Week 3: Discourse, Ideology and Hegemony Examples

Here's some examples of media exhibiting clear signs of discourse, ideology and hegemony.

Last week we learned that Saussure says communication takes place through 'signs'. A sign is constructed of two parts:

(1) A signifier, which is a word, object, image or sound.
(2) A signified, which is the concept that signifier triggers off.

A signifier can trigger off multiple concepts. It will also change its meaning depending on the discourse in which it appears. Here's a couple of examples:


Example One:
This is the original trailer for the 1986 film Top Gun, one of the great examples of mid-eighties Cold War propaganda:



Example Two:



The Cultural Studies academic Stuart Hall says there's a couple of basic questions to ask yourself when trying to decipher work like this:

(1) Within these texts, which elements are operating as signifiers and what concepts - signifieds - are they evoking? In other words, what images, sounds or words are being presented and what meaning do you think they're trying to impart?

(2) Now consider the ideology of behind this film. What is this film trying to make you think? Who benefits from making you think in that way?


Now let's consider some examples that high light the importance of 'discourse'.

Foucault says that nothing is meaningful except within discourse. Let's consider an example in which the images from Top Gun are put into a different discourse.



What has this text done that changes the meaning of the film? A good way to identify this is to think about the different discursive understandings it employes in relation to gender, sexuality, the military and popular film.