Understanding Media and Communication:

A Life of Crime

SEMINAR
4 NOV
INTERTEXTUALITY

Syllabus
Lecture
wk 1

Mon 7 Oct

Introduction

wk 2

Mon 14 Oct

Narrative

wk 3

Mon 21 Oct

Genre

wk 4

Mon 28 Oct

Representation

wk 5

Mon 4 Nov

Intertextuality

wk 6

Mon 11 Nov

Transmediality

wk 7

Mon 18 Nov

Conclusions

INTERTEXTUALITY
SEMINAR

Recap: intertextuality
Intertextuality is pervasive and inescapable
Individual texts always refer to each other:
together, they constitute an intertext
Intertextuality is ideological in its representations
and discourses
Intertexts are situated in a social, cultural and
political context

Recap: active audiences

Meaning is not (only) in the text: audiences co-create it
Audiences actively construct ideological meanings
This process of meaning-making is cumulative, open-ended
and inclusive: texts generate meanings generate texts,
connected in an intertextual construct
A particular way of creating texts/meanings occurs when
audiences literally produce new texts, adding their own
(counter)hegemonic contribution to the intertextual web

Ideological representations:
Colonialism

Colonialism: ideology and

discourse

Orientalism:
us and them

a style of thought
a body of theory and practice
a system of knowledge and representation
a relationship of domination
politics and institutions

Power-laden binary where

Us the West speaks for/of
them the silent East
East is projected as a
dangerous, irrational and
specular other
The mirror other emerges as
a mediating category to cope
with the very new/different
and control it

Colonialism, Orientalism and

Sherlock Holmes:
Afghanistan
Victorian Dr John H. Watson:
Army doctor
Afghanistan veteran
Wounded at the battle of Maiwand
heroic battle
murderous savages
benevolent caretaking UK government

Remnants of an Army: Dr. Brydon's arrival at Jalalabad by E.Butler (1879)

Dr John H. Watson today:

Army doctor
Afghanistan veteran
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Chaotic scary fight
No visible enemies
Desolation and abandonment

Task 1: Orientalist
representations
The Sherlock Holmes intertext includes
various colonialist and orientalist
representations. Sherlock (2010)
tackles some of these ideological
representations.
1.

Watch this clip from the series: what

representations can you identify?
Where do you think they are coming
from? How are they reproduced?

2.

What is the position of this clip in

relation to the ideologies in the 19th
century Sherlock Holmes text, as
seen earlier?

ACTIVE AUDIENCES

Task 2: Active audiences

1.

In groups, choose to analyse either Twilight or Harry Potter

2.

Map an intertext of texts related to your choice. Here "text"

means any type of narrative, artifact, activity related to the
central text. Model your work on the example on the
handout provided.

3.

You MUST include both officially and unofficially produced

texts.

4.

What types of creativity are at work here? What do you

think of the different texts you come up with? How do these
texts compare? How do you feel about them?
Prepare to discuss your findings with the class.

Group Tutorials 4 NOV

ET130

ET135

1.30

Group 3

Group 8

1.45

Group 4

Group 9

2pm

Group 5

Group 10

2.15

Group 1

Group 6

2.30

Group 2

Group 7

Each week, we
will assign you a
group task to be
performed over
lunch. Bring your
completed task
back to your group
tutorials for
discussion.

Tutorial times for today above. Each week we will

rotate times for fairness, so make sure you note
this down each week. Please be on time!

Lunch Task
1.

As a group, pick a scene from a narrative text you are familiar

with (could be one of the texts we analysed so far, but you can
pick anything you like).

2.

Re-write the scene, changing one or more of the following:

medium, genre, narrative structure/plot, settings, ideology,
hegemony, intertextuality, characterisation. Make sure your
changes are not just cosmetic or superficial. Draw on the
notions presented in todays lecture, and in the module in
general.

3.

Bring your work to the group tutorials. Be prepared to discuss

your version of the scene in relation to the original, and to
explain your choices.

4.

How much of an author you are? Whats the difference

between your text and the official one?