A22 hour Examination

Critical Perspectives in

Media

•Theoretical Evaluation of Production

•Contemporary Media Issues: Media in the Online Age

Section A: Theoretical

Evaluation of Production

• Candidates answer two compulsory questions.

• The first requires you to describe and evaluate your skills development over the course of your production work, from Foundation Portfolio to Advanced Portfolio.

• The second asks you to identify one production and evaluate it in relation to one theoretical concept.

• Question 1a.

• The focus of this evaluation must be on skills development, and the question will require them to adapt this to one or two specific production practices. The list of practices to which questions will relate is as follows:

Digital Technology

Creativity

Research and planning

Post-production

Using conventions from real media texts

In the examination, questions will be posed using one or two of these categories.

• Question 1(b) requires candidates to select one production and evaluate it in relation to a media concept. The list of concepts to which questions will relate is as follows:

• Genre

• Narrative

• Representation

• Audience

• Media language

In the examination, questions will be set using one of these concepts only.

Section B: Contemporary Media

Issues

•Media in the Online Age

• demonstrate understanding of the contemporary issue of Media in the Online Age via specific case studies, texts, debates and research of the candidates’ choice

• This understanding must combine knowledge of at least two media and a range of texts, industries, audiences and debates

• Each topic is accompanied by four prompt questions, and candidates must be prepared to answer an exam question that relates to one or more of these four prompts

• There should be emphasis on the historical, the contemporary and the future in relation to the chosen topic, with most attention on the present

Issues to research

How have online media developed?

What has been the impact of the internet on media production?

How is consumer behaviour and audience response transformed by online media, in relation to the past?

To what extent has convergence transformed the media?

• You must explore combinations of online news provision, online television and music downloading and distribution considering how each (or the above in converged forms) can be analysed from the prompts.

Historical - development of the media forms in question in theoretical contexts.

Contemporary – current issues within the topic area.

Future – candidates must demonstrate personal engagement with debates about the future of the media forms / issues that the topic relates to.

Example QuestionsSection A:

• In this section you need to write about your work for the Foundation Portfolio and Advanced Portfolio units. You must answer both 1(a) and 1(b).

1 (a) “Digital technology turns media consumers into media producers”. In your own experience, how has your creativity developed through using digital technology to complete your coursework productions?

(b) “Media texts rely on cultural experiences in order for audiences to easily make sense of narratives”. Explain how you used conventional and / or experimental narrative approaches in one of your production pieces.

Section B

• What difference has the internet made to media production and consumption? Refer to at least two media sectors in your answer.

• How important to change in the media is the idea of convergence? Refer to at

least two media in your answer