#a level media studies

[aaloosshitposting]

what do you mean no ones active on the a-levels media studies tag

pls my ppl find me 🙏🙏

[discoddity]

OK i’m definitely doing history and psychology for a-levels but what should my 3rd choice be

don’t vote yet please!!!

don’t vote yet!!! read below the poll first pls

pros and cons

media studies

pros

• i think the lessons would be very interesting

• we are exposed to media everyday! so i’d understand something i see all the time a bit better

• two of my english teachers that are also media studies teachers said i should do it

• i’d have the potential to make cool video essays and tumblr posts …

• coursework might be fun

cons

• i’ve never done it before so i don’t actually know if i’d enjoy it

• i also don’t know if i’d do well in it bc of that

• i often struggle to understand picture sources in history (media has a lot of analysing of pictures i think)

• i understand words better than pictures

• coursework might be stressful

• i want to do the other two aswell :(

english literature

pros

• i understand words better than pictures

• have been doing it at school for like five years now #experience #XP

• i get good grades at it in gcse, so i will probably be able to do well at a-level too

• i know i usually enjoy it

• i like reading

cons

• the fact that an english essay’s marks could change from examiner to examiner makes me nervous, what if i get all the angry examiners who want to watch the world burn.

• what if i don’t like the books we learn about?

• idk what i’d do for coursework (comparing books you’ve read i think)

• apparently it is very different at a-level and more work / stress .. EEK!

• i want to do the other two aswell :(

spanish

pros

• my teacher really wants me to do it

• have been doing it at school for like five years now #experience #XP

• i get good grades at it in gcse, so i will probably be able to do well at a-level too

• i think learning a language can be a v useful and good thing to do

cons

• i want to do the other two aswell :(

• i struggle with the speaking and listening parts sometimes

• don’t think i’d be able to understand a full book or film in spanish yet (but ig thats the point of learning it,,)

[bixels]

I'm not explaining why re-imagining characters as POC is not the same as white-washing, here of all places should fucking understand.

[finalgirlsamwinchester]

supernatural was truly just. a fifteen year long experimental study looking into an audience's ability to empathise with the Narrative Scapegoat. the results? most people are still filled with the medieval urge to throw rotten fruit at the resident Freak in the town square.

[secretsofthewilde]

There's something particularly frustrating about how academic fandom studies tend to talk about fandom spaces as being a place for inclusiveness and queer representation when there's still a very prominent misogyny problem throughout them. Even when these studies address issues of racism within fandom shipping dynamics, they still tend to perpetuate the idea that fandom is the rare place where queer ships tend to be more popular than straight ones, without really addressing the fact that this tends to only true when it comes to cis, white, m/m ships. If you want some kind of numerical evidence of this, you just need to look at the statistics on ao3 to see that f/f ships are the least popular kind of pairing on that site. And when you think of the stereotypical big name fandoms, most of them are well known for their m/m ships, with the f/f ships often being dismissed or treated as a joke.

I'm not of the opinion, nor trying to make an argument in support of the idea, that this is due to the stereotype of fangirls fetishising queer men. Instead, I think it's largely due to misogyny* - shocker, I know. I really do think that the stereotypical fangirl gravitates towards slash pairings due to both internalised misogyny and the general prominence of male oriented media over female oriented media (which will therefore have more male characters that are fleshed out with more engaging writing as opposed to their female supporting cast).

However, it's one thing for the abundance of male driven stories to generate more fan works exploring said characters, and another entirely for those same fans to then ignore when we do have media that gives us well written and enjoyable female characters. I think it's in part due to our internalised misogyny that fangirls have a tendency to gravitate towards their familiar male orientated shows and then fixate on the same familiar character types, rather than exploring and celebrating the breadth of female-centric media we have finally been getting produced in recent years. And this inability to allow ourselves to enjoy female characters the same way we do with male ones is what leads to an abundance of slash pairings being celebrated in fandom spaces, while femslash ones struggle to get recognition**. The fact that there's a common joke in fandom spaces about popular pairings developing between two characters who never interacted (or for only a brief scene) is all very well and good fun, but this is almost always referring to a m/m pairing.

As fans we should really reflect on why we might celebrate a male character for doing morally grey things, but then hate a female character for exhibiting those exact same traits. It's fine to genuinely not enjoy the writing of a female character (especially when sexist writing is often to blame), but we should consider how much more willing we seem to be to forgive poor writing when it comes to male characters than we are with female characters. If we can make a million headcanons and claim to love a poorly written male character, who is now viewed as something so far removed from the canon of the media he appears in its practically a different character entirely, why do so many of us seem unwilling to do the same for female characters?

We should be doing the same with our female characters - we should be putting more female characters into our favourite dynamics and tropes. I want to see more enemies to lovers headcanons with femslash pairings; I want nbc hannibal levels of art and meta posts about toxic femslash couples; I want johnlock levels of delusion posts about a femslash couple the story writers are claiming they didn't write the subtext for. I would just really love to log into tumblr and see a femslash pairings tag is trending more than once in a blue moon.

*note: obviously misogny is not the only contributing factor, and this initial argument I'm raising doesn't address the issues surrounding racial, gender-queer identities, and other inequalities within fandom. Please do not think I'm ignoring or downplaying them.

**Theres also an argument to be made here about fangirls projecting themselves onto male characters in order to explore queer relationships, without having to challenge their own internalised misogyny/homophobia, but I'll come back to that later (and this in general) and expand on it some other time I think.

[oxymoronicdumbass]

if i have to sit through one more conversation in which i have to listen to someone chirp about the benefits of AI, i am going to stab someone

[icewindandboringhorror]

It's always interesting to hear about people's weird/unexpected "alternate life paths". Like, something that you could have done with your life, a job you almost took, a school you almost went to, etc - that was still actually realistic enough that it could have happened, but NOW it seems to not suit your current personality.

Like for example, I currently hate advertising (how manipulative it is, brands trying to be 'relatable', social media amplifying it to an obnoxious extreme, etc.) so much that even seeing a little ad before a youtube video is grating to even witness, but there was a point in time where I was genuinely seriously considering going into marketing/making commercials as a career lol. Or like, I have a relative who was very inclined to be a pastor when they were younger, even though today they're a super strong atheist, etc. etc.

[feelingthedisaster]

that awkard moment in which my teacher says "your english is so good and you have a really wide vocabulary" and i have to pretend it isnt because of fanfiction

[bipolarmango]

Just because I feel like a ton of people have had to hear this lately. Being privileged ≠ having everything going perfect in your life and having zero problems. Moreover, just because someone is privileged in one way doesn't mean they may not be underprivileged in another way.

Normalize admitting being privileged when you are. I doesn’t automatically make someone a bad person to be privileged in some way. As far as I am concerned, it's more offensive trying to hide the advantages that have helped you in life while others may not have those advantages that admitting you have them. You don't have to be ashamed or constantly apologize, and privileges don't automatically mean you wouldn't be talented, work hard, be smart, or cancel out all your accomplishments, but for fuck's sake, just admit having those privileges.

[slurping-up-grass]

The Tumblr post that wrote itself:

They used the fire text

Perfection-

The vibes are immaculate

Lift Off!

[thawthebeez]

oikage......... if you carry the one and factor out a four... are a manifestation of the thin line between admiration and jealousy .... i've solved it....🚬

[space-opera-slays]

Currently so glad i have the English school system purely for alevel physics because things are so cool

[aggressiveguitarnoises]

i have media studies exam (although mock so its fine) that i didnt study for so im gonna force myself to practice by applying barthes narrative theory to season 1 hannibal (vaguely tbh cuz its the whole seasom but ok)

hermeneutic codes(how do u even pronounce this omfg) :

enigma codes, they are def crucial to this show as each episode raises more and more unanswered questions as the audience continues watching the show, questions like who is commiting the crimes, is will ok, does he know how fucked up his clocks are, is crawford fucking stupid, is abigail ok, what the hell is hannibal doing, why are they using cat guts for strings, are the dogs gonna live oh my god please can the dogs be okay for once

usually done by leaving cliffhangers for each episode

it drives the audience forward and interests them so they continue watching the show to find out the answers to their questions

its also a convention to use hermeneutic codes for horror crime shows like hannibal

Proairetic codes:

action codes, the actions done to drive the narrative forward, previous events drive other events into action. ngl this one is fucking stupid to apply i dont get if i ever apply it correctly

in hannibal, proairetic codes tie a lot with hermeneutic codes as the actions of the characters raise questions for the audience questioning their choices and makes the audience wonder what will happen next. the action creates tension and makes the audience wonder how the created problem(if there is one) will be resolved. for example when hannibal lecter called abigails father to inform him that "they know" and that fbi is on the way. this drives the narrative forward as then the audience wonders how the characters will react and wonder how the actions will affect the story. this action ended up with abigail becoming an orphan and their suspect dead, creating a few side plots and introducing new characters. this constant tension created by each action drives the narrative forward and engages the audience to continue watching the show

semantic codes:

connotations, things associated with something, the deeper level meaning of a symbol. this one is hard yet so easy cuz theres literally SO many of them

they basically give insight into the plot and characters, building personalities and maybe even starting the deep questions the audience will have

for example, for hannibal, hes quite sophisticated, the semantic codes for that would be how he wears suits all the time, his overall style and his acquired taste. those things connote sophistication, wealth and even control and power (especially the suit and his high respected position as a psychiatrist)

but another thing that can be derived from things like how hes always careful, always has a cloth that doesn't leave any fabric fibres, how he doesn't use anything digital, only physical things like journals to leave no traces, the fact that hes literally eating his evidence lmao, his knowledge and experience of human anatomy and mind connote that hes a careful, experienced, ambitious man and prob(definitely) is a serial killer

symbolic codes:

it has such an easy concept that its literally confusing to understand. its basically symbols, binaries, a thematic/structural device, but it's basically about themes and contrary signs specifically, which is ig why its kind of difficult to understand since its specifically binary symbols

some symbolic codes in hannibal would be life vs death, clearly a reoccurring theme with all of the crimes happening, good vs bad, murderers and their victims, health? both physical and mental? stability? work vs personal life? idk its so hard to pin point it even tho its so easy and common idk

a better example woukd be the bad vs good binary used in star wars with ghe colours of light sabers

Cultural codes:

literally cultural and social conventions, knowledge that comes from the outside world of the text, specific connotations used

example, FBI for crimes and america, religion and faith, the whole fbi units especially medical, even Christmas is a cultural code as its a celebrated event of certain social and cultural and religious conventions

bruv i cant think of any more examples even tho i know theres so many

hope yall enjoyed my silly analysis of hannibal as my media studies application practice if u read it all xx

[idunnowhatimdoingatall]

since batman is lowk a hater so i'll have to post

hi, junoerm here. i was busy with math and economics and ssome other stupid irl stuff

regardless of things, we're done with pretty much every single planning process - i'm currently working on the strip sheet rn (albeit a bit distracted im sleepy aaughh)

just so you know batman is reading tumblr fics rn

[blackflameru]

How the heck do I still have six months to go until the final exam?? Already dreading and looking forward to it