Evaluation Question 2

How effective is the combination of the main product and ancillary texts?

The ideology of my products is to be local and right wing. Rural interested and family orientated. With a conservative ethos, a friendly newspaper and ancillary texts which appeals precisely to housewives. Ideologies are used within the product to help to link it to the secondary products. The ideology of my newspaper was that it was family friendly, it introduced housewives with the news of the community, especially that of children and families. I used this ideology within the secondary products also by involving a picture of a child and a mother on my poster. I believed that this would attract the eye of mothers. I used similar pictures to header each page of the website as well – the first one being four generations in the same family reading a newspaper, the second a grandmother and granddaughter and the third a little child on their own. I feel that without being exactly the same picture, it is the same theme and combines the two together along with the newspaper as being family friendly is its main ethos.

The Conventions used within the three products help to link them as a whole. The fact that the same props (the newspaper) was used within the picture for the poster and the webpage links the two secondary texts together. The register of the articles in the newspaper, website and poster are very similar which will therefore unconsciously be a link for the reader.

 The codes used help the newspaper link to the secondary products. The name of the newspaper on the newspaper itself is the same font, which is used to advertise the newspaper on the poster and the webpage. I think it is important to keep the same or similar fonts throughout for the title of the newspaper because it links all of the three products together for the audience and it will be a recognizable font so I continued to use san-serif text. The logo of my newspaper is also on all three of the products and this helps to link them together. I think this is effective because everyone will see the logo and automatically know what it is for It is also important to do this with the colour as well. I decided that I was going to use a dark purple colour for the title of the newspaper and I have tried to keep this theme throughout – the title of the webpage also is dark purple.

The Representation of the social group is provided in both the newspaper and the secondary products. The language used throughout is intellectual and friendly, representing women as both academic and friendly.  It also shows housewives to be family orientated because not only does the poster have a picture of a mother and daughter reading the newspaper, but the webpage also contains this. My newspaper as a whole along with the website and poster represent women to be very family orientated and I believe this is very clear.

Representation Theory is used within my products. The way in which the newspaper, poster and website is written and the process of this. I have developed male gaze theory within my newspaper and have a slight Female gaze as the idea of adding a footballer within the magazine represents the fact that women want to know about things what other men do, especially famous footballers which live in the area. All of my products use implicit personality theory of representation because it is based on stereotypes of right wing housewives. This idea is also involved in Hegemonic Theory of representation because the news is in control of what people think – they rely on the newspaper to give them the correct information. The hypodermic Needle Theory of Representation also applies as the audience is passive and believes what the newspaper tells them. The idea of social conditioning is therefore present as there is an idea that the audience is being trained to think what the newspaper says in the articles.

Narrative theory is used within my products as Levis Strauss’ idea of binary oppositions is something, which I have used. I have used black and white in my poster, young and old through colours and through stock characters.  This is to promote how my newspaper is family orientated and to show the connection between ages and generations through one thing – a newspaper.

When producing a newspaper, it is important to think about the awareness of audience and expectations. The audience expects something from the newspaper they read and each week they expect the same. I have tried to make sure that my newspaper was local and contained stories which would be important to the community. Women like to know about other families and their stories and I tried to incorporate the fact that there were local stories, mainly focusing on families and children. Therefore focusing on C/B socio-demographic groups.