Defining ideology:‘a thought or suggestion as to a possible course of action; a mental impression; a belief’.
"When the same life choices are valued by the majority of texts, the majority of the time, these ideologies become dominant. Because the majority of the mainstream media are owned by similar people, with similar interests, the majority of media texts encourage life choices that are in the interest of those media owners"
"He describes residual ideology referring to beliefs and practices that are derived from an earlier stage of society, and emergent ideology, referring to those values and practices which are developing in society outside of, and sometimes actively challenging, the dominant."
Wife Swap – the concept and the narrative
"The narrative structure is clear. After a set up which involves the male voiceover introducing the two families, the problematic is caused by two women being placed in unfamiliar roles at odds with their own values."
"The stage of selection in the process of representation cannot be overlooked here. Subjects are clearly chosen on the basis of their demographic and psychographic heterogeneity (or difference); it is no coincidence that moderns are swapped with traditionals, urbans with rurals, etc...These binary oppositions in the organisation of the programme are a basic prerequisite; no friction, no show."
This text challenges gender roles, expectations and their own values and how they might differ to others in society. This creates conflict of individuals and people creating entertainment for audiences.
"The structure: Stock situations throughout the majority of the show include disagreements between husband and new ‘wife’ in both homes as the two narrative strands of each family are cross-cut to imply parallel action, usually over cleaning, cooking and disciplining children. The narrative climax is provided by the showdown between the two wives in the debriefing."
The use of parallel allows audience to journey with both families learning new things from both. It also allows audiences to viewpoint from both sides. By paralleling these activities, usually done by women, is it at the same time reinforcing gender roles? Representation and stereotyping
"The swapping of wives, a sexual double entendre in itself, may suggest that a wife is owned by her husband in some way, and is his property to swap with another man. It is the woman who changes home and leaves her children, not the man....writing of manuals as ‘experts’ in their domestic environments and their participation in the final showdown, all reinforce the competitiveness of women for the approval of others, in this case, the audience."This is reinforcing a patriarchal society- females are swaping rather than males. Suggets women are interchangable. This could suggest there is hegemonic values in this text- as it still in some way subordinates women through male dominance. There is also a representation of women to need acceptance from other people and society- it reinforcies it as a representation and also it might impose this representation on others- media effects/hyperdermic needle theory
"It may be in keeping with feminist thought, Wife Swap refuses to take up a permanent ideological position on gender roles in contemporary life, preferring to sit, accompanied by the audience, on the proverbial fence – a particularly high fence from where we may look down with sadistic glee upon the warring, dogmatic wives."
Though it could be argued this is hegemony, a feminist would argue that there is no set gender ideologies- as some female characters are very dominant, there is no repetative ideology of males or females being more powerful than the other.
"It is usually one of the husbands who emerges in the most positive light, having undergone an emotional journey in which he realises that perhaps things could be done differently. Flexibility is therefore suggested as a desirable character trait; husbands who are willing to embark on a spiritual journey provided by Wife Swap are rewarded with positive – or at least sympathetic – representation."
There is a typical narrative struture, or narrative role that is dominant in the text: most likely constructed this way. Another example of hegemony- the males get the sympathetic view and the positive representation- suggested this text is constructed by an elite male.
"Such a narrative resolution is common in the ‘self-improvement’ broadcasting trends of the early twenty-first century. The problem with Wife Swap is that the couples don’t realise they’ve got a problem; that’s the show’s role to point out. Although the newly enlightened husband’s new ‘wife’ invariably claims his ‘conversion’ as her victory, it is doubtless short lived, as both women will be represented as narrative antagonists. The women rarely admit alternative life options are viable, sticking to their guns as overbearing harpy or lazy good-for-nothing. Who was it who said that if women ruled the world, there’d be no more war? Certainly nobody working on Wife Swap!"
This shows how the text suggests how people should be or live- media effects theory.
"Whilst the juxtaposition of such obvious binary opposites is useful in the study of ideology itself, it is the narrative representation of women that I find most interesting. I’m fascinated not by the ideological choices that the producers openly display for us to dissect, but by the ideology implicitly encoded in the programme’s production."
Wife Swap case study – the New Year episode: Channel 4’s Christmas 2004 ‘specials’
"The audience’s perception of these two women is very carefully constructed in the opening five minutes of the show; and we may begin to make some educated guesses about how the audience will be positioned in relation to the female ‘stars’ of the show."
"Darenda is presented seated in the bottom two thirds of the frame, on the far left of a high angle shot with Pete, standing, taking up most of the right hand side. He points at her as he speaks, as if addressing a child, and penetrating her half of the frame. Dressed in a shirt and tie in comparison to her casual style, and emphasised by the choice of shot type, Pete appears authoritative and domineering, Darenda insolent and child-like. To reinforce the point, Darenda punctuates her sentences with the word ‘fuck’ – and it’s only two minutes past 9pm. The VO continues, ‘and what happens when your new man doesn’t meet your standards?’ There is no irony lost in the juxtaposition of the now common-currency term ‘new man’ to anchor an image of Alani in which the pint he is downing takes up the majority of the mid-shot."
This is an analysis of how characters are mediated to convey an ideology of the institution. It is mostly done in the opening of the text.
"Whilst we cannot overlook the way Wife Swap is constructed, the fact remains that the participants are real people, living real lives after the cameras have stopped rolling. For us, as audience, the pleasure in the programme comes from our view of the drama of social difference played out before us. Not only must the participants be different from each other, they must be different from the audience. Perhaps this is why this particular episode of Wife Swap is so entertaining."
This reminds us that the text is based on real people, but is constructed to show create entertainment: this is why the show is popular.
"Going back to Raymond Williams’ classifications of ideology: whilst the audience are dominant, Bonny has been represented as having residual values, and Darenda as having emergent, both safely represented as outside the ‘norm’."
"Wife Swap is no more or less constructed than any other pseudo social-scientific documentary"
"These hour-long offerings of entertainment contain significant records of social identity and hierarchies of class in Britain in the early twenty-first century."
Lucy Scott-Galloway teaches Media Studies at Havering 6th Form College
This article first appeared in MediaMagazine 12, April 2005
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