1. {
How does your media
product represent
particular social
groups?

2.  My media product is a 21st century Rap music magazine, for
this reason I clearly portray a particular representation of a
certain social group. The social group which my product was
aimed at was the youth of today, the primary market for it
was the deprived council block kids who look up to rap
stars. These people are willing to give it their all just to
become successful like their elders who have gone from rags
to riches.
 This social group is sometimes portrayed in a negative
perspective by the media; we constantly see articles slating
them off in the newspapers. The Sun loves portraying a bias
and negative image of us teens, they quite frequently publish
articles and front page story’s which are dedicated to how
bad the youth of today are!
Social group representations

3.  As you can see in the newspaper front cover stories below they
love a good old exaggerated story about how bad the youth of
today are. They always portrayed in an unjust way and I am
going to explain why I am using them as my target audience and
still keeping some of the common stereotypes in my
magazine, but at the same time portraying them in a positive
light!
Social group representations

4.  My rap magazine has images of rap stars looking fierce
and aggressive, alongside this it features some images of
a girl lying in a provocative manner wearing not much
clothing flaunting what she has to offer, as well as this I
also have an image of my rap star posing like he has a
gun. On top of all the pictures I also have a few quotes
which are referring to drugs and living life on the other
side of the law.
 That’s all the supposed negative aspects out of the way in
my magazine. A typical stereotype would be that my
magazine readers and the people featured inside it are
drug dealing sluts! However I am going to portray to you
the other side of the story, which is the real side to the
story!
 My magazine represents the primary social group of the
“troublesome teen/ghetto kids” in a positive light, it
fulfils all the necessary ideologies in its content, the
images are no different to those in XXL and Vibe but mine
have this explanation and justification as to why they
aren't as bad as people make them out to be.
Social group representations

5.  My first image of an aggressive and fierce looking rap star isn't
because he goes round beating up people and robbing up granny's
like The Sun and The Daily Mail like to make us believe. The reason
why my star is posing in this way is due to his upbringing, being born
and brought up in an area as rough as Peckham isn't easy. When
people want to take everything you have off you and exploit you, you
have to put on a fierce and aggressive look to protect yourself. TJ
Cruz is using this look to show everybody that he grew up in the
hood where life wasn’t pleasant but he has managed to make a name
for himself, he has turned himself into an international star thanks to
him not giving up on his dream and fighting for it. Once the people
understand why he looks the way he does they will empathise and
sympathise with him. The gun and gang culture isn't because they
like the thrill of going into turf wars, there gangs are like our
families, they don’t have lovely “nuclear family” like all the
posh, privileged people reading the newspapers do, they are brought
up with one or even none at all! For this reason they have had to join
gangs to find support for themselves, if they point a gun to
somebody's head or threaten somebody its only to protect one of
there gang members, if somebody killed or threatened one of your
members of family wouldn’t you do the same? I know that most of
you would and even in the bible it says “an eye for an eye, a tooth for
a tooth”, they are only doing what is right and just morally in there
society, its just the media decides to escalate everything and make
them seem like serial killers! I am not saying that murder is right or
that any man should take the law into there own hands, I am just
trying to portray to you what is going through the minds of these rap
artists and how there line of thought goes!
Social group representations

6.  The next image of Laura lying in a provocative manner is
stereotyped as a “immature girl dressing provocatively for
attention” in newspapers like The Sun and The Daily
Mail, when in fact it is an image of a girl who is making the
most of her options in life, if she isn't the best academically
at least she can make a living for herself by modelling, she
isn't doing any harm to anybody by taking these photos.
 In fact she is saving the tax payers money by not sitting
around as an unemployed benefit thief, she has gone out of
her way to make herself look like this, nobody notices the
amount of time and effort she has to go through to make
herself have a figure like that. She puts in the hours at the
gym and makes sure she eats healthy, the least we can do is
appreciate what she has to offer, let her go by the motto “If
you’ve got it, flaunt it” and allow her to make a living
through whatever method she seems necessary!
 Members of other social groups will understand that what
she is doing is at last resort and will appreciate the work she
is doing and what she has to offer. I think we need to all
become a bit more understanding, this will help us
understand the true representations of these social
groups, it will also show us that there is more to the way
they are behaving than what first catches our eyes!
Social group representations

7.  On top of all these images I have a few quotes
throughout my magazine which refer to drugs and
disobeying the law. I would just like to take a moment
to inform you that I am not trying to publicise and
agree with them taking drugs, I am just trying to
portray a correct and accurate image of what they are
doing. As well as showing you what they are doing I
want to tell you the genuine reason why they are doing
it as well, not the myth that they do it to act “cool” and
“hard”. In my magazine both “TJ Cruz” and the artist
“SAHI” mention about smoking weed in a round about
way. They are both fictional characters but they don’t
say that they supposedly smoke it to act cool, or to fit
the gangster image, they smoke it because it keeps
them calm and stress free, they aren’t brought up in the
nicest of areas and when you have a lot of family issues
and things going on in your head it is impossible to
find time to sit down and write lyrics. On the other
hand by having a bit of Marijuana it helps them calm
down and manage to think straight so they are able to
write their lyrics for there songs! They are only doing it
so they can help aid their career, they don’t deal it
either, TJ Cruz mentions how he chose rap over drug
dealing at a young age, this shows the dedication he
had unlike a lot of young boys who decide to go for the
money rather than what's right!
Social group representations

8.  So after reading through the reasons I have given now I would
hope that you can agree with me with the fact that my magazine
is portraying my social group in a positive light. I feel that I
have given a clear justification as to why I have done certain
things to my magazine and justified the reason for the members
in my social groups behaviour.
 Due to my product being on the music genre of rap I had no
other choice but to portray these representations. In my photos
you can see that I have mimicked the styles used by professional
magazines in order to have similar image quality and effect. You
can see in my front cover image that I have used a mid shot style
picture so I can portray my artists facial expressions but neck
region as well where his chain is balanced! I have done this
because the chain is a significant piece of iconography which is
related to rap stars and the hood image!
 The chain and hood image does play a big factor in the built up
overall social group representation which is related towards
these boys and girls. Lots of iconography is related towards
them which are both good and bad.
Social group representations

9.  Through my article I have subverted the stereotype that all rap stars and hood rap
lovers that are part of my social group are uncaring, ruthless yobs who don’t have
feelings. You can see in my article that I have mentioned about members of this
social group caring about their loved ones who have died and that they only kill
or fight due to certain circumstances in there life that they cant change, if that had
any other option they would take it, but they don’t so there stuck in this vicious
cycle. At first this stereotype which I have subverted was an implicit
ideology, after reading this the explicit ideology is that the members of this social
group do care and have feelings just like other human beings, they just can t help
it, this is the way that they’ve been brought up so they are forced to act in this
manner!
 The reason why I have chosen this representation is because I feel it is unfair for
this social group to constantly be portrayed in a negative light, it is a bias view
point which doesn’t portray the true, full story!
Social group representations