How to use this website and textbook
As a Media student you will no doubt be aware of the fast pace at which technology is changing the ways in which we gain access to information. The beginning of the 21st century will almost certainly be seen as an important period for the transition from older established information technologies such as printing to newer digitally based information technologies such as the Web. This website is a product of such a transition now taking place in the world of textbook publishing. It gives access to a number of useful extra materials, including moving images, that couldn't be provided within the textbook itself. However, it is designed to work with the textbook, where you will find the key concepts of study and a number of worked examples.
So our advice to you is:
- Read the book carefully, especially the sections that relate closely to whatever it is you are studying. So if you are working on how to respond to and analyse texts, then read the section early on in the book about the key concepts.
- Learn from the appropriate section in the book the framework for how to explore the topic you are studying. Try to get to grips with the general principles. Then look at how these have been applied through examples in the book.
- If you are struggling to understand you can either just accept you don't understand at the minute but may well do later or you can ask your teacher or a fellow student, who does understand, to explain.
- Consider some of the further reading and web links suggested in the book if you want to get a bit deeper into the topic. All of the web links in the book have been reproduced on this website in the Webguide to avoid you having to re-type them. Try, however, to avoid swimming out of your depth. Make sure that the limits of your study are within the bounds of what is required at AS level. If you do want to go further, there is plenty of opportunity for that later.
- Once you have a grasp of what the book has to tell you, move on to the website. Look at some of the further examples which we have offered you. You will find that some of these are worked through for you while others offer some basic guidance for you to work through activities on your own.
- Now find some of your own media products or issues to explore. Become an independent student. Use the knowledge, understanding and analytical skills you have learned from the textbook and developed through the web as a toolkit for exploring those aspects of media output that most interest you.
- Take your knowledge and new found freedom of spirit into the exam room with you and give them hell.
Well over half of all the media output you are likely to consume will consist of moving rather than static materials. Having a website allows us to explore with you the complex ways in which moving images are used to construct media messages and to consider the many ways in which audiences respond to these.
Finally, as you will have read in the introduction to the book, the digital revolution is changing radically the way in which we interact with the media. Much media is now a two way process. The line between audience and producer has become blurred. Rather than worrying about how young people are represented on some tedious soap, you can fly your own representation on a social network site.
So please feel free to interact with this site. Tell us what you think. Let us know if you enjoy studying the media What do you find easy? What do you find difficult? If you think there is anything we can do to help your study, within reason, let us know.
Above all, we very much hope you find our small contribution to the study of a complex and ever changing discipline of some value.
Peter Wall & Philip Rayner