Dina Gharib
MCS 333
4/27/2014
The Mass Consumption of an American “Hero”
“The event must become a “story” before it can become a communicative event” (Hall, 138). These stories that are developed by Hollywood are made to trigger a reaction from the audience. In many situations, these stories are originally novels that are transformed into film for a new medium of entertainment. When the message has been delivered, the event or the “story” can then be classified as a communicative event. According to Hall, this event can then be further classified into specific codes: the Dominant or Hegemonic code, the Oppositional, or the Negotiated code. The message that is being received to the audience must be correctly decoded by the receiver in order …show more content…
The first phase is classified as the dominant or hegemonic code. The viewer is functioning in this code when they take a meaning “full and straight”. The dominant viewer is reading the message exactly how the creator of the message intended it to be. Therefore the viewer is engaging with the message at a “one to one” ratio; there is only one message and there is only one meaning. The message is unmediated, unchanged and unchallenged. The dominant code for American sniper is that Chris Kyle is an American war hero who saved thousands of American soldiers lives, and contributed to the maintaining the safety of American citizens. He suffered the consequences of his heroic actions through Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and not seeing his child grow up, but he suffered through those implications for his country. In the dominant code, this film is an American war story that will warm any patriotic citizen’s heart. The second phase is the negotiated code. In a negotiated code, the viewer is operating within a negotiated code when they acknowledge some aspects of the dominant code, while also disagreeing with aspects of the dominant code that might negatively impact them …show more content…
To put the film in perspective of Dyer, the stereotypes that we’re held about Muslims and Arabs were very typical for American film. According to Dyer, stereotypes involve a number of processes, with each one being represented in American Sniper. The first process is that the complexity and variety of a group is reduced to a few characteristics. This was evident in the film when all Arabs and Muslims were reduced to violent “savages”, as I stated previously, all the women were wearing a hijab or a niqab, and all the men were wearing traditional dress called a Ghalabeya. While this is a part of the culture this isn’t a societal norm. When discussing Arabs it is extremely inappropriate to represent them by one image. The Arab world and the Middle East vary so much so that they can’t be classified into one stereotype. In the film there wasn’t a single Christian or Coptic Arab. This is absurd since countries like Egypt and Lebanon are filled with Christian. If they included Christian Arabs in the film, the message to the audience would be skewed, so it was easier to classify all the Arabs as Muslim. Dyer claims the second process is an exaggerated version of these characteristics is applied to everyone in the group as if they are an essential element of all members of the social group. This also goes back to the representation of women in this film. As a Muslim family, I can say that not a single
MCS 333
4/27/2014
The Mass Consumption of an American “Hero”
“The event must become a “story” before it can become a communicative event” (Hall, 138). These stories that are developed by Hollywood are made to trigger a reaction from the audience. In many situations, these stories are originally novels that are transformed into film for a new medium of entertainment. When the message has been delivered, the event or the “story” can then be classified as a communicative event. According to Hall, this event can then be further classified into specific codes: the Dominant or Hegemonic code, the Oppositional, or the Negotiated code. The message that is being received to the audience must be correctly decoded by the receiver in order …show more content…
The first phase is classified as the dominant or hegemonic code. The viewer is functioning in this code when they take a meaning “full and straight”. The dominant viewer is reading the message exactly how the creator of the message intended it to be. Therefore the viewer is engaging with the message at a “one to one” ratio; there is only one message and there is only one meaning. The message is unmediated, unchanged and unchallenged. The dominant code for American sniper is that Chris Kyle is an American war hero who saved thousands of American soldiers lives, and contributed to the maintaining the safety of American citizens. He suffered the consequences of his heroic actions through Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and not seeing his child grow up, but he suffered through those implications for his country. In the dominant code, this film is an American war story that will warm any patriotic citizen’s heart. The second phase is the negotiated code. In a negotiated code, the viewer is operating within a negotiated code when they acknowledge some aspects of the dominant code, while also disagreeing with aspects of the dominant code that might negatively impact them …show more content…
To put the film in perspective of Dyer, the stereotypes that we’re held about Muslims and Arabs were very typical for American film. According to Dyer, stereotypes involve a number of processes, with each one being represented in American Sniper. The first process is that the complexity and variety of a group is reduced to a few characteristics. This was evident in the film when all Arabs and Muslims were reduced to violent “savages”, as I stated previously, all the women were wearing a hijab or a niqab, and all the men were wearing traditional dress called a Ghalabeya. While this is a part of the culture this isn’t a societal norm. When discussing Arabs it is extremely inappropriate to represent them by one image. The Arab world and the Middle East vary so much so that they can’t be classified into one stereotype. In the film there wasn’t a single Christian or Coptic Arab. This is absurd since countries like Egypt and Lebanon are filled with Christian. If they included Christian Arabs in the film, the message to the audience would be skewed, so it was easier to classify all the Arabs as Muslim. Dyer claims the second process is an exaggerated version of these characteristics is applied to everyone in the group as if they are an essential element of all members of the social group. This also goes back to the representation of women in this film. As a Muslim family, I can say that not a single