MEDIA AND INFORMATION LANGUAGES

Media language is a method, consisting of signs and symbols, used by

information producers to convey meanings to their audiences (Orlebar, 2009).
It is a set of technical codes and conventions to communicate information
(UNESCO, 2016).

1. Codes are systems of signs that are put together to create arbitrary
meaning (Fiske, 1987). There are two common types of codes: technical
codes (ways in which materials are used to tell the story in media such
as camera angles and techniques) and symbolic codes (comprise of
objects, setting, body language, and actions that signify things more
than what is seen by the audience).
2. Convention, according David Croteau and William Hoynes (2003), is a
practice or technique that i widely used in the field. Conventions n be
classified as either technical conventions (applied to technical area
such as the length of television series or movies) and genre convention
(associated with the type f content).

Codes and conventions are used to represent an information in a specific

manner that oftentimes do not represent reality. This is referred to as media
representation.

Croteau and Hoynes (2003) provided several issues that explained how media
represents the world.

1. Media representations are not the realities of the world, but only
results of selection processes that highlight some aspects f reality d
neglect others.
2. Information producers use media to develop some ideals, or to convey
principles.
3. The definition of the term "real" is indefinite for many scholars.
One way to analyze media representation is through denotation (the literal
aspect of information) and connotation (the meaning or interpretation people
associate with an information.