Thursday 26 January 2012

Analysing Spooks Clip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uq9bK9YeTsI


Discuss the ways in which the extract constructs the representation of ethnicity using the following:
-       camera shots, angles, movement and composition
-       editing
-       sound
-       mise en scene


This essay will be examining the representation of different ethnic groups that is created in the clip from ‘Spooks’. This clip contains stereotypical constructions of ethnic groups and non-stereotypical constructions of ethnic groups.
            The clip begins with an establishing shot of the room that the Iraqi people are holding the English hostages in. The audience can tell that the room is part of an expensive house or apartment because even though there isn’t that much furniture or particularly extravagant luxuries, the room is large, grand and well furnished. This immediately opposes the stereotype that all Iraqi people are poor. Another factor that opposes an Iraqi stereotype is the way the man is dressed. He is wearing a smart black suit

Tuesday 3 January 2012

Hotel Babylon Ethnicity Essay

Discuss  the ways in which the extract constructs representations of ethnicity using the following:

·         Camera shots / angles / movements
·         Lighting
·         Sound
·         Mise en scene
·         Editing

This essay will be examining the representation of different ethnic groups that is created in the clip from ‘Hotel Babylon’. This clip contains many stereotypical constructions of ethnic groups, some of which can be considered negative.
            The clip begins by showing a black man who works at the hotel serving a white man by the swimming pool. The fact that the white man is being waited on by the black man could imply that the white man has a higher status and could be considered ‘more important’ than the black man. The black man then meets another black man who seems to recognise him. They begin to talk and it quickly becomes apparent that the one who has jumped out of the pool fits into the black stereotype more than the other one who works at the hotel. The one who doesn’t work there has his hair in braids, is wearing jewellery, has brightly coloured swimming trunks on and speaks using words that could be considered ‘black slang’ such as ‘bro’. The fact that his shorts are red, yellow and green (colours of the Jamaican flag), and speaks about smoking ganja, could imply that he is from Jamaican descent, or that he embraces the Jamaican lifestyle which is a stereotype that is sometimes applied to black people.
            Next in the clip, the audience sees two maids who work at the hotel who appear to be from Eastern Europe. We can assume this because of their accents. This in itself could be seen as a stereotype because in television programmes, maids or cleaners are often foreign and quite a lot of the time they are Eastern European. The maids go into a customer’s room and begin to perform a ‘strip tease’ for the customer. This shows that the Eastern European women have been sexualised, so the programme could be aiming to represent them as exotic. The older woman tells the younger one what to do and appears to be confident and to know what she is doing, which implies that she has done this before. This could fit in with the Eastern European stereotype because the story might be that they have come to England to get a well-paying job so by doing this kind of thing earns them more money. The younger woman looks more reluctant and uncomfortable and eventually leaves the room, which implies that she has not done this sort of thing before. This could be because she is religious – she is shown to be wearing a cross around her neck.
            The man that they are performing the ‘strip tease’ for is Japanese. This is definitely a stereotype; the ‘Japanese tourist / businessman’. We can assume that he is a businessman because he has a lot of money (you see the piles of cash that he is going to pay the girls). We can also assume that he might be a tourist because he does not seem to be able to speak a lot of English. He does not speak at all in the time that he is shown on screen.
            The next people that are shown in the clip are the two chefs. One of them is English, and one of them is Mediterranean. This is immediately a stereotype because Mediterranean people, especially French and Italian people are often associated with cooking and shown to be chefs. The two chefs quickly become involved in an argument, and the Mediterranean man gets very angry very quickly, even turning violent – he picks up a chopping knife and threatens the English man. He also uses the word ‘English’ as an insult to the chef which could show that he thinks that the English man is not as good a chef as he is (perhaps because he is Mediterranean therefore he thinks he knows more about food and cooking).
            Overall I think the programme Hotel Babylon has constructed mainly negative ethnic stereotypes using its characters. However, they are stereotypes that people can immediately understand and relate to, it is nothing new that they have created. This shows that although the stereotypes may be negative, it is a good tool for the programme to use in able to relate with the audience.