The Concept of Industry and Institutions
At GCSE, the concept of industry is concerned with the construction and impact of the messages and values of media products. The Core Media Framework, as articulated and detailed in each board’s specification, is designed to enable students to explore:
- how the institutions construct audiences based on demographics and psychographics
- how and why institution models change over time dependent on social attitudes
- how the media institutions shape their products to meet perceived needs of audience
- the Effects debate – issues of media influence and control
- what is valued and what is critiqued in media products
The concept of industry is not as easy as it might appear for GCSE students to fully get to grips with and grasp. It takes time, plenty of practice, and constant reinforcement of the key issues if they are to feel secure in their understanding. Like much of the work in these units, it responds best to returning to the ideas and issues over the course of the teaching/learning of other units.
A challenge will always be for students to acquire the ability to analyse the details of media language – sound, editing, mise-en-scène, camerawork – in order to demonstrate how audience are constructed and aligned by the products.
It is also important to reinforce the point that media students are required to analyse, rather than make judgements – they are looking at the judgements others make about people, places, events – these are not necessarily their own views…
