Representation of Britain.

The three texts in the essay will be a TV show “Mrs Browns Boys” (albeit Irish), British newspaper “The Sun”, and film “The Brothers Grimsby”.

Starting with the Constructionist Approach, in Mrs Browns Boys, the program starts usually with Agnes presenting the program, and she usually pours the traditional cup of tea, for either her family, or best friend Winnie. The house is a traditional one that most Brits are used to, very old fashioned, giving a war-time sense to it. This quickly creates a sense of nostalgia between the encoders and the audience, but also a personal connection, as each member of a family can relate themselves to each character, mainly the mother looking out for her own, like what most British mothers do. As the show goes on, the show is only set in three areas, the living room, kitchen and pub, three areas that usually old school, traditional Brits would have been used to, as post 1950’s this was a dominant ideology, for the men to go down for a pint after work. The scene at the pub is an important one, as it shows that their community is strong, and represents a lot of British communities, that British people stick together, and are friendly with each other. The encoders have used this effectively, as they are reinforcing their point that British people have a strong bond together, and despite the many arguments in the program, they still end up becoming friends again, and looking after each other, showing how resilient their community and love for each other is. The programme’s target audience is a middle aged, but working class society, approximately 25-40 years old, living in cities such as Dublin, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle etc., cities who are commonly stereotyped to be working class. It could possibly attract a more female audience, as against, stereotypically, women look out for their family more than males. The soft, warm humour created is also commonly linked to females rather than males, and with the main character being a woman, more women in the country can relate themselves to Agnes, due to her love and caring for the family, creating a personal connection. The clothes, characters, and general ‘feel’ of the show fits into the Traditionalist lifestyle category, and it would suit a Mainstreamer, as their core need in life is security, which Mrs Brown Boys fulfils with the love and warmth in the community, creating a sense of safety and security. 

Compare this to The Sun, Britain’s popular newspaper, and the representation is completely different. The Sun like to represent a matter in a negative light, specially Islam, or refugees, and try to persuade their readers that their opinion is the right one. They like to enlarge an image on their front cover to reinforce an idea, and to make it stand out more to the audience. The Sun represent negativity, hatred, but also patriotism, they want the very best out of the country, and very rarely stand for nothing less. As the paper is the most popular, it could be interpreted to represent the views of every Brit. The opinions of the encoders is to try and get the best out of the country, but they mainly want to attract sales. They give the audience no other choice but to agree with them, and to make the audience feel that the encoders opinion is “Just common sense”. The opinions that The Sun are usually patriotic, as they often make references to how Brtain could be better, but they make it a personal thing by creating this feeling that, they are all in this together. This is done by the use of demand, for example “Stealing OUR jobs” was a cover line on the front cover, getting inside the heads of the audience, and making them worry, which is why they attract sales. The target audience is right wing people, who share the opinions of The Sun. It would be unfair to label them uneducated, but The Sun caster to them with their use of hyperbole to describve certain issues, representing Britain as full of narrow-minded people. This possibly is the dominant ideology in society, a lot of people are now worried about refugees for example due to the extended use of exaggeration by The Sun.  

In "Grimsby", the main character is Nobby, a uneducated family man living in a low class area claiming benefits for his 9 children. Nobby signifies Britain to be "chavvy", lack of manners or class, and not the traditional stereotype that most would connote with Britain. The house they live in shows that it is a poor place to live, ugly, and shows that there are areas in Britain that most won't know about that is completely ridden with poverty. With so much going on in the house, and generally throughout the whole programme, it is presenting Britain to be eventful, rather than peaceful. Those encoding the film want to tell the audience the side of Britain that many aren't familiar with, and despite the dominant ideology of Britain being that it is rich in culture, tradition and history, there is still a side of Britain that lacks those three, and is completely the opposite of that stereotype. Yet despite all of this, the encoders are also reinforcing an idea that there is nothing better than the strength of the community, like in Mrs Browns' Boys and The Sun. This is important, as it shows that despite how rich, poor, ugly or pretty you are, in Britain, every single community looks after themselves, and treats everyone with respect, and love. The encoders clearly represent Britain to be chavvy infested, but despite that, no matter how clever, or uneducated you are, everyone is always in it together. The target audience of the film is definitely a male audience, possibly about 18-25 years old. The crude humour used would be best suited to a male audience, with many references to sex and drugs. This would be suited to the Mainstreamer, as many Aspirers, explorers and Succeeders may not expect their core need to be fulfilled when watching the film. The Mainstreamer would like this film as it's a film most can enjoy, simple humour created, and their core need could be matched with the love of the community in the film, representing that Britain is a safe environment.

Stereotyping has been used a lot in Mrs Browns Boy’s, not so much in a derogatory manner, but to create a sense of familiar text, and the audience. Mrs Browns Boys stereotypes Britain (more specifically British communities) to be a tea-drinking, calm, loving society, there aren’t too many negative stereotypes that it uses. The hair of Agnes and Winnie represents an old fashioned look, one that was more common years ago than it is today, and we commonly associate the hairstyle with mothers, rather than young daughters. The constant change in clothing for Dermot gives the impression that he is uneducated, but it creates humour, and enigma coders, or “what will he be next episode” so to speak. The behaviour of the characters does stereotype men and women in Britain, that men are the ones working hard, and the women don’t work, or work part time jobs, but the mother is still the one driving the family, and keeping that special bond that they have. She stops Mark leaving the country, and Dermot from going to prison due to his antics, and constantly keeps Cathy’s confidence high, something that all mothers do well is to look out, and love their own. Some audiences could react differently, and say that Britain is boring, as not much actually goes on that is ‘eventful’ in the community, and they are all alcoholic, boring idiots. 

In The Sun, a lot more stereotyping is used compared to Mrs Brown’s Boys. The newspaper is representing the common views of Britain due to its popularity, but it often makes negative remarks about people from specific areas of the world, even making an unbelievable archetype of what a terrorist looks like, one being an ordinary Muslim looking female. They usually like to stereotype Muslims behaviour, claiming that they are prepared to take "OUR" jobs, creating that connection that makes them sales. The unpopular front cover of the Hillsborough disaster further strengthened people's stereotype of the people from Liverpool, to be robbing, degenerate idiots with no class or morales. As the Sun is the most popular paper, it could be considered that the opinion the Sun have represent the entire country, and while this isn't true, many of their opinions are based on the dominant ideology to create more sales, whether the encoders agree with those opinions or not, they make sales, the most important thing for them. A younger audience would take a different reading to the text, as younger people stereotypically tend to be more open-minded about matters the Sun are opposed to, like refugees for example. As older people are stereotypically more right wing, they are more likely to take a preferred reading to the paper, as the headlines the paper uses can be relatable to their opinions. 

In Grimsby, several archetypes of used, mainly the people of Grimsby. They are archetypically portrayed to be ugly, out of weight and on benefits. Their poor teeth, horrific language and choice of clothes represents that they are poor, and gives the audience the sense that they don't care about their life, and taking life as fun, and not seriously. They also very clearly have no standards, as they are seen at the start to be naked on a public bed in a shop, portraying chavs, specifically people from the area, to be strange, and little class. Sacha Baron Cohen usually plays a man who is a bumbling idiot, and in this, it's no exception, with Nobby being a man who finds it easy to present his love for his girlfriend very openly, with them even kissing in front of their many children, and in public. He speaks like the stereotypical chav, many slang words in a sentence, with a lack of intellectual words, representing Britain to have a lack of class. A younger audience would take a different reading to the film rather than an older audience, as the humour used is something that can be relatable to a younger audience due to the constant referral back to sex and drugs, while an older audience would possibly take the film too seriously, and not the satire the encoders are intending. As "chavs" aren't common in other countries, the humour may be lost in other countries due to the lack of familiarity in the film.

Mediation is something that is more commonly used in the Sun compared to the other two choices. The choices that the encoders make for the front cover of the Sun usually should represent the main story of the day, and as I've mentioned previously, due to the Sun being the most popular paper in the country, and views that the Sun have should be the dominant ideology, and their views that represent Britain in society. With any front cover of the Sun, the main story will usually take up the majority of the paper, whether that be about Brexit, sport or refugees for example. In this front cover, a-on the day after the Brexit vote was announced, the selection of images shows that Britain has been victorious, which several cheers from the people on the picture, connoting the immense amount of pride that the country. The cheers, raised hands, lifting people up all have been selected as the represent how happy the public is over the vote, representing that the majority of Britain did in fact want to leave the EU. The headline is a clever play on words, creating some humour as they've used the "EU" instead of "you", two words that sound similar, but could be seen to be disrespectful to the EU. This could represent Britain to be not proud of its history, as they clearly are looking ahead into the future with happiness, and they clearly don't regret leaving the EU, with the use of an exclamation mark to represent their joy at the time. At the bottom reads: "Nations BBQ Brexfast" another play on words with Brexit and breakfast, usually people serve a big breakfast at a time of happiness, and with the word "Nation" it creates a feeling that every single person is happy to leave, ignoring the fact that 48% did not want to part with the EU. The clear focus of the front cover is the happiness of "What's to come" in the future for the country. There was no other story on the front cover, representing that Britain don't care about anything else on the day, and they are all dedicated to their futures. In the picture, there is no person who is unhappy with the vote, representing that everyone in Britain was happy, and making their ideology seem "common sense" due to the lack of other ideology in the front cover.

Finally, anchorage and ideology is used, again more specifically in The Sun rather than Mrs Browns Boys and Grimsby. In this cover of The Sun, the Queen is the main image, with the masthead of "Queen backs Brexit". With no evidence to back it up, and the fact it's a statement, there is no way of trying to argue against it. With the Queen used on everything associated with Britain, banknotes, coins etc, the Queen is definitely the main "icon" for Britain, anything associated to her will mean that she represents everything about Britain. In this front cover, she looks prestigious in her crown and clothing, and with the statement next to her, the audience can't argue against what the Queen says, as it would be seen as wrong by many to do so. The audience hasn't been told anything other than what she claimed to have said, so with no other argument, the audience is forced to agree with the front cover. The cover has a very closer ideology that the Queen, the most important person in Britain right now, wants to scrap something that is so valuable to many in Britain, giving the ideology of "Out with the old". With the Queen looking into the camera, it gives the idea that now she has done her bit, she wants YOU to do YOU \R bit for the country, and agree with her.