Representation Essay Question

"Representations in media texts are often simplistic and reinforce dominant ideologies so that audiences can make sense of them." Evaluate the ways that a media product you have studied has used or challenged simplistic representations. (12 Marks)

The media product that I have studied is Attack The Block (Joe Cornish, 2011), which is an independent sci-fi/action/horror film. The film begins by using simplistic representations that reinforce dominant ideologies; in the opening scene, a gang of young, mostly black boys mug a middle-class white woman at night in a south London street. 

The representation of both the gang and the woman make heavy use of stereotypes; the gang wears hoodies, baseball caps and bandanas, ride bikes and threaten the woman with a knife while speaking in slang and profanities. The woman is well dressed, well spoken and is weak and submissive to the gang.

These characteristics follow the stereotypes of young black boys in London as well as middle-class women, which reinforces the dominant ideology carried by much of the upper classes of the UK, which in this case is that black kids in London always go around mugging people and that they should be avoided / feared.

This is done for the same reason as most films, which is to help the audience to quickly identify and make sense of who the characters are. This concept of stereotypes was coined by Walter Lippmann in the 1950s in the advertising industry, not as a negative term but as a shorthand way to categorise groups of people to aid in targeted advertising.

However, the film progresses to challenge these representations by changing the way that these characters are represented, undermining it's own stereotypes that were established in the beginning of the film. Other aspects of the gang members' lives are revealed in order to show them in a new, more sympathetic light, for example a scene showing into their home lives and families where situations typical for even middle class people are shown, like parents giving curfews and asking for the dog to be walked. 

This is done to show that these characters are not just the stereotypical gang members that they were established to be at the start, challenging the dominant ideology previously described and making a social commentary on how such ideologies are wrong and invalid.