How Are Women Represented In Reality TV Programmes? (chels)

Representation questions for case study- the representation of women in reality TV shows

Q1. How is your group of people represented typically in the media? Explore specifically how the representations are constructed.

Women in reality TV are represented differently to the men, for example ‘the only way is Essex’ the women are represented to be very beauty conscious and quite stupid. The women in ‘made in Chelsea’ are represented differently to the women in ‘the only way is Essex’ because they are more established because of the money that they have, but when it comes to men, the women become naïve, this is the similarity between the girls  in both reality TV programmes. This supports hegemony that women should be beautiful and take care of thier appearance. The women in ‘Geordie shore’ are similar to ‘the only way is Essex’ and ‘made in Chelsea’ because they are trying to be the typical stereotypes of that particular place in the UK, because of their specific location it makes people that are watching it think that everyone from that particular place are like that, when actually there not.

The women in other reality TV programmes such as ‘big brother’ and ‘tool academy’ offer a diversity of people because they are all different with their values and ideologies. ‘Tool academy’ has different women that have brought their men on the show because they have the same values in this sense, because they want thier boyfriends to behave and not cheat. The women all have something in common, that is that they are unhappy with their men’s ways, so they all connect because they have the same things to talk about. The representations of women in these programmes are very different but they are set up to be like this

What institutions are responsible for the production of your media texts?

The institution responsible for ‘the only way is Essex’ is ITV2; because this is the TV channel that ‘the only way is Essex’ is broadcast on. They decide what will be broadcast on their TV channel. The institution for ‘Geordie shore’ is MTV because this is the channel that this is broadcast on.  The production company for this TV programme is ‘Lime pictures’, this is also an institution for this programme, which is the same as ‘TOWIE’ which is the abbreviation of ‘The only way is Essex’. ‘Made in Chelsea’ is broadcast on E4, this there institution. The production company for ‘Big brother’ is Endemol pictures and the TV channel that the programme is broadcast on this channel. ‘Made in Chelsea is broadcast on E4 and thier values are Channel 4 is different. More than any other broadcaster it tries new ideas, takes risks and presents alternative points of view. It is what has always underpinned our public service role, and led to the articulation of the public purposes presented in Next on 4, thisis showing  that they want to take risks with new programmes such as ‘desperate scousewives’ and ‘Made in Chelsea’ which is a risk because people might not like them. Another value is that they want to change people’s lives, this would also be putting demands on the audience to like the programmes and watch them.

Customer focus – understanding our customers and exceeding their expectations
Collaboration – working together across the organisation acting as one ITV
Commitment – committed to our business, our programmes and to each other; proud to be part of ITV, these are ITV’s values and this shows that they play the programmes that people want to watch such as ‘the only way is essex’ and ‘the X Factor’ because they have such as high demand which is thier main focus.

What other reasons might there be for why your group of people/ place is represented the way it is? 

The group that are being represented are women in reality TV, and the reasons that this group of people that are represented in this way is because it is more entertaining for the audience, Stacey suggests that stereotypes can be good and being able to represent women to be the same in reality makes it easier to stereotype these people to the particular place that these women are from. The people that are in these reality TV programmes are represented differently, because if they are all similar then people will either want to watch it for this reason or avoid it. The representations for people in these programmes depend on how they act in the programme, they are often told to act a certain way or they cut out what they have said so that it gives either a positive representation of that person in the programme.

Is there evidence or any alternative representations of this group of people in the media, perhaps in different genres? If not, why do you think this is the case?

There are different types of people in the media and the stereotypes of the main reality TV programmes such as the only way is Essex and Geordie shore often are in the media because of their different personalities. People such as Cheryl Cole are from Newcastle and classed as a Geordie, because of their accent and where they are from. Celebrities such as Jade Goody were in the media and she is from Essex, but then there are people like Jamie Oliver that are in the media for the right reasons because of his talent rather than what Jade Goody was famous for which was going into the Big Brother house. Programmes such as tool academy and big brother have different types of people in the programmes but they choose different types of personalities to make entertainment for the audiences, they will usually have the outspoken person, the pretty person, the political person and they will put these different types of personalities together in the hope that they will clash making entertainment for the audiences. These different types of personalities will be found in the media but they will be famous for the way that they are, because that is the way that the gatekeepers want people to see these celebrities through representation.

Consider if your group of people have always been represented in the same way or has it changed over time?

The only way is Essex is supposed to give a representation of the people that live in Essex but not everyone that lives in Essex dresses or acts like the people that are represented in the programme; they are known but their fake tan, fake eyelashes etc., yet everyone that is from there aren’t like this. Jade Goody went on Big brother in 2002 and when she arrived in a tight pink dress and bright blonde hair, people automatically linked this look to people that live in Essex. This shows that the only way is Essex didn’t invent the way that the people look because some people from there have been represented in the same way.

People from Newcastle have always been known to be rather chavvy, and they are also known to be big drinkers and up for a good night, and then the programme Geordie shore came on the screen and people fell in love with the characters because of how genuine and loveable the characters are, so in some sense this group of people are the same as the stereotype that has been created. There were some complaints that the show didn’t give a positive representation of the place and not every Geordie is like that, but because these are the extreme stereotypes (archetypes) it makes good viewing entertainment for the viewers and the audience.

There are parts of Chelsea that are very posh and then there are parts of Chelsea that are quite run down and the opposite, but the programme of made in Chelsea shows the posh people of the town in London and how they all act, it’s a lot like the programme gossip girl because they have a camera following their life and gossip flies round about the characters, people like this because it is easy to relate too. This has been a representation of this group of people for a long time because this is what this town is known for.  With reality TV programmes such as big brother and tool academy all the people are from different places.

who are the primary target audience for each of your three media texts and how do you know?

The target audience for these programmes are usually 18-30, because older generations feel alientated towards reality tv programmes as they were only broadcast not long ago. The primary gender for these are usually women and then men choose to watch this through thier girlfriends, because a lot of the programmes are women based audiences. The audience want to watch this programmes because they want to form personal relationships with the ‘characters’ in the programmes and also personal identity with the characters because they are ‘real’ people on TV, escapism is also provided when people watch reality TV such as ‘im a celeb’ and ‘the only way is essex’ because the characters provide entertainment that is far fetched.

how are the target audience respond to and/ or be affected by the representation of your group in the chosen texts?

People will respond differently to the representation of the texts, the audience for the only way is essex would be slightly different to ‘i’m a celeb’ because this has been around for longer and has a much wider audience. ‘Made in Chelsea’ also has slightly different audiences to the other two media texts because they have different demographic audiences which is where the person is from. Audiences are different because they have different values, and they want to engage in something that they want too. I believe that people that watch a certain type of reality TV tend to watch the other types of reality TV programmes aswell. I think that if people watch ‘TOWIE’ then they are likely to want to build personal identity from them and be like them with the fake tan and the make up, and i think that this is the same with the ‘Made in Chelsea’, ‘Im a Celeb is different because the text has intended meaning to make people escape thier normal lives and provide entertainment, this is also the same as the other two texts involved. The women in these programmes often influence the audience of these programmes because how real they are, and how bitchy they come across, people enjoy this as viewing entertainment.

now consider the issues of consumption by an audience and production (e.g. supply and demand). other than the political reasons, why might it be that such representations exist?

There is high demand for reality TV, thats why there is so much of it being made, and they are also making and thinking of new ones to broadcast on the TV channels, because of the high consumption from the audiences with programmes such as ‘TOWIE’ and ‘Geordie Shore’ .

(need help on this one)

does the representations of your group vary in texts from different cultures and from different institutions in different countries (do they perhaps offer an alternative or oppositional representation)? if so why may this be the case? if not, why not?

         ‘reality TV is sleazy, it is manipulative. It is as momentary as anything in popular culture’
Morley Safer

     realiity is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
Albert Einstein

my representationschange in the different cultures, if it is from different areas of the country such as ‘geordie- newcastle’, and desperate scousewives- liverpool, these groups of girls are brought up differently so they have different values therefore are going to think differently about sex, drugs and alcohol and the shows look at thier values and how they want to represent themselves.