Media Terms

Anchoring – Describing what you see in a media text.

Audience – The group for whom a media text is intended.

Bias – Prejudice in favour of or against something.

Broadsheet – A serious paper aimed at professional upmarket people, previously in a large format but now mostly compact.

Connotation – Meaning which is suggested by a media text.

Deconstruct – To take apart / analyse.

Denotation – The intended meaning of media text; what a text shows or represents.

Editorial – A newspaper article written by or on behalf of the editor which gives an opinion on a topical issue.

Genre – Group of texts that share certain characteristics; classification.

Masthead – The title of a newspaper article written by or on behalf of the editor which gives an opinion on a topical issue.

Narrative – The way in which a story is told in both fictional and non-fictional media texts.

Objectives – Not influenced by personal feelings.

Representation – How the media shows us the ‘real world’.

Sensationalism – Exciting or shocking reportage which is intended to interest the public, without necessarily being accurate.

Structure – In newspapers, the way an article is organised.

Subjective – based on or influenced by personal feelings or opinions.

Tabloids – A compact paper, designed to appeal to a mass audience.

Text – Any media product (e.g. advert, photo, film, video game, web page …) or piece of writing.
Values and ideologies – Systems of beliefs which determines how power relations are organised within a society.

Strap line – A few word sentences to accompany a brand or product.