The BBC THREE Is Britain Racist? (2015) documentary is an investigation conducted by Mona Chalabi into the degree of racism occurring in British society. Racism is any form of prejudice attitude resulting from the belief that those belonging to another race are inferior compared to oneself (Chandler & Munday, 2011: 349). The documentary suggests that Britain is racist and Chalabi concludes “society has shaped our brains in racist ways whether we realise it or not” (Is Britain Racist, 2015). This statement implies that the representations of race in the media are negative, and they lead to subconscious racial prejudices.
A headline featured in the Daily Star (2006) states 'BBC PUT MUSLIMS BEFORE YOU'. Ethnocentric language is used to unsettle …show more content…
(2015) documentary identifies that negative opinions are prominent in British society. Chalabi's investigation observes how a Muslim woman wearing a niqab is treated by other members of the community. The woman is subjected to hate speech as she is called a “b*****d” and told to “**** off back to [her] own country”. This outcome indicates that the effects of the hypodermic needle model are occurring, which is when 'the stimuli forwarded by [a medium] convey an immediate response from the audience' (Baya, 2012: 155). This idea of a passive audience, however, was refuted by David Morley who claims that audiences can negotiate their own meaning of media texts (Morley, 1992 quoted p.156). The idea that not all audiences consume messages in the same way explains why the participants of Chalabi's investigation were met with both positive and negative responses from the public. Conversely, the hypodermic needle model explains why although Chalabi feels she is responding to negative representations of race with ‘that's not true’ it is discovered that in her brain she has 'a learned response to associate […] black individuals with fear' (Is Britain Racist?, 2015). However, one must remember that this is an assessment carried out on an individual thus to apply to all would be
A headline featured in the Daily Star (2006) states 'BBC PUT MUSLIMS BEFORE YOU'. Ethnocentric language is used to unsettle …show more content…
(2015) documentary identifies that negative opinions are prominent in British society. Chalabi's investigation observes how a Muslim woman wearing a niqab is treated by other members of the community. The woman is subjected to hate speech as she is called a “b*****d” and told to “**** off back to [her] own country”. This outcome indicates that the effects of the hypodermic needle model are occurring, which is when 'the stimuli forwarded by [a medium] convey an immediate response from the audience' (Baya, 2012: 155). This idea of a passive audience, however, was refuted by David Morley who claims that audiences can negotiate their own meaning of media texts (Morley, 1992 quoted p.156). The idea that not all audiences consume messages in the same way explains why the participants of Chalabi's investigation were met with both positive and negative responses from the public. Conversely, the hypodermic needle model explains why although Chalabi feels she is responding to negative representations of race with ‘that's not true’ it is discovered that in her brain she has 'a learned response to associate […] black individuals with fear' (Is Britain Racist?, 2015). However, one must remember that this is an assessment carried out on an individual thus to apply to all would be