/female, love/hate, peace/war, right/wrong, normal/abnormal, etc. By looking for these kinds of structures in text and media, students will be prepared to pick them apart and ask critical questions: How does the dichotomy present itself? What are some general associations or stereotypes associated with this binary in our culture? How are these associations used to play up the binary in this media? What perspectives are left out or ignored when employing such a binary? Is one part of the binary portrayed as better than the other?

The second approach I studied in-depth was Critical Discourse. Unlike the Poststructuralist approach, which focuses mostly on language and categories—and the limitations of binary categorizations—critical discourse delves more deeply into perspective-taking and how modes of thinking are formed. Beach neatly points out that discourses define perspectives based on the world in which one lives. An attorney’s point-of-view is shaped by their experiences and lenses, which could be very different from the ways of knowing held by a teacher, physician, or priest. In using critical discourse to analyze text, students must be able to determine the dominant culture and ways of knowing that influence or permeate the text—and their reading of it.

Last semester in one of my courses, we discussed at length the roles of white privilege and white culture in our schools. Initially, it was difficult because we were examining very closely systems, thought patterns, and behaviors that are so ingrained many in the class were not aware of them. It is very difficult to define your own culture. It is easier to define what is perceived to be the culture of another, because it is defined in terms of how it differs from your own culture. In the course, it was initially difficult to examine the institutional practices of American education because they are so ingrained that it is hard to imagine things being different—or wrong. It takes careful consideration of what is believed and practiced in order to identify oppressive practices.

Similarly, using critical discourse analysis seeks to define the discourse being used so that students may consider and analyze how it impacts the meaning or the reading of the text/media. Beach talks specifically about discourses of class and race, but there are others as well, such as religious and Western. Using the book’s website, I followed the link for 4.6.4 and found this: “ [Critical discourse analysis] is concerned with studying and analyzing written texts and spoken words to reveal the discursive sources of power, dominance, inequality, and bias and how these sources are initiated, maintained, reproduced, and transformed within specific social, economic, political, and historical contexts (Van Dijk, 1988).� I find this especially helpful in getting to the core of critical discourse and how it can be used to analyze media and texts.

In the classroom, this approach to analyzing media could be very time-consuming, but I can also see that it could produce wonderful work, thoughtfulness, and growth in the students. The issues of class and race are very difficult to discuss because they often call to mind painful experiences or unpleasant thoughts about the establishment. In a classroom of high school students, I fear it could lead to tensions between students or a lot of misunderstandings if it is not handled carefully and thoughtfully by the teacher. That is, the process of analyzing through critical discourse often requires the reader/media consumer to first recognize their own discourse in order to identify their own ways of knowing that could be impacting their interpretation, followed by a viewing of the media from the perspective of the intended audience or from that of the creator of the media or text. The process of questioning and identifying discourse inherently raises a lot of questions, often about stereotypes or misunderstandings, which could cause problems in the classroom—especially in a classroom of mixed race, gender, class, and/or religion, wherein students may have questions about the discourses of others that could raise tensions.

I appreciate Beach’s examples of studying discourse, both for class and race, because they provide examples of existing media with clear weaknesses that are easily examined. In the first example, students analyze ads to determine the intended audience. The second example of critical discourse analysis, surrounding race, is taught through a viewing of the film Dangerous Minds. Students can examine the values placed on the teacher and the students and how those values ultimately become equated with race. Students relate to humor and another possible way to help students with the idea of critical discourse analysis would be to use satire or parody clips on race, class, religion, etc. MadTV has done a number of segments to this end, including scathing satires of films such as Dangerous Minds and Freedom Writers’ Diary, and satirical commentary on race through mock episodes of “Survivor� wherein teams are divided by race. By using satire or parody, that which is being criticized is pointed out very clearly, so students may be able to more readily pick out bias and inequality than in a serious work. Starting with a satirical piece on race or class may be a good way to break into critical discourse analysis, followed by examination of non-humorous works.

I feel that the best way for students to appreciate the different kinds of critical approaches is to use them all! I think I would teach the approaches one at a time, starting with a description or overview of an approach, then offering a short demonstration or practice activity for each. Students may feel overwhelmed learning all eight approaches at once, so I may select a few approaches at a time that would best lend themselves to analysis of a class reading or media. For example, narrative analysis would probably not work well on the Coors Light commercials to which Beach so often refers, but Poststructuralist and Semiotic approaches likely would. The course text or media being studied would dictate the method of analysis I would teach students to employ.

(In case you missed it, there are 2 links in this post to MadTV videos on YouTube. Go back up and click on Dangerous Minds and Survivor.)

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Please follow the link to see my analysis of a 60-second TV commercial.

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I chose the beginning scene from an episode of NBC’s The Office. The scene shows Jim, the office prankster, and his fault-finding, self-important, socially awkward co-worker Dwight, sitting at their desks, which abut one another. Throughout the series, Jim perpetually goads Dwight, who is incapable of resisting Jim’s provocations. In this particular scene, Jim claims he is having computer problems and restarts his computer, which makes a certain chiming noise, then he innocuously offers Dwight an Altoid mint. Then the scene cuts to an interview with Jim in the conference room, supposedly being conducted by a documentary film crew who films the day-to-day happenings of the office. In this interview, Jim admits he is playing a joke on Dwight based on a science experiment he learned about in high school, in which dogs are conditioned to respond to the sound of a bell (i.e. Pavlov’s dogs). He confesses he has been feigning computer problems for a couple of weeks, each time setting off the computer sound, then offering a mint. The scene cuts back to Jim and Dwight at their desks and shows several occasions on different days when Jim sets off the restart chime and offers a mint. Finally, Jim once again sets off the computer, which prompts Dwight to involuntarily thrust out his hand for a mint. When Jim asks Dwight what he is doing, he looks confused, then starts smacking his lips and saying that he has a bad taste in his mouth. The last part of the scene is a close up shot of Jim with a smiling, satisfied look.

The camera work, sound, and lighting in The Office are particularly interesting because the entire series is a mockumentary. It is a scripted series posited as documentary, wherein the characters are aware of the cameras—they are built into the series and acknowledged by the characters. This is in contrast to other scripted shows where the cameras function to capture the action but the characters are not addressing the cameras directly.

In the scene I chose, the lighting, sound, and camera work are all very subdued and the pace of the scene is slow, reflecting the tedium of office work. All but one of the camera shots are medium close ups, close ups, and big close ups, and all but one of the shots uses a normal angle (not high or low). While camera angle is frequently used to depict status or insignificance, I do not think a normal angle is used to convey status, even though it is true that Jim and Dwight are peers—one does not have a higher position than the other. My feeling is that the normal angle shots are used to give a neutral effect, as though the action of the office is benignly being observed through the eyes of the viewer, rather than through the lens of the camera. There is one shot that uses a slightly high camera angle and a medium shot, which conveys to the viewer that the “documentary filmmaker� is watching one exchange between Jim and Dwight inconspicuously from afar. Very important in this scene are the big close-ups of both Jim and Dwight because of the emotion conveyed. When Dwight thrusts out his hand involuntarily, the camera angle and shot are such that his face and hand are both in the screen. When Jim asks Dwight what he is doing, the camera zooms in on Dwight’s face, revealing a quizzical, confused, bewildered expression, then a gnashing of his tongue and a comment that Dwight has a bad taste in his mouth. The final shot, a big close-up of Jim, reveals a very pleased, satisfied, almost gleeful prankster, though he also appears a little surprised that his experiment worked.

The use of lighting gives a very bland impression. Because of the mockumentary nature of the show, the lighting in the scene is supposed to appear as plain old overhead fluorescent lights. There are no highlights, lowlights, or backlights. Again, the absence of dramatic lighting serves to point out the everyday ordinary-ness of the office. The sound is slightly different, in that each little sound between Dwight and Jim is very clear and picked up on camera. There are few, if any background noises, which would be expected in a normal office. Instead, the lack of clacking keys and ringing phones serves to focus the audience on the interactions between Dwight and Jim—the chime of the computer restarting, the crinkle of the paper in the Altoid tin, Dwight fanning some papers in annoyance when interrupted by Jim’s offer of another Altoid. The final sound in the scene is that of Dwight gnashing his tongue in his mouth because of a perceived bad taste.

The entire scene perpetuates the on-going bickering and banter between Jim and Dwight. The neutral camera angle may hint that for as much as Jim picks on Dwight, and for as unbearable as Dwight can be, they are still peers and nobody is getting ahead of anyone else. There is no race or contest between Jim and Dwight to be won, but rather an ongoing series of petty skirmishes that cannot be won by any amount of wit on Jim’s part or pompousness on Dwight’s part.

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Undeniably, we are living in the media and digital age. Our young people are more connected than ever before. They are also more barraged by media and media messages than ever before. If a school exists to educate students and prepare them for the future, then we must include studies of media literacy to serve our students’ needs for the world they live in.

The school district’s attitude toward media seems cold, indifferent, as though not warranting time or attention. Currently in our district, students have limited ability to access technological media in school. Computers are few, as are technology classes. Media studies are non-existent, either as a stand-alone courses or as an integrated set of student competencies. This is not fair to our students. The Kaiser Family Foundation studied the habits of young people ages 8-18 in 1999 and 2004. The latter study found that America’s youth were spending 6 ½ hours per day using media. In the words of Kaiser Vice President Vicky Rideout, “Anything that takes up this much space in young people’s lives certainly deserves our full attention.�

Unfortunately, a strong back-to-the-basics movement has been taking over our schools and curriculum in response to a never-ending series of tests mandated by local, state, and federal entities. Rather than using an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to teach reading and writing, many curricular components have been jettisoned in favor of a strict and stringent reading and writing approach. This is shortsighted.

Admittedly, schools are under pressure to perform well on tests. But bowing to the tests and dumping courses of study is ridiculous. Standardized tests have long been criticized for oversimplifying the learning that takes place in our classrooms and reducing the measure of student knowledge to some number, some test score, on reading and writing tests. This is a fundamental flaw in the way the tests are set up—they only measure concrete skills and achievement in a couple areas. The tests do nothing to measure other skills that are vitally important—critical thinking, problem solving, synthesizing data, evaluating information, etc.—skills that our young people need forever.

Our curriculum should not be created based on the kinds of test students are required to take. The curriculum should be based on the skills and knowledge students need to be successful in the world, based on teaching students how to be critical thinkers, and based on teaching students how to think for themselves.

The purpose of media studies and literacy in our classrooms is myriad:
1. Students learn to use the media available to them
2. Students learn to think critically about the media
3. Students learn how media can shape culture and society
4. Students learn to recognize bias in the media
5. Students learn to communicate in a variety of ways with a variety of media
6. Students increase their classroom engagement by using a variety of media
7. Students learn to recognize forces influencing media

It is my goal as a teacher to incorporate media and media literacy into all my classes. The world is moving quickly and schools need to keep up so that our students don’t fall behind in the global marketplace. Students must become familiar with and learn to use the media tools available to them. Using media in my classroom means teaching students to think critically about media, teaching students to use media to express themselves, and using media as part of required coursework. For example, students may be required to read an online journal article rather than a chapter from a textbook or respond to a writing prompt on a blog rather than writing on looseleaf paper.

In the back-to-the-basics era of education, the idea of media studies scares people into thinking that reading and writing are not important. That is just the opposite. Media literacy and media studies are best employed as an integrated part of all classrooms, just as reading and writing are not reserved for English classrooms. In college, I wrote excruciatingly detailed lab notes for biology and read extensively on the Romans for Western Civilization class. The integration of reading and writing applies to all content areas, just as media studies and media literacy do. An online video tutorial can be used for a chemistry lab, a You Tube video can show a scene from Shakespeare, or actual footage from political debates can be used in civics class.

Media is not separate from classroom activity. It needs to be an integrated part of classrooms as another avenue for learning and gathering information. For those of us more comfortable with the analog age of getting information and communicating—via newspaper, radio, TV, telephone, snail mail—we cannot simply dismiss conventions of the digital age as fads—cell phones, blogs, wikis, webcasts, podcasts, You Tube, social networking sites—because they are our students’ reality. We must draw on these media as tools to make student learning more useful, engaging, and relevant.

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I wanted to try my hand at uploading files to the blogoshpere!

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