MAC201 lecture notes on Stuart Hall's encodiing-decoding model UPDATED APRIL 2013

1. Encoding-Decoding: the TV
audience
Stuart Hall & David Morley
MAC201
robert.jewitt@sunderland.ac.uk
1

2. Outline
 Mass Communications Research and Cultural Studies
◦ i. the story so far
◦ ii. ideology and institutions
 Stuart Hall’s Encoding and Decoding model
◦ i. history and application
◦ ii. the model itself
 David Morley’s Nationwide Audience
◦ i. David Morley and Nationwide
◦ ii. the Nationwide Audience study
◦ iii. results
◦ iv. Nationwide conclusions
 Conclusion
◦ i. problems
◦ ii. benefits
2

3. Mass Communications Research and
Cultural Studies:
 i. the story so far…
1. audiences as mass
2. media ‘effects’
3. ‘positivist’
assumptions of direct
link between media &
audiences
3

4. The impact of broadcasting
Pivotal in changing the ‘collective dimension of
public audiences, dispersing them to their
home’ (Butsch, 2000: 173)
◦ Brought concerns over foreign propaganda
◦ Huge cost offset by commercialisation
◦ 1st audience research: ratings analysis (quantitative)
◦ Audience as commodity
4

5. The impact of broadcasting
Post WW1, highly influential political scientists
(Lippmann, Lasswell) with military links advised
broadcasters in how best to develop ‘public
opinion’ via their research
◦ Origins in wartime paranoia and national security
◦ Sought social administration rather than questions
◦ Shift towards ‘content and response’ analysis (1940-
60s) especially around propaganda
5

6. Personal influence & communication
flows
1955/1964: Katz and Lazarsfeld shifted away
from simple causal role of media messages.
They documented accounts whereby people
turned to others for advice (a ‘two step flow’)
◦ Indirect transference of media messages
◦ Opinion leaders in particular spheres (public affairs,
movies, fashion, etc) access information and convey it
their networks of associates
◦ Assumed a homogenous audience
◦ Difficult to explain media-audience relationship
6

7. The impact of popular psychology
Turn towards activity of audiences (Blumler and
Katz, 1974) via ‘uses and gratifications’ research
which investigated the socio-psychological
motivations for information-seeking activity via
4 basic audience ‘needs’
1. Diversion: media use as escapism
2. Personal relationships: media as companion
3. Personal identity: compare audience life with media
4. Surveillance: media as window on the world
7

8. Enter Cultural Studies
“shiftfrom the analysis of what texts do
to the audience to what texts mean to
them” (Ruddock, 2001: 116).
Note: this is quite different to the traditions
of Media Effects (too passive) and Uses &
Gratifications (too active)
8

9. ii. ideology and institutions
New approaches needed (1970s-?):
◦ US – behaviourism (media & direct effects)
◦ Europe – neo-Marxism (ideology & culture)
Influence of:
◦ Karl Marx
◦ Louis Althusser
◦ Antonio Gramsci
◦ (For overview see J. Storey, 2006 – chapter 4)
9

10. The influence of Marxism(s)
The mass media…
◦ Define
◦ Disseminate
◦ Popularise
◦ Protect
…value system of the social elite (Stuart Hall)
“the ruling class in a society legitimizes its power
by creating the ideas that people use to make
sense of reality”
(Ruddock, 2001: 120)
10

11. The influence of Gramsci
The role of ideology as the place where
competing versions of social reality meet to
win over popular consciousness in a
continuous struggle to define the world in a
particular way
nb this is what Gramsci called hegemony
11

12. Mass media as a site for struggle over
meaning
Prince Harry in
Afghanistan:
◦ A hero?
◦ Normal soldier?
◦ One of ‘our’ boys?
◦ PR stunt?
12

13. Mass media as a site for struggle over
meaning
Prince Harry in
Afghanistan:
◦ A hero?
◦ Normal soldier?
◦ One of ‘our’ boys?
◦ PR stunt?
13

14. Mass media as a site for struggle over
meaning
Texts contain specific ways of seeing the
world – they are semiotic constructs
Texts are ideological – they serve to
define and shape our perception of the
social world
14

15. Need to note:
Concentration of media ownership &
competition
Capitalist
monopolies own media
corporations & promote self interests
Routine dependence on government,
police, juridiciary sources for
information & interpretation (esp. re.
law & order).
◦ The PR industry?
15

16. Need to note:
 Ideology as naturalising
◦ Controls how people make sense of
information.
◦ Becomes ‘common sense’ to see the world a
certain way
Further reading:
See also Louis Althusser on ‘Ideological State Apparatus’ and
‘Repressive State Apparatus’
16

17. Stuart Hall’s Encoding & Decoding model
i.history & application
Hall: 1973
University of Birmingham’s
CCCS
Blended:
◦ social science,
◦ semiotics,
◦ ideology,
◦ audience research
17

18. Marxism + Semiotics
What a text says = cultural convention
18

19. Marxism + Semiotics
“The key to political power lies in the
ability … to make contestable
signifier/signified relations seem like
common sense” (Ruddock, 2001: 123)
◦ E.g. Thatcher and the ‘welfare state’
19

20. ii. The model itself
From TV producers to TV audiences
20

21. Encoding to decoding
Producers operate Events/issueshave to
within standard be ‘made to mean’
professional
conventions &
routines
Messages are then
Create/encode
disseminated
‘meaningful’ messages
21

22. News stories are semiotically encoded &
shaped
◦ (i.e. they are constructs of reality, not reality)
“Audience members are engaged in
semiotic labour too. They bring their
interpretive frameworks to bear on the
message.”
(Moores, 1993: 17)
22

23. Encoding & decoding may not be
symmetrical
23

24. A caveat…
‘There exists a pattern of “preferred
readings”’ or ‘common sense’ (Hall, 1973)
Interpretations depend on readers
sharing a ‘general framework of cultural
references’ (ie their political, religious,
sexual beliefs, etc)
(Eco, 1972: 115)
24

25. 3 reading positions viewer decodes
(after Parkin, 1972) message in contrary
manner
Oppositional
Negotiated
viewer acknowledges
legitimacy of
Dominant message but
operates with some
exception to the
meaning.
viewer interprets
preferred meaning
‘full and straight’
25

26. David Morley’s Nationwide Audience
i. David Morley - Nationwide
TestingHall’s hypothesis
Analysed ideological themes, mode of address, style
Empirical study – qualitative interviews
Magazine style TV show – human interest
26

27. Morley & Brunsdon (1978: 92)
“Nationwide constructs a picture of ‘the
British people’ in their diversity. We are
constituted together as members of the
regional communities which make up the
nation and as members of families … our
shared concern with domestic life is
grounded in Nationwide’s common sense
discourse.”
27

28. ii. the ‘Nationwide Audience’ study
(1980)
Videos shown to 29 groups from
educational settings
Managers, students, apprentices, trade
unionists, shop steward, etc
Class room interviews
2 different episodes – latest on Budget
28

29. iii. results
Bank Managers response to style:
“it wasn’t sufficient … it’s entertainment
… if I’d wanted to find out about the
budget I’d probably rely on the next day’s
newspaper … something like The
Telegraph”
29

30. Shop Stewards (Union reps) response:
“ittakes the issues of the day and it is
quite entertaining”
rejectedshow’s ideological sympathy to
middle management
30

31. Dominant readings: (accepted text’s
ideologically encoded message)
◦ Management groups; apprentices; schoolboys
Negotiated readings:
◦ Teacher training students; university arts
students; some trade union officials
Oppositional readings:
◦ Some trade union stewards; black college
students
31

32. Resistant?
Schoolboys
Black FE
Bank
students Oppositional
managers
Apprentices
Shop
stewards Negotiated Print
Management
Trade Trainees
union
Dominant
officials
Trainee
Teachers HE Arts
/Photograph
y Students
32

33. Morley, 1980: 142-3
Black FE students:
“In a sense they fail to engage with the
discourse of the programme enough to
deconstruct or redefine it”
They didn’t disagree with the show’s
ideological message so much as failed to
engage with it
33

34. iv. Nationwide conclusions
Reading position can’t be reduced to socio-
economic location only (it might limit reading
positions available)
Stilldifferent reading positions available (age,
gender, experiences, taste, etc)
No longer possible to divorce texts from their
productive contexts and moments of
consumption
34

35. Morley, 1981, ‘Interpreting Television: A
Case Study’: 56
“We cannot analyses communications
separately from … the structure and divisions
of the social formation … We must attempt to
avoid a crude sociological reductionism … (e.g.
all working class people, as a direct result of
their class position, will decode messages in
manner X) … we need to investigate ways in
which the structural factors are articulated
through discursive processes.”
35

36. Problems:
 Hall - broadcaster’s  Morley – is his study
replicate dominant representative?
social interests  Enforced viewing of
 ‘Preferred reading’? text
 Only 3 reading  Role of environment?
positions?  Role of taste & cultural
 4th position: Resistant competences in
reading or ‘aberrant programme selection
decoding’ (O’Sullivan choices?
et al, 2001: 138)
36

37. Benefits
Hall& Morley stress that texts & audiences
cannot be viewed in isolation from each other
◦ No simple textual ‘effects’
Complex social relations play important role
(gender, class, experience, age, etc)
Move away from conception of audience as
‘passive’ receivers of media texts
37

38. Moores, 1993: 22
“Even those viewers who made sense of
the Nationwide message within the
dominant code performed active, if partly
unconscious, semiotic labour. Their
general acceptance of the programme’s
preferred reading was the outcome of an
interdiscursive encounter – rather than a
result of them being ‘blank sheets’ for the
text to write on.”
38

39. 5: Conclusion
No longer simple to make easy claims
about what the media do to people
Inorder to understand what sense
audiences make of texts, we need to
consider wider contexts of consumption
Textsdo not exist in isolation and do not
mean one thing to all
39

40. Useful sources:
 R. Butsch (2000), The Making of American Audiences: From Stage to Television, 1750-1990,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
 Katz and Lazarsfeld (1955/1964), Personal Influence: The Part Played by People in the Flow of Mass
Communication, New York: The Free Press
 Stuart Hall (1974) ‘The television discourse – encoding and decoding’ in Paul Marris & Sue
Thornham (eds.) (2000), Media Studies: A Reader – 2nd Edition, New York: New York
University Press, pp. 51-62 or in Ann Gray & Jim McGuigan (eds.) (1997), Studying Culture: An
Introductory Reader – 2nd Edition, London: Arnold, pp. 28-34
 Stuart Hall (1980) ‘Encoding/decoding’ in Stuart Hall et al. (eds.), Culture, Media, Language,
London: Hutchinson, pp.128-138.
 Shaun Moores (1993), Interpreting Audiences: The Ethnography of Media Consumption, London:
Sage.
 David Morley (1980), The Nationwide Audience, London: British Film Institute.
 Frank Parkin (1972), Class Inequality and Political Order, London: Paladin
 Andy Ruddock (2001), Understanding Audiences: Theory and Method, London: Sage.
 John Storey (2006), Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: An Introduction 4th Edition, Pearson:
Harlow – chapter 4
40