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Ideology

T his chapter brings tagether twa natians that we have already intraduced but left rather underdevelaped: .E.0wer and the

social CQPsR;�];l.Qf reality. Every saciety attempts ta guarantee its' own cantinuing existence. A saciety maintajnsitself by:reproducin� its institutians and)t� structure.af,�acj.9.Lre.ktigp�R? Ta da sa, it has ta continuausly reproduce the things necessary far its existence, from the resaurces ta produce faod and shelter far its peaple, ta the labar neces sary ta transform these resources inta commadities, ta the individuals willing and able ta participate in the institutians and .occupy their assigned roles in the sacial relatianships. But we have been suggesting throughaut this baak that the institutians and relatianships that consti tute a saciety always embady structures .of pawer and inequality. If a society is ta cantinue existing, it must, therefare, ensure that its particu lar relatians .of pawer-its particular hierarchies .of ecanamic, palitical, and cultural power-cantinue ta .operate with same appearance .of legit imacy in the lives .of the general papulatian. One way .of daing that is ta use farce ta cantrol peaple's lives and to actively suppress appasitian. �11hling and...n:tQI:�.QflDt way io.volyesg¥tting eeaple ta - -y_ �cept an ideolo&1�12articula� w�.Y QLth�kll,}g a�d seeing"the wa�ld ./f' lhat makes the eXlstmg.2!g<gl.lZ,!h()D�o�J.reJatlo�QQear nafUreT and inevitable. Althaugh suchid.eill!lgica1 power the.....attempt to define --- r�lity in l?articular wa�has always been part of social life, its

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importance increased significantly in the eighteenth and nineteenth . centuries, as part of the processes of modernization in Europe and

America. Historically, becoming modern involved the democratiza tion of both political and cultural life. As "the masses" gained political power and cultural literacy, partly as a result of the develop�e�t of new communication media, the use of force became more diffIcult, costly, and visible, and thus it became an instrument only of last resort. Instead, society came to rely more and more on the ideologi cal possibilities of communication and culture.

IDEOLOGY, REAilTY, AND REPRESENT ATION

The issue of ideology is closely tied to the discussion in the previous

two chapters: �dia ma�� meanings ane! �ganize them into vari

ous codes and systems. Implicit in these argu ments is the assumption

th�t'ili�s�=�des intejin�t!�f!.hty; they make the world meaningful and

comprehensible. T.b� .. Jnt!Qd�cti0I1. � .f . t�r.IT1�)i�� .r�fl{ity..and.J:bg.J1 1Qrld.

signals _ the _m�ve from._ gu��!i on�_ gf �eanJng . . t�.q1Jg§.tj.��g�esen:

tation .from.cuHvre tQ ideo19gy. After all, th ere are lots of mearungful

·t�xts {hat do not ne�-;��rily�iaim to describe an actual reality. Much of

the time, people assume they know the dif ference between fact and

fiction; although, as we shall see, this assum ption is very problematic.

Many meaningful statements explicitly descr ibe a world that is not

actual (for example, a world in which a man with super strength and

X-ray vision constantly saves the world from bad guys). That world

might be one that we can imagine; it might ev en be one that we assume

to be plausible. Or there may be certain featu res of that world that we

take to be descriptive of our own world. For example, we might agree

that the legitimate law enforcement agencie s need help, or that the

difference between the good guys and the bad guys is obvious. Other

meaningful texts describe fantasies that people may take to be describ

ing impossible realities or at least realities th at they would not want

to see actualized. People experience the world only through th

e cultural codes of

meaning that enable them to interpret or make sense of the world. Yet

people are capable of understanding many co des �f me�g that :�ey

are incapable of experiencing as possible or even Imagmable realIties.

In other words, certain codes of meaning are not only intelligible, they

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Ideology

are also assumed to be descriptions or possible descriptions of the wor

. ld. As descriptions or representations, particular codes appear

. ObVlOUS, commonsensical, and even natural. They are assumed to be objective descriptions of how things are and, more often than not, of how things have to be.

The word representation literally means "re-presentation." To �e-pres:,

nt somet�ng �eans to take an original, mediate it, and "play It bac� .

. But, agam, this process almost necessarily alters the reality of

the . ongmal: �ejJ!�� g2!�!DY£l¥.�_�ma\2n�aim on and. allout.. _;e�l,�!y: but It IS not the same as realism. It is not merely a matter of

realistIcall� . constructing an imagined world; it is not merely a matter

of what cnhcs have called "the willful suspension of disbelief. " In this sense of r�alism, the producer of a text will try to maximize the experi ence and Impact of the text on the audience by drawing the audience into the universe that the text has created. Hence, as we have noted films use continuity editing to create the illusion, not that this is the real wor

. ld, but that the world the film creates has a reality of its own, a

r�alIty that acts in much the same way as the reality of the world out SIde the text behaves. Even so-called reality TV is a representation. The producers use a variety of techniques (such as hand held cameras "confessional" type interviews, or "surveillance camera" type images) to convince the audience that what is presented is unmediated, or at least less m

ediated than what is on television the r . est O

. f . t . h

. e time.

/ .10 make a [email protected].!J:¥-ta..bide.tJ;lIait....QWll. .£resence in and operation o�lh':._t�t As we have already suggested, a produc�r w�o IS aImmg for realism will avoid editing practices that emphaSIze his or her own interventions; for example, audiences notice such things as jump cuts, when cinematographers and video editors keep � camera a�d subjects in the same position but edit out a portion of a fIlmed or VIdeotaped sequence. They not only notice that some thing is missing but are also reminded that the world they are seeing is not "real" because it has been produced. The illusion of realism is broken. And

. for just this reason, media producers seek to avoid jump

cuts: They aIm for a seamless, involving presentation that draws the audience's attention into the content. The audience must "forget" for a mo�ent that the text is "just a text" producing meaning: Its realism, whic

. h may or may �ot necessitate that the world of the text has specific

relations to the audIence's everyday reality, depends on the audience's ability to imagine the actualization of that world.

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two of the authors were wat ching the .

first For example, when 1 d

. dway through the mOVIe, as . . 1990 we were start e ml . d Batman mOV1e � ' . . hen a college student

sitting behm us Batman is scalmg a b.Ull

dmg, ; 1" U to then, we guess, he had fou

nd blurted out, "Cheez, ls that fad

ey . d

� a bat costume and hopping off If own-up resse m . f the portraya 0 a gr . 0 D nnis Muren the supervI

sor 0 f tly plaus1ble. r, as e ' . skyscrapers per ec d

. f e Academy Award Winner special effects for Terminator

2 a.n � SlX- l

t m

hy Everyone can tell if . t "Reality 1S so OUC .

in that category, put 1 , hin . unbelievable, you've lost the

something isn't real. Once somet g IS

" ( t d in Pollak 1991, p. B2). li . audience quo e ' h h d is not necessarily rea stIc,

t· on the ot er an , . Representa lOn, . 1't Realism as a genre IS 1 t king a claIm on rea

1 y. although it is a w�ys s a . which articular texts might atte

mpt to only the most ObVIOUS way

� k

P 1 'ms about reality. But even . 11 tl at 1S to ma e c al operate ideolog�ca y-

1. . k f 11 the Disney animated movies- can

the most fantastic texts-thm 0 a'd I . not a characteristic

of texts still be effective ideologically. F

o l r

1 t eo d ogy

dl�eployed in society.ln?.s1.ar as ,r th ys they are oca e an . --r-themselves but 0) e wat makes a claim about t�e�e!Y }�at its � �,!eXl�g!z��r;;;;d--;��ibl�� tT;;;;:'p �W;,t i:.,.i;ieologica1. ence lives m-about what l�!1£LP��--A -' 1'" f 1992 "riots" erupted --�"""�

� �

"""""""'f 11 ing example: In pn 0 ,

Consider the 0 ow C l'f rnia J'ury acquitted fou r

f Ventura County, a 1 0 , ,

in Los Angeles a ter a . f the beating of moto nst

. harges stemmmg rom P olice officers on c . th nation and many acroSS V· t lly every person In e ,

h' h Rodney King. lf ua 'd f the beating, in w IC d t dly seen a home VI eo 0

h the world, ha repea e . ff' No one challenged t e

58 r by pollce 0 lCers. King was struck lffies . ture real events. But to render a "truth" of the videotape: l� dId .cal Ph d t interpret the reality of the . . the Kmg tna a 0 . verdict, the Jurors m d on them one verslOn, ting attorneys presse videotape. The prosecu b lice officers out of control; the that King wa� savagely.

be;:e;th� �� police officers acted reason�bly defense's verSIOn of reality . d'fferent ideological artlcu-. t ces One pIcture, two 1 . . under the Clrcums an · 1 ,",,..,,t� ... e ..... t�at,,,,.....,r; the...x�:I£.,

��rnntlOn l'r But a so no lC . .. -""""' ..... lations, two different rea I Ie� .

1 " . t "-rath� than as "p�tsl" or \ I ", cl..t}:le events following the tr�.::'�.""''''' :r1 n oillo:�l.&l:boice ,_ , -" . ' 71 -"V'e'flci n uonsmg -�gn � �e ' . -:; <" "demonstratIons, ,!?r e ......,. ........ ��.� • ..".- ""':" b omm' g representatlOn; '" __ -a r' - tt of meanmg ec --rd�ology is not only a ma er d inequality Although the h estion of power an . f h it is also about t e qu . ' d 'th the French philosophes 0 t

f 'd 1 gy ongmate WI hil concept O l eo 0 . t s the German p oso-. tl eighteenth century, I wa . Enlightenment m le . 1 M who developed the con cept In

pher and political economIst Kar arx

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Ideology

its present form. Writing in the nineteenth century, Marx wanted to understand how minorities were able to maintain power and why the vast majority of people accepted a system and even acted in ways the consequences of which seemed to be against their own interests. Why did subordinated populations accept their subordination and even act in ways that continue that status? Quoting Marx (1975),

In the social pro.duction which men carry on they enter into definite

relations that are indispensable and independent of their will; these

relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development

of their material powers of production. The totality of these relations

of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real

foundation on which legal and political superstructure arise and to

which definite forms of social consciousness correspond, The mode of

production of material life determines the general character of the

social, political, and spiritual processes of life, It is not the conscious·

ness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their

social being determines their consciousness. (p. 425)

Marx is concerned here with simple questions. How do societies maintain and reproduce structures of social difference and power? Why do some people see themselves as superior and thus justify their privileged position in society? More important, why do people who are subordinated accept their subordination? In some societies, hierarchy is maintained through the use of force; you may be surprised to learn that even less than a hundred years ago, factory owners often used force to subdue workers and to compel them to accept their exploitation (Ewen, 1976). Even today, force is often used against illegal immigrants and in many Third World countries. However, most modem democra cies eschew the use of force in favor of ideology. If those in power can succeed in constructing a dominant vision that justifies social inequal ities, and they can win agreement to this vision, then their position of power is reasonably secure; force becomes unnecessary. The construc tion of such a consensus is thus always tied to the particular interest groups that struggle for power in society. �atjon ilFld.:r;ll.ammROIIiI"Q-Q.f,.. such a consensus is called hegemom . ...

L�t's take-"iS' e examp e: fu the nineteenth-century American South, the dominant ideology represented Blacks as inferior, often not quite human, beings. To the extent that both Blacks and Whites agreed to this ideology (and notice that this agreement was often unconscious

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MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA

because it seemed so commonsensical), the system of subordination and subjugation endured. Of course, not everyone-certainly not all Blacks and not all Whites-accepted race-based subordination as a nat ural fact, and some struggled against it And often force was used to subdue such disagreements. Still, the ideology was largely successful for many decades. Paradoxically, this ideology often was more humane in its consequences than less discriminatory ideologies; in treating Blacks as not fully and rationally human, it allowed for interracial rela tionships of a fairly wide range, and it usually protected Blacks as if they were like children. For all of the horrors of this period, then, we should not forget that Northerners who staked out the moral high ground often ended up treating Blacks worse than did southern Whites. Nonetheless, and certainly by today's standards in the United States, any ideology that justifies the enslavement of any human by another is unjustifiable.

In�the_conterp.P9rf:1rX,�Qr!f!'.Jh!;_m�g.t'Las�jDY9!y�9j�_t.he gr�duc .!L9n._oUg�0IQgy.;,a}.Ub��e. After all, they are, as we have suggested, perhaps the most important producers of meaning and the codes of meaning in contemporary society. Furthermore, they are often a central and important part of people's everyday lives. They have the potential, then, to become the site at which meanings become more than mean ing. J::Yhen.the.media. become. representations,_when they m�-t.. claims �� . .!bf_"Y.eY_i.il�_tyQrl91§,=tl�)1,b?J;Qme�p,o.w:exfuLideologkal.jpsjjtu ,tiOp.s, And they are, therefore, potentially a source of great conflict and struggle.

Almost all media texts, from the news to Evenjbody Loves Raymond, can be seen as ideological. Although it is true that not all media texts (whether apparently factual news reports or obviously fictional enter tainment programs) support the status quo or the power structure, what is often presupposed or taken for granted is a set of relationships that usually do: The dominant codes of the media in the United States, for example, rarely if ever question whether a business enterprise should make a profit or whether politics is defined solely by the elec toral system as opposed, for example, to organized protest Similarly, the media seem to regularly present the world in a way that makes assumptions about such things as the primacy of the nuclear family, the necessity of working for wages, and the relative value of various segments of the population; in these media portrayals, these values seem commonsensical, universal, and even unquestionable. That is,

1 9 8

Ideology

the media, like other ideological operators, are constantly hiding the gap between reality and their representations of it. Even alternative media operate ideologically. They just may not share the mainstream ideology. But ideology cannot be understood simply in terms of particular unrelated acts of representation, or particular unrelated codes of meaning, �pplied to particular events, people, relations, or practices. It a�ways Involves ways of representing, seeing, and thinking about reality. In Ways of Seeing, John Berger (1972) gives a number of examples of the new ways of seeing the world that characterized the emer�en7e of n:odern society � Europe. Berger points, for example, to artIsts practIce of representIng people with their possessions as a new perceptual system for thinking about the value of individuals. S�milarly, he points to the ways in which women are represented in VIsual arts (from painting to advertiSing) as the passive objects of an unseen man's gaze.

Another example of a "way of seeing" the world touches some of the deepest assumptions about reality in the United States, where the laws, economy, and value system all seem to be centered on the "natural" priority of the individual. Americans tend to see individuals as th� most basic and valued unit of social life. Perhaps this in part explaInS Americans' hostility to socialism, as well as the effectiveness of negative rhetorical appeals that attack social alternatives (from singlesource health care to labor unions) as so�ialist. It might also explain most Americans' suspicion of religious cults, because they are based on the community as the basic unit of social life. Ideologies are not merely particular systems of representation or ways of seeing. � are also ways of excluding and limiting, for they -.l }et the �ounda:ies k on what we gr.Ei:..able to-1lnderstand as I2.Qs�� JiIaeologles are also not neutral. In defining the terms within which reality is experienced, perceived, and interpreted, they are always arti

. cul�ted or connected to the struggle of one group or another to �amtam or challenge particular social organizations, particular rela-tIons of power. !s!t;ology is,. then, abQyt,tryiug..to...ge.Lpeup!e W. see..t.be �grl.d..ac.c.ording.J;f).th.e�h�Lms�code.s..tl14.t..h�en..selby one or *�roups of p.:.££le, Us�illx)hQ.�e who control tb�12Q.wer within' �y. Although some ideological codes are explicitly linked to polit�cal positions and philosophies (think of the ideologies of commUnIsm and capitalism, or of the Democrats and the Republicans),

199

MAKING SENSE OF TH E MEDIA

ideology is a much more pervas ive and common feature of socia

existence . Capitalist societies, for example,

need to have people who are

willing to sell their labor so th at someone else can profit from

it.

Capitalist ideology needs to have people believe that anyone can b

economically successful who is willing to apply himself or herse

lf.

People who "fail" must have som ething wrong with them. (What mu

constantly remain hidden is the fa ct that there are structural inequali

ties in the system and that the sys tem in fact needs such inequalities

Similarly, the two-party system depends upon people's unshakab

belief that the two-party system g uarantees them a real say in the go

ernance of their country. Patriarch y-the assumed superiority of men

and the masculine over women a nd the feminine-requires that al

people take as "natural and obvio us" that men are stronger, more rat

nal, better rulers, natural family heads, and so on. An example of

ideological or taken-for-granted a ssumption about the natural way o

organizing television can be seen in the fact that American televisio

programs are always interrupted b y commercials. Whereas Americans

find watching this unproblematic and have no problems connecting

the segments into a single narrati ve, people from other cultures ofte

complain that they find it difficul t to follow the story and distinguis

the program segments from comm ercials. As we shall see in Chapter 9,

ideology is always involved in th e way that the media treat various

segments of the society.

REALITY AND THEORIES OF I DEOLOGY

Reality is a somewhat paradoxic al concept because reality is what

most people assume exists indep endently of any concept or repre

sentation. Reality is what exists, end of discussion. Thousands of

years of argument in metaphysics (the theory of the nature of reality

)

and epistemology (the theory of knowledge of reality) quickly di

proves the commonsense assump tion that reality is not a problem

Even if reality is what it seems, h owever, the question remains how

human beings can know and talk about it. The most common theory

and the most commonsensical, a. .§§.Umes tha��5..a��itilli1.-2f

�riillact? (what actually exists or happens),j.he�.nw:nil ll_�jngs. .

�t-el-Y-Fercei\Le3uchJ�<;:t�LjiI! d _�h� t _ !��se.pef(;epti?��J an3_��

'")(1(1

Ideology

�acts they cor e d ) � ._ : . r: sE.9n to �an be accuratel d 'b even m1rrored.by th .

. " .��' Y . � scn f�;L.calllured or

_ __ . e vanous verba ancLvisuaLl --' ..

£llllure...Every society assumes that its own g�g1¥!��of h�man

provide the only and m t perceptlOns and languages

sorts of realism have two OS ac

t c fl urate representation of reality. These

grea aws' They are thn . cannot explain ' .

. e ocentnc and they ffilspercephons halluci t' d'

so forth. , na lOns, 1sagreements, and

A second theory goe b k I PI t h '

s ac at east as far as the Greek philos h a 0, w 0, rn The Republic, offered the foIl

. op er

humans' relationship to realit I ' owmg fable to describe

been prisoners in a cave h �' �agrne that some people have always

wall. Behind them f ,c arne so that they can only see the back

, 19ures move and dance in fr t f f' shadows on the back wall The ri

. on 0 a He, casting

cave and never having se�n th �. soners, havmg never been out of the

are real and that they are al� 1furesl�

assume both that the shadows

I 0 rea 1ty. Plato was sugg f h

peop e confuse appearances (wh' h d h es rng t at

I . 1C 0 ave some cau I . d .

re ahon to reality) for reality 't If PI sa or rn eXlcal

b 1 se . ato drew an abs 1 t d" .

etween people's experie f h 0 u e IshnctlOn

d nce 0 t e world-an experie f .

:er :��::�::�: S��dw l�t

e h alit

t Y itself·

d The latter exists b::n� :::;

a�:� , ou an un erstand' f h

causal relationship, people are inca b mg 0 t. e nature of this

Such a "phenomenal" theor mak pa Ie

. of knowrng reality itself.

of reality. y es expenence the other inferior half

. A third the

. ory asserts that ��ru.�"l�J1Q t . .real....iJ;wml .

Errect se�ls rafuer,..th FEQauGt.ci.h; . . .bM.i.� v" people create and re-create .

um.aU..JJl.¥£nhoo.. ...,.something

In this view no independe ( t prOd

l �ce� marntaill, repair, and transform).

, n rea 1ty IS ever availabl t h rather, the things that ar t k b

e 0 uman beings; e a en to e real are real b h

socially constructed, or re resented as r . eca�se .t ey are

.3e� �o be made to mean. PThe cla' h eal. A�co�drng .to thIS v1ew,..!E!1:.. . . , Ir

implies that communi J:' . lffi t at realIty IS sOClally constructed

chain or sliding of Sig�;' lOn. IS always doubly articulated: First, the

. 1ers IS stopped to produce me ' d

ond, parhcular meanings are th I . anmg, an ,sec-

d emse ves articulated to oth .

an events as their representations The f t ' h . er practices

ing or significance' the second th HS IS t e production of mean

of reality And ' ' f

, e representation and construction . mso ar as each of thes f l '

from a P OSitiO�f - P-;

----h--·,,- -·��

�!?ns E..��ssible only _

_ wer, t en, the SOCIal co st, f f -

--- - ;-.- - always a .-ryocess inextricabb -1 t€G

� ruc ill.1L.QlJ@!.UUs-

"';-"-_ __ �. ¥_re a . ,....tGl-tn€-re.lati.,Qns f .

sOClety,l.Jotice that such a theo d . .

.. _. 2.., p.£��E.2!1_�_ _

ry oes not necessanly imply that there

MAKING SENSE OF THE MED IA

is nothing that is not language or culture, that there is �o materi�l reality. It does, however, imply that insofar as human be�ngs �xpen ence any reality, such reality is always the double articulatlOn of culture, an ideo!ogical product.

. Each of these theories of reality and knowledge offers a dIfferent account of the operation of ideology. Because human existence is always more complicated than its theoretical description, each of them has a certain truth and describes at least certain moments of the rela tions of power constructed within and by the cultural and communi cation environments in which people live.

A Realistic Theory of Ideology

/ The most commonly held theory of ideology, �£aJisLth.e.ru� �de91Qgy_aQ....1al�� .. <:..on�� For example� Marx and Engels (1970) claimed that the dominant ideas of a socIety are the ideas of the dominant class. That is, the class that holds power (for example, the capitalist class) attempts to imp�se its .

ideas, its �ersion of reality, on the rest of society. These ideas mtentIOnally n:Isrepre sent the world, at least from the point of view of the real mterests of the working class. The capitalist class tells the world that it .is the natural order of things that labor power be sold as a commodIty on the market, that the quality of one's being is measured by one's life, that the family is where one lives out one's real life, and so on. The fact that workers believe them means that, in one way or another (and Marx never quite figured out how), they are brainwa�hed. They are suffering from false consciousness because they are takmg as true knowledge ideas that are false. (This formulation assumes that there must exist true knowledge and that there must be some way to tell the difference.)

This theory of ideology also implies that there is a direc� corre- spondence between social position (such as .

class me�ber�hIp) an� knowledge and interests. Thus there is something called the mterests of the working class, which can be defined independently of any par ticular social struggle and defined solely by the fact that workers sell their labor as a commodity. Moreover, there is a truth that would describe their reality. Similarly, the capitalist class has its own interests and its own truth. The problem comes when the truth of the capitalist class is universalized and naturalized, then offered as the truth for

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Ideology

everyone, as if it were both the way the world is and the way it has to be. In other words, ideas, knowledge, and culture are simply a reflec tion of the social position of those who produce them. They are not real; they are nothing but the effect of more real and determining social and economic relations.

Such a view of ideology is common in the contemporary world. As we shall see in Chapter 9, it plays a central role in many discussions about the politics of identity, as when one member of a group accuses another of having bought into the mindset of the dominant group. Equally common, some critics of contemporary society assume that the media are consciously and intentionally feeding the population false information and a false set of attitudes about the way the world is and has to be. In fact, some critics assume that, on the basis of the social identity of the producer of a particular text (by which they usually mean the board of directors of the responsible corporation), one can know the ideological bias of a text. Capitalists produce procapitalist texts that intentionally misrepresent reality to the audience for the sake of maintaining their own power. Male-run corporations produce pro masculine texts that intentionally misrepresent reality to the audience for the sake of maintaining their own power.

Experience and Ideology

A phenomenal theory of reality adds a layer to the analysis of ide�log� . . gXR�p�n��, al.way� jrL§Q ID��n§� J£lLe�2�J:.��.ha.�2..� r�tyi.)t always eXIsts at a dIstance from reality. And xgte4(Reri�JKg ,/ .h� it§...9o.Wn..s orkru..tIalth .. 1t is, at the very least, the necessary starting point for any attempt to discover the truth of reality. Experience is the dimension through which human beings live the meaningfulness of their culture. That is, a phenomenal theory emphasizes the fact that human beings live in a meaningful world, but it still privileges the real world as if it could be accessed outside of the codes of meaning that define people's experience of it. [email protected])!: of reality giyes v r..i.sa..to a hllmanistic theo�y 9f.ideology,

This theory of ideology emphasizes the more humanistic and less economistic side of Marx's (1975) writings. It refuses to reduce culture and knowledge to a mirror image of reality or to a direct effect of some thing else; it refuses to ignore the active role of meaning in human life. Instead, this theory begins with the assumption that people's position

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MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA

in the social world determines their experience of the world through the mediation of the cultural and communication forms that have emerged naturally and authentically from that position. That is, rather than assuming that there is a natural correspondence between social position and truth, a humanistic theory of ideology assumes a natural correspondence between social position, cultural forms, and experi ence. First, social position determines experience. By virtue of being working class, a worker is alienated from his or her labor, whether or not he or she knows it. By virtue of being a woman or a person of color, one inevitably has certain experiences of the world. For example, every woman has had the experience of being "sized up" by men, and any person of color has had the experience of being treated differently from White people. Second, left to their own devices, groups produce their own cultural forms and institutions, which accurately express and represent their experience.

However, precisely because these social groups are politically and economically subordinated, their culture is also subordinated to the cultural institutions and forms of the dominant class. The domi nant culture tries, through any number of means, to replace and dis place the authentic culture of the subordinate. It may simply drive or crowd their institutions out of business in the name of profit, in the way that the record and radio industries basically defeated and erased the music hall tradition of the working class. It may marginal ize the cultural products and practices of the subordinate groups by constructing them as unworthy of serious consideration, or of social support. It may castigate them as vulgar, profane, obscene, dangerous, and even unpatriotic. Or it may appropriate them by making them a part of the dominant cultural codes so that these authentic expressions of subordinate experience are transformed from a challenge to the dominant values into a reaffirmation. This is called recuperation. For example, during the protests against the Vietnam War, dominant news media reporting on demonstrations would often emphasize that the very fact of such protests confirmed the unique privilege (freedom) of American society. In the process, the actual object of the protest (for example, the war in Vietnam or the disproportionate number of Blacks serving in the armed forces) was forgotten or ignored (Gitlin, 1980).

The result of this contest between an authentic culture and a dominant culture is that the subordinate group's ability to express and

204

Ideology

represent its authentic experience is negated. The dominant culture misrepresents and redefines others' experience. Thus the subordinate group comes to experience the world in the codes of the dominant group; its experience is made inauthentic because of the mediating power of cultural or communicative codes. While the truth of knowl edge (as an authentic relation to the world through experience) and ideological misrepresentation are still at stake, the key terms are no longer truth and reality but experience and culture.

The correspondence that such a theory assumes-a correspon dence between one's position in and perspective on reality, experi ence, and cultural forms-is reflected in the assumption that there is a structural homology or parallelism that operates and can be read across these diverse dimensions. It is as if, everywhere one looks, one sees a particular message that can be taken to describe the structure of culture and experience, whether the authentic or the dominant. For example, consider Raymond Williams's (1992) discovery of the structure of mobile privatization. Mobile privatization, in its simplest terms, defines a structure in which the individual avoids the hostile world by retreating into the privacy and safety of the home. The outside world is beamed into the home via the mass media; no longer do individuals need to foray out into the world to gather information. Williams argues that this "structure of feeling" describes at least a significant part of the culture and experience of contemporary life and that it can be read from a wide range of texts and aspects of the mass media.1

Social Constructionism and Ideology

-'22!.h..��l.l�.2rt.�Q).gg�m tbilLl��glQK¥�.i§..llt�9,m� VC" j�D§�Qi§tQX,tio.n.Qt.£.Qrr�c!a2.1�misJ;�t.ese.ntatiQn Qf.realily. In the end, ideology is a kind of bias operating within culture and knowledge. But social :?�::,�i,��?e::!.��,�t th:::,}s a�!�,?�� r��,�t-srcreor representatIons that wouFdatiow one to measure the truth or .... ) �,9!.��tions. lOe'010gy IS nm-�mas''''oecaiis'e-rf carmO'tb� -;<r measured against something that is not ideological, or that exists out-side of ideology. ODe <:an 0Bly com}J.are..ane.ideoIQgic.g,Ln::1?J�.�lltllliQll.. �er. Phenomenal theories of reality that contrast it to "mere appearance" assume that people (or at least the critic or scholar) have at some level an unmediated (nonideological) experience of the world

205

MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA

that can serve as a normative yardstick against which to judge specific ideologies.2

People live within the systems of representation; they experience the world according to their codes of meaning. T here is nothing outside of them that allows them to measure or judge their truth. Ideologies, then, are the systems of meaning within which people live in reality or, to put it differently, live their relationship to reality. They define how people experience the world, what they take for granted. Ideologies define what is taken to be common sense; the truth of ideological state ments appears obvious and even natural. But people are often unaware of many of these ideological codes, because the codes are unconscious and often unchallengeable.

If realist theories deny experience any significance, and humanis tic theories make experien�e into the privileged access to truth, a social constructionist theory argues that experience itself is what ideology produces. It suggests that the most powerful and important effect of ideological representations is that they construct our most fundamen tal and basic experiences of the world. When Richard Nixon and even Robert Kennedy went hunting for Communists in the 1950s, they hon estly saw such figures everywhere and viewed them as a real menace. T here was no way to argue against this ideology by appealing to some experience outside of another ideology. In other words, an ideology is self-contained and nonfalsifiable.

T he twentieth-century French philosopher Louis Althusser (1970) was the leading proponent of such a theory of ideology, arrived at, he argued, by bringing the insights and arguments of semiotics and struc turalism to bear on the question of ideology. Althusser defined ideology as the systems of representation in which people live out their imaginary relationship to their real conditions of existence. Notice: What is at stake here is not people's relations to reality but their relationship to a rela tionship. What is this imaginary relationship if not people's already meaningfully interpreted relations to the world? To put it simply, there is no way out of experience. Experience is the beginning and end of ideology. It is the world in which human beings always exist, and it is the product of ideological experiences.

If this theory is accurate, then it would seem to follow that the more obvious the truth of an experience is and the more certain people are of that truth, the more ideological that experience is. Consider the following analogy: Two people are talking. Person A says that his arm

206

Ideology

is broken. Person B says that it is not Onl " . of fact. (Even judgments of s h . Y one IS nght m this matter uc rna tters of fact' 1 pow��. As Michel Foucault [1973] has de

mvo ve relations of medlcme is partly a hi t f

monstrated, the history of s ory 0 the reorg . . example, Who has the . aruzati on of power: For P

power to dIagnose su h thin erson A had said that he ' . c gs?) But suppose

There is an obvious proble:� m pa

b m, and B had challenged this claim.

f · ere, ecause Person A d a expenence and not fact. rna e a statement i1 . . ' we assume that pe 1 d eged empmcal access to th . op e 0 have some priv-

th elr OWn experien I at I see red, although l b ' ceo cannot be mistaken

th y, can e mIstaken that th . ere. et a constructionist th f . ere IS something red . eory 0 IdeOlogy Just such experiential stat seems to suggest that ements, statements th t secure, are in fact the most ideological.

a seem to be the most How does this production of ex . indiViduals into its signifyin s

per�ence Work? 1t '"Y0rk� b.r E.u� �ore or t��e�r;sI'O��;' a w�y as to make them of th . . ns, m IVlUuals b �=....--_ ... __ �. own experiences Yo k �- "- .. - - -_ �co�Jti ut1iors . �.--.; .... . u now when you" " � IS, you authorize yo"li'rown . t . see a red car. That th m erpretatlOn as the t th b e SOurce and author of th t ru ecause you are Ideology works in J'ust thO e s alteme�� and hence of the experience IS way t poslho . d' . . of their own ideological st t . ns m IVldua1s as the subjects P 1 b a ements and hence f th . ! eop e�e them$e1ves to b th b' 0 err experiences. ill L t ."� .e e ar Iters of an . lac constructed b�i d 1 ·'1 =r -""':� expenence that is thi --- - - ,,-� eo ogica codes Althus -(19;7"-'''' . .... _ s process as interpellation" fut 11--: ser 0) describes assilm ind" d 1 .. . _erp-�_ahQn '§ ig.go Qg,y��h;I;�, ��J.��,<�s to S �gtIC ositions within ' = -�Lt� �lOhc2 renr esentatio,n"'!of: � . 'l":""""t ---.......--. I1s 02:'n communicative f --��i,Ij.�-;..:xzP��.u.eg l� ��'r � We can further explicate this rather d ' . . two experiments First p' k IffIcult nohon by suggesting t . " IC up something th t en In the first-person singul h a Someone else has writ-I �s� �ak� a Dud. You will find that you b ' . . r or a report. Now read it you feel yourself living wh t thegm to Idenhfy with the I in the text, that a e person who Wr t 't l' seems to become part of y h- 0 e 1 lVed, and that it Thr h ou, or ra t er you seem t b . aug an identification with the I .; b ' 0 ecome part of it. Identi

.ty, but, of Course, this will onl '� egms to become part of your

What IS going on. y e temporary because you know

. Now, try a second experiment· The . Imagine that the world that' . next tJme you go to a movi e that you are i n i t . Ask yo l

i f s re

h Presented on the screen is real and

Th' k urse W ere are you st d' In about your field f '. an mg in that world a V ISIOn, what you can and

. cannot see;

MAKING SENSE O F T HE MED I A

that will pretty clearly define where you are. Then, ask yours

elf if

you could be standing anywhe re else. Even if you can imagine

other

positions, you will still be una ble to actually put yourself in th

em;

you remain firmly rooted where you are. Why? You are position

ed by

the camera. Because the cam era that filmed the scene is you

r only

source of information about the world of the movie, you are bas

ically

forced to identify with the cam era and to be in the place it de

fines

for you . Films represent a reality that d

oes not exist outside the film.

Viewers experience it accordin g to the way they are positione

d in

relation to what appears on th e screen. They can see only wh

at the

camera shows them . More imp ortant, in most commercial Holly

wood

films, the camera never violat es people's sense of their perce

ptual

position in the world by showi ng them something that it wou

ld be

impossible for them to see. The y cannot see what is going on b

ehind

a wall or in another place or behind their backs. The camera

may

turn around, but it must alway s do so in predictable ways that

do not

violate the viewers' sense of wh ere they are standing in relation

to the

film's world. These two experiments illustr

ate the process of interpellation .

Interpellation literally means "putting into the space." Theo

rists

use it to describe the way in which different codes-the co

des of

language or the codes of the ci nema, for example-place peop

le into

particular positions that define their subjectivity and experien

ce of

the world. It is a bit like walkin g down the street and hearing s

ome

one say, "Hey you." You turn around thinking that perhaps

they

have called to you . In that ins tance, you have been hailed an

d posi

tioned-interpellated by that s ingle simple utterance. Interpe

llation

makes the individual into a sub ject (a speaker of language) resp

onsi

ble for every word that he or s he speaks and for the reality tha

t these

words imply. Return to the im age in Chapter 5 of a game of musi

cal

chairs: Meaning is created whe n the moving signifiers stop mo

ving,

and some signifiers slide below others into the chairs, taking o

n the

fu nction of signifieds. Interpel lation answers the question of

why

the music stops. The individua l speaker stops the music; it is

his or

her apparent intention that cre ates the meaning. To put it an

other

way, it is the I who is both insid e and outside of language tha

draws the line between the sign ifier and the signified. (See Bo

x 7 . 1 ,

"Interpellation and Advertising. ")

208

pellation and Advertising

� o s �t of advertisements ran on television a few years ago f

mod;1\J rClse equipment. One advertisement featured an a

Ideology

. \ another an attractive female model Both vOlceo e\� nd Imager A . . co

" :d y. vOlceover would intone "Th'

��:nt n ��n��e

c ��-�fh

shot of a finely mu�cle] f. . ��:Jv:�� shoulders ' ' 0 t "

er body parts suc�/ � ' our leg " "your . ' ur s omach, and end with "This I.

" ' pan led by a m-shot of the m d I f '

0 be you accom-

was the close t advertisement � e rom the wta . This final image

was the only ti e saw the pers��S e f� o c!

hOW e entire model, and

. What we wo I e to focus on here i t ,i . . . Interpellation by th ertiseme t li I

. s e .4 licit use of Ideological

reminds us that ide 0 . s n . e eVlsl n ' olar Mimi White ( 1 992)

are systems r e t t' to construct individua so ' I b' "

sen a Ions that "function

and recognition of one' v cia su Je ' s, ntributing to the production

, . sense of> d ty" (p 1 69) N Ing Implicitly hails the au 'e b t l,. , " ow, all advertis-

"This could be you " What t ' u I I . vertlsement was more explicit:

to the hailing and �ays i�Pli 't � e , If an audience member responds

. h ' ould be me"? I th

IS t e ad asking you to do? WH . ' n 0 er words, what

is "you," who are you? Wh�t t s sklng you to believe or value? If this

world, one's place in it an 0 umptlons does one make about the

At its most basic, to y " t ets thln�: don.e?

mean that one is or ide fie th b ' � be me �o thiS particular ad could

disposable income, It oul, ean t�at Ite, middle class, with a certain

sonality, intelligenc Int aJiity d values appearance over per-

one's body and 0 ,' Ii '7 ' an , so

. \ could mean that one sees

to work on my a '

I S a continuing ie'ct to be worked on ("I need

d ' i ' a so on my relatio .

� and

an on my ed ati nd ") It Id , on my decorating;

ally based a �h, of �h�t i ' cou

, mea one buys into a cultur-

ness of th 'Po ,� but their b:��n�ld�red at I\e: not only the white- Gould me n ;tl ne buys into the'

a� .

of bo ifr and so on. And it

proble (in case the proble �o lon

l tha� p . �ng things solves

li evi' " interpellates its aUd m 0 not ooklng Ii models).

d' lence In many way , II

IreG ad s. We are hailed as " " eCla y through

b d you or perhaps as p " " '

ro c ,� , game shows talk shows a d we In news 1 � � e a h 'I d '

, n across the um (Aile

ahd ' as ,;� al e when a television host looks directly

10 ' I 0 us. Each of these instances can be viewed a

�0.l . �� l

i ��

t a a U s ��c�s

��:��i� the lerms of reference

l)i�lng us to value? What is It ' k' IS It asking us to believe?

Who benefits if we ' see the w�r�d

l�h�S u�:��O? And, finally, we shou

209

MAKING SENSE OF THE MED I A

I n this way, b y having reporters "embedded" with the troops during the second Iraq War, and reporting live from the battlefront, the Pentagon sought to interpellate the audience by increasing the audience's identification with the troops (and therefore with the war effort itself) by placing them in the shoes of a person in combat. Positioning the audience in this way makes them feel more directly a part of the war itself. The reality of the war that was presented was that as experienced by some of the U.S. troops, and not the reality of others (such as the Iraqi troops or civilians, or diplomats, or others).

If ideologies are somehow linked to particular power relations and interests, then it appears that one has to assume that ideologies somehow distort reality for the sake of the interests of those in power. Returning to the example above, it is in the interest of capitalists to con struct an ideology of the free market of labor, but such a market does not actually exist, or so it would seem. But, according to social con structionism, an ideology is not a biased view of a reality that can be described outside of ideology. This problem is known as mystification.

Ideology mystifies in two Wqys. First, Kg�C�l!se an ideology pre- senEli�If�h�§�1 ;��-u;�§1,jJ hiQ��)t� conn��trQn !QThti;;.k ests', of particular �9cial grolJPS QLPow�r. blocs in society. By making th� labor market, as it functions in capitalisn;.: '�ppea;:' to be the only rational and natural form of labor, for example, the ideology of capi talism hides the ways in which this particular form of the labor mar ket exploits workers for the benefit of capitalists. Second,}deolo�y !£.. !E.ysttiY1I2g"p_r�s!�eIL��'?��,�h�!��Uty"llJ_� . resents. For /fexamPle, the ideology of patriarchy represents women as the weaker sex and thus continues the privileged position of men in society, Precisely because of the commonsensical nature of this ideological

I representation, parents often treat boys and girls differently. Boys will

. be encouraged to participate in activities that augment their strength, and they are allowed to be rough, whereas girls will be guided toward

\ more passive pursuits. Or consider a different example: Marx (1977) said that the major figure of capitalist ideology is the commodity, something made to be sold. Capitalist ideology represents everything, including labor, as a commodity. Through the power of this ideology, everything in capitalism-including workers-becomes a commodity, The mystification arises not because things are not commodities (they are) but because they need not be. In a different ideology, such as the communism Marx envisioned, labor need not be rewarded on

2 1 0

Ideology

the basis of its value, but o� the basis " humane life. of people s reqUIrements for a Or, to return to the question of at ' different system of child '

p narchy, one can imagine a , reanng that would h dIsprove the apparently natu I d 'f'e ' among ot er things, ra I lerences between th B new system would not actu 11 d ' e sexes. u t this a y Isprove patriarchy h patriarchy with a different ' so muc as replace which would in turn create .

�onstructlO� or representation of reality, I s own realIty.

IDEOLOGY AND STRUGGLE One need not choose among these theories f ' , seen to have different uses Th . I

0 IdeologIes, for each can be . e SocIa constructi . t h the broad terrain on which " oms t eory describes a SOCIety s COrnrnun' ti actively determine both the tru tur f '

Ica on and cultural life s c e o SOCIal r I ti h ' their relationship to the world. Still 't h r e a ons IpS (power) and

ations in which ideology b , l as Ittle to say about specific situ-ecomes a more c ' struggle, A humanistic theory f 'd 1

onsclOUS and explicit site of attempts on the part of subor:in�t:�

��e . s�ribes the

. struggle between

life outside of the control of the dom' n�es

. to defme a part of their

ity to which they a�sign d' ma�t maJ.onty, a space of authentic-a Irect relationship t th ' b ' It also describes some of the r ( . 0 elf su ordmation. �:�=:::a��

O !:�e�,,:�rii�;

e t��:��t:S d:��;��a:�:;: :o:��

concerned with the way dornm' ti' , rnm� IOn. Both of these theories are a on IS achIeved and ' . the construction of a cultur 1 ,

mamtamed through , a consensus usmg the f cation, But neither theory add h ' , means 0 cornrnuni-

. resses t ose SItuations wh th ' . consensus IS precarious enough that it b ' . ere e eXIsting

explicit ideological war that often cons . can

l ��mtamed only by an

ence. A realist theory of ide 1 . ft CIOUS Y IssIrnulates to the audi

political economic battles (f � ogy IS 0

1 en u�ef�l for describing explicitly

. r examp e, capItalism vs co ' ) ,

A SOCIal constructionist theory maintains th .

, rnrnunlsm ,

mvqlves practices of articulation, In Cha ter 5 at Ideology always

, event or media product can have multi 1 p " We a:gued that any

The same media product ca b d P e m�anmgs or lOterpretations. , n e rea as telllOg a n b f d ' stones, We argued that m . um er 0 Ifferent , , " eanlOg was produced b link' ' mg SIgniflers, signs, or texts, Similarl

� 109 or arhculat- number of different stories about real '�'

there b

exlst at ��y moment a 1 y or a out speCIfIc events that

2 1 1

M A KING SENSE O F THE MED I A

occur. Ideology is then the product o f a double articulation: First, a text is articula ted to a certain meaning, and then a meaning has to be artic ulated to reality to become an ideological code. Consider any govern ment scandal (from Watergate to Irangate to the latest one): Every scandal elicits a number of stories, each of which seems to make sense of the "facts . " Each version has different consequences, and each is related to different political interest groups. For example, Watergate was a scandal of the corruption of a small group within the Republican Party; Watergate was a phony scandal invented by Democrats to embar rass the Republicans; Watergate was a sign of the corruption that has become pervasive in American politics; Watergate was a "nonevent," no different from the way politics has ever been conducted.

Notice that it does make a difference which of these stories becomes the accepted one, which becomes "knowledge" that most A mericans share. It is this struggle to make specific meanings and stories into taken-for-granted representations of reality that defines the struggle over ideol ogy. If articulation describes the way specific meanings can b e attached to specific signs or texts, it also describes the way a partic ular set of meanings can be linked to m a terial or nondiscursive prac tices and events. Remember the example of the Trobriand Islanders, who believed that sex has nothing to do with reproduction: As a story, it can be humorous and entertaining to Westerners; but, as an id eol ogy, that story had been successfully articulated to reality so that the islanders actually experienced the world in its terms.

The question of how reality is represented, the choice between d ifferent stories or pictures of reali ty, is not random. Nor is the decision freely made by each individual in isolation. Individuals do not get to decide that reality is this way, even though the rest of the world dis a grees with them. The construction of a socially shared representation of reality is always implicated in society's attempt to reproduce its own e xistence and to ensure the continued viability of the pa rticular relations of power characterizing that society.

On the other hand, although one ideology (or more accurately, an ideological formation, because it is composed of numerous state ments that might not fit seamlessly together) is usually dominant, there are always competing stories about events and reality in a society. The dominant ideology defines the taken-for-granted or commonsense real ity of the vast majority of people in the society. How does this work? Ideology can be effective only if it appears to be u nquestionably true,

2 1 2

Ideology

to be so obvious and natural that an rati to its interpreta tions. Recreational d �

f onal h uman would assent

demonized by contemporary . gs,

. or example, have become conservatIve Ideolo . d . . the common sense of A "

gIes, an mcreasmgly men can SOCIety To stand d tain drugs to argue that th . up an speak for cer-

led to beli�ve seems a1m e t y

. are no� the evil force that we have been , os ImpossIble Inde d th d ' . marijuana is quite clear in th d b ' e , e emoruzatlOn of

medicinal p urposes In this :

a e ates

. a�o� t the use of marijuana for

of reality become b�th natu I y, ;pec�c Ideological representations

ideology assume that any r:�o�:l b � versal. Those living within an

sense perceptions; if they do t th emg wo�ld share their common-

h no , en something must b . t em. The construction of "welfare "

e wrong WIth chea t the American public 'd

q f

ueens as lazy parents out to .

provI es a urther exam Ie. There are always multiple ideol ' ' . p

. is not quite the same as s .

ogles WIthin any gIven society. This aymg, as we did in Ch t 5 always many meanings t ' F . ap er , that there are or s ones. or an Ideolog . h It is a representation An 'd I . Y IS more t an a story: . � �� eo Qg}{-emb.o� t�la · b . /. group that th;"_mearun' g.o t . -� JrrL�y.<-'i, F iJfhrul r . ' �= ... H!""- � ll: S ory.....represen t li hI C ologies are always in co ' h' t : ' - " . '� ��_§. •. I� - u ' onsequently, ide-mpe IOn WIth each oth Th ' struggle between ideologies to achieve dorrun' eInr. h ere IS always a b ance, t at sense I cannot e seen as passive "d " h ' peop e opes w 0 unkno . I ' by a single dominant ideology B } . , wmg y are marupula ted

how reality will or must be re ' ecause t tere IS no Sure way to establish

in the struggle over ideolo presen:e

, d, peop�e ar� �onstantly involved

tells a story about wh hi g�· The Bnhsh medIa cntIc Stuart Hall (1 985) en s young Son wa I . simultaneously something ab t hi '

s e , arnmg the colors and ou s own Idenhty Th 1 understand why he was "bl k " b '

, e Son cou d not ac , ecause m fact h b particular color has been arti ' ,

, e was rown, But a color carries with it a parh'

c l ulated tO

f a part�cular social identity That cu ar set 0 meanmgs ' In Wi these are largely negative, as in black rna '

. estern cultures, of black at funerals And th .

glC, black humor, the wearing . ese mearungs a . d . tion, This articulation is t re carne mto the articula-

ralizes and legitimates th P e

ar b and

d . p ar�el of a racist ideology that natu-su or mahon of Bl k B H out that one of the most i

ac s, ut all also points the ideological struggle torr;:::::;::��

t �l��

e civi , l rights �truggle was

tions and to rearticulate it to a " , rom ItS negatIve connota

Or consider another example 0 7�:e p�ItI�e

. Image: "Black is beautiful. "

the authors were owin e ar cu ahon of color and race: When

labeled flesh TOd: r

y that g u

l P, �ne of the crayons in the Crayola box was . co or IS peach.

2 1 3

' I ')t

MAK I N G SENSE O F T H E MEDIA

les hetween competing i�.Q!Qgi�1 'C u lture m' volves cons�ilnt stf1,l.gg_._,�l.( �.,, __ �_�_"._ -"��=qople '

� . ,,,-

1... ..l::-to Selmeft't9 . . .. _ . r'" ' . :-:-- " ---r - to gain the l!p.p.er�J?laRl:t, . , , ' . _

' code��9S . � t.t�IEP. m�·' __ -=·"�-f-:-ts parh'cular meanings, to expenenc-- -' ''= . I d terms 0 1 into seemg the wor m l ' 1 formations are not as coherent ing the world in its ter�s. I�eo o�Ica

f y have made it appear. As and systematic as the dISCUSSiOn t U . S

G ar rn a

. (1971 ) argued common . d ' f Antomo ramsCi h, ...... � •. _, _..., the Italian journalist an . cn IC

e On the contrary, it is made up of_ sens� ��ysJ:.¥mat!S str1.!<;�'';'_ 'd"� eiSta'lliil!!8L asslimptions .' �tradicto f�gm�ll�Lme�g ... an_fr ' an"' · n�ber of different ' . �- �l rl �h � so,...;phr ;�h eIlts om :V ' __ . ..-, ._ b !Lth��bUfu,. ' '''''''''''''J-MJMh '�� -",w, .......... . f kn ledge jl.....,Q1l . . - remember where these bItS 0 ow sources. Often, no one can bl' h d They are now, as Gramsci h . truth was esta IS e . ongmated or how t eir

. t ry ' we have lost the ability to h traces without a n mven 0 , bl

describes t ern, d hy they seemed so reasona e remember where they came from an w

at some time. . f articular text need not be deter-Thus the ideologiCal effects 0 a p

arrative One can watch h t t I ' ty of the program or n . mined only by t e o a I t f the films unacceptable and . find many aspec s o

. '1 the Batman mOVIes, h h t finding notions of Vigi an-I ' f b t leave t e t ea er . certainly unrea IS iC, U f h l ' ce strongly articulated (or rearlic-tism and the incompetence 0 t e Ps? 1 '1 I consider the Rambo films: . , mon sense. Imi ar y, ulated) m one s com . hole one might argue that at least Looking at the narratIve a� a 1 w

. ' f the movies makes the federal one possible ideol ogical arhcu at h iOn

. 0

bably not the most common . t th enemy But t at IS pro d

government m o e ' . h ' h ere more likely linke to . 1 ff t of these mOVIes, w IC w .. . .

ideologlca e ec d . d ' ' dualism and even JIngOIstIc various notions of violence an

:;n:; I Day displaced the Cold War patriotism . More recently, In d�en

h e

my as the feared Other into . b y relocatmg t e ene k

fear of commumsm . f' . f the 1 950s one can as B . the SCi- 1 mOVIes 0 , outer space. ut, as m

th ts facing the United States f' l . eally about new rea w hether the 1 m IS r . . h ested less about particu-. some cntIcs ave sugg , here on Earth or IS, as

h d to reassert a strong sense of iden-. n d more about t e nee t the

l ar enemIes a . th face of political challenges 0 tity against a commo� ene�? I:n d

e di fferences. To put it simply, is the established system of Idenhh�s

b t alien species really a backlash . I f sci fi mOVIes a ou C Id

current reVIva 0 - . . ts and the end of the 0 . . f racism new Immlgran , against femmlsm, an

1 M' . Black films seem to undermine any ') 0 the other hand, the en In War . n . iformly threatening others. ability to represent alIens as u�

t ublic spectacles presents a One of the most int�re�tmg �ece; tl � complexity of ideological good opportunity for thinkmg a ou 1

7 1 4

Ideology

struggle and the differences between the theories of ideology we have discussed here. On August 31, 1 997, Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed in an automobile accident in Paris while fleeing with her lover from the paparazzi. The world media coverage was unrivaled, and the public response unprecedented. Over a billion people watched the funeral; millions of people sent flowers or waited for hours to sign books of condolences from all Over the World. The dea th of Diana, the "people 's princess, " was the occasion for a worl d wide collective act of public and private m Ourning. Let us begin by conSidering how each of the three theories of ideology might be used to enlighten Ou r understand ing of this event. An ideological realist migh t interpret this event as another media spectacle that distracts public attention from the serious problems of contemporary SOCiety by fOcusing on the life of another member of the rich and famous. A fter all, Diana's worldwide celebrity was itsel f a construction of the med ia. Dian a 's image as the people's princess is false consciousness, beca use, in reality, she was a wea lthy member of the ruling elite who used most of her time and m oney in conspicuous consumption of exorbitantly priced designer fashion. A hu manistic theorist might talk about the ritual aspects of her life and her dea th. Beginning with her marriage and ending, for the moment, with her funeral, Diana 's entire life and image as Princess of Wales was a media ritual celebrating all sorts of common values and dreams. Like the mythic Cinderella, the fairy tale that was Princess Diana's marriage reaffirmed our faith in love, m a rriage, and the apparently happy ending suggested b y the myth that Prince Charming is waiting around the corner for every woman. Diana 's life reaffirmed Our belie f in the importance of compassion, charity, and, in the contemporary p olitica l clima te, volunteerism . But the events leading up to her divorce and her dea th were a spectacle of another order, reaffirming Our Worst fears about dysfunctional m a rriages, unsupportive families, and the victimization of women in contemporary society. The social constructionist might make a n umber of observations. First, he or she might raise the question of Dian a 's relationShip to contemporary notions of royalty and the pOwer of the monarchy in contemporary British life. Diana 's death seems to have challenged the monarchy in new and powerful ways that threaten to either reform or end its power. Second, a social constructionist might want to inquire into the grounds for the very real and powerful emotional identification with

MAKING SENSE O F THE MEDIA

Diana that marked the worldwide response to her death. Psychiatrists reported that women patients talked about her life and d eath as public parables about the changing nature of life for women in contemporary society, from eating disorders to abuse. Finally, the social constructionist could use Diana's life and death to talk about the changing nature and role of celebrity in the media; how the traditional and tabloid press are implicated in the development of the paparazzi and journalists who spend their lives stalking celebrities to provide the apparently insatiable demand for coverage. Are these changes in the media themselves related to other aspects of contemporary definitions of entertainment and news, and the blurring o f the distinction between them?

The question remains, Where is ideology produced? Where is it found? Where are the struggles over ideology taking place? The answer is simple: wherever l anguage, culture, and media are found . For it is in the

��"""""-.. shared culture of a society that ideology resides. And as the media have gro�wn to b e · themosHmportari.f arld-vfSlble cultural institutions of the society, they have become the most important ideological battlefield. It is in the media that one finds not only the dominant ideology-from which people learn the commonsense view of reality-but also subor dinate ideologies struggling to change that commonsense view.

NOTES

1 . In fact, Williams discovers this structure through an analysis of the econom ics, technology, and cultural forms of television.

2. See Marx's Das Kapital (Capital, 1 977), where he describes ideology as a necessary misrepresentation.