INTERTEXTUALITY OF MEDIA AND CODES OF INTERPRETIVE COMMUNITIES

Abhishek Yaduvanshi Manika Garg Paul Charmaine Sanjana Sud Swati Shukla FC IV

Definition
The shaping of texts' meanings by other texts.
Introduced by Julia Kristeva Kristeva argued against the concept of a text as a isolated entity which operates in a self-contained manner and states that:

"any text is the absorption and transformation of another"

Julia Kristeva

Intertextual figures include:

Allusion- The practice of making such references, esp. as an artistic device. Quotation- A group of words taken from a text or speech and repeated by
someone other than the original author or speaker.

Plagiarism- The practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and

passing them off as one's own

Translation- The process of translating words or text from one language

into another.

Pastiche- An artistic work in a style that imitates that of another work,

artist, or period.

Parody- An imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.

Understanding Intertextuality
A reader of media texts can easily combine, for instance, the experience of a programmes with that of advertisements inserted in it, or with adjoining programmes. This is one aspect of the intertextuality of media, and it applies also to crossing boundaries that are set on the production side between programmes or between media (such as films, books. And radio). Intertextuality is not only an accomplishment of the reader, but also a feature of media themselves, which are continually cross-referencing from one medium to another, and the same message or story or type of narrative can be found in very different media forms and genres.

 Intertextuality refers to the network of content and code interdependencies for meaning, prior and concurrent works presupposed for the intelligibility of the work being viewed. What do the art works themselves and the "communities of practice" or "communities of reception" unconsciously presuppose about prior and contemporary work through which (and only through which) the work is intelligible? A text is intelligible only through "a mosaic of references and quotations that have lost their origins" (Kristeva's definition of intertextuality). Art works are similar in mosaics of implied references and responses. What is already encoded, part of a cultural encyclopedia, prior to anyone's interpretation (Eco).

One of the intertextual example which relates to the well known "Star Wars" movie.

The Theory of Intertextuality :

It assumes that meaning and intelligibility in discourse and texts is based on a network prior and concurrent discourse and texts. Every text is a mosaic of references to other texts, genres, and discourses. Every text or set of signs presupposes a network of relationships to other signs like strings of quotations that have lost their exact references.

The Principle of Intertextuality:

It is a ground or precondition for meaning beyond "texts" in the strict sense of things written, and includes units of meaning in any media. Expanding the theory for cross-media symbolic activity, we could call this "intermediality" or "intersemiality" (the structures of meaning presupposed or embedded in any set of signs like nodes in a network). The notion of "intersemic" describes the interdependence and implied relation of any unit of signs (like a movie) to a network of other texts, genres, artefacts, documents, and symbolic works (images, artworks) in a culture.

Types of Intertextuality
The Australian media scholar John Fiske has made a distinction between what he labels 'vertical' and 'horizontal' intertextuality. Horizontal intertextuality denotes references that are on the 'same level' i.e. when books make references to other books. Vertical intertextuality is found when, say, a book makes a reference to film or song or vice versa.

Similarly, Linguist Norman Fairclough distinguishes between 'manifest intertextuality' and 'constitutive intertextuality .
Manifest intertextuality signifies intertextual elements such as presupposition, negation, parody, irony, etc. Constitutive intertextuality signifies the interrelationship of features in a text, such as structure, form, or genre.

Intertextuality of Media
Intertextuality is the idea that any text (anything that can be read or seen in the context of media-movies) has been influenced and shaped by texts that have come before it in some way. Therefore this shows that no film exists on its own all film whether consciously or not, have borrowed ideas from other films. Some texts refer directly to each other such as in 'remakes' of films, references to the media / society in the animated cartoon The Simpsons, Family Guy, movie-Pulp Fiction and many amusing contemporary TV ads. The interpretation of these references is influenced by the audiences prior knowledge of other texts.

GOOD HUMORED INTERTEXTUALITY

The Simpsons

Intertextuality of Media
Robert Palmers Addicted to Love (Donovan 1986), alludes to fashion photography and has been parodied many times for its use of mannequin style females in the band fronted by a besuited Palmer.

Shania Twain copied it for her Man I feel like a woman (Paul Boyd 1999)

MUSICAL INTERTEXTUALITY

A famous intertextual example of placing the ad in the cultural and brand contexts is seen in the Absolut vodka ads. This one asks the viewer to use what they already know about the brand or based on their knowledge of Absolut vodkas advertisements. The viewer is used to searching for the bottle somewhere in the ad. Juxtaposed to this is a culturally interwoven motive, such as Absolut Etiquette or Absolut Amsterdam or Absolut Bangkok.

MOVIES AND BOOKS Its also pretty common the intertextuality between cinema and literature. One example is George Orwells book 1984 and the science fiction movie Equilibrium from 2002 written and directed by Kurt Wimmer. The film itself is an original story, but it takes a large amount of influence from many books such as Aldous Huxley's book "Brave New World", George Orwells book "1984" and "Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.

PAINTING INTERTEXTUALITY

The Dwarf Sebastian de Morra from 1645 by Diego Velzquez.

"Velzquez Dying Behind the Window on the Left Side Out of Which a Spoon Projects from 1982 by Salvador Dal.

Intertextuaity: A World War I-era propaganda poster and the controversial Vogue cover from 2008, feat. LeBron James and Gisele Bundchen.

Ray Ban ad inspired by Marilyn Monroe Pop Art, Andy Warhol

REFERENCES
Sources: http://adenbafilm.wordpress.com http://theoutsidersgang.blogspot.in http://narrative.georgetown.edu http://valerie6.myweb.uga.edu Image sources: http://junaidqureshia2.wordpress.com http://academicfactory.wordpress.com