Wednesday, 15 November 2023

KA1 - independent revision tasks

Lessons are essential but revision is where things start to make sense. Revision literally means 'to look at something again'. In lessons you will be seeing things for the first time. In revision, you take another look, and practice your approach.

You can find the class notes from the time we did this as a class by clicking here! There's lots of good stuff so do it right now before you try these tasks!



Revising how to revise

Check out this handy infographic on what forms of revision are best, and what forms of revision are less effective. Basically, there is no such thing as bad revision, but you need to mix it up!

Revising how to actually write an essay

This might be a bit much right now, but if you want to know exactly what to do in an exam situation, check this post out

Revising question one: unseen analysis revision - for the unseen textual analysis question, you are going on a journey. Using media language, you will talk about how the thing you are studying creates meaning. These meanings may be extremely complex, or confusing, or profound, or weird, or straightforward, but as long as you back up your response, you can say what you want and get marks!

The media language question in component one is always unseen. You will get something you've never seen before, either print or video based. For this upcoming KA it will be an 'advert' of some description, but it can be loads of other things in the final exam.

Pick a brand, for example Paco Rabane, McDonalds, Sainsburys, Playstation, Amazon Prime, or literally anything else. Then Bing/Google/Dogpile "[brand name] video advert" (or just advert)

With the textual analysis toolkit in front of you, break it down. Pull out the meaning. How does this advert construct meaning? Make a BIG snappy bullet point list of elements of media language, and the meaning it creates. That's it! That's where your marks come from.

Next, use this plan, and spend fifteen frantic minutes writing an answer to the question 'How does this advert construct meaning?'

Then do this again, but Bing/Google/Dogpile "[brand name] print advert" instead.

Revising question two: defining a key term or concept - for this one, you have to know the answer. Give a quick definition, and a quick example, and you're sorted!

Here is a list of industry terms and concepts you could be asked to define in the mock exam. Please make sure you can do so. That's it!

  • BBFC
  • Circulation 
  • Conglomerate/conglomeration
  • Convergence
  • Digital convergence 
  • Digital technology
  • Distribution
  • Horizontal integration
  • Independent 
  • Major
  • Marketing
  • Monopoly
  • Multimedia integration
  • Regulation
  • Subsidiary
  • Synergy
  • Vertical integration

Revising question three: film industry question - industry questions are about cold hard facts, and not analysis! So do you know how much the film made? Who starred in it? How many US cinemas it opened in? What UK age certificate it received, and exactly why? If not, you need to get online and do some research!


This one is way more straightforward. Remember for Black Panther, we have studied the trailer, other forms of marketing, a key indicative scene and some other things. But you don't need to analyse: you just need to chuck out facts. Here are the questions you could be asked:

  • How is this media product produced, distributed and circulated, and by who? 
  • In what ways does the specific industry (i.e film, newspaper, radio, videogame, TV or magazine) use specialised forms of production, distribution and circulation?
  • How have recent technological changes in this industry changed production, distribution and circulation?
  • Who owns this media product? Who owns them? Are they a part of a conglomerate, and/or vertically integrated? 
  • What economic factors have affected this product? How financially successful was it? Was it made commercially or not for profit?
  • How does this product attract and maintain its audiences both locally and globally? What marketing and promotion does it use to do this?
  • How exactly is this industry regulated, and who does it?
  • How have new digital technologies affected how this industry is regulated?
  • How did the specific process of production, distribution and circulation shape this media product?
  • How has digital convergence affected how the media product is distributed, produced and its circulation?
  • How has the way this product is regulated affected its global production, distribution and circulation?
  • How do individual producers (eg bloggers, vloggers, independent directors etc) affect this industry?
And here are the theorists you should refer to:

  • James Curran and Jean Seaton – power and the media industries
  • Sonia Livingstone and Peter Lunt – regulation 
  • David Hesmondhalgh – cultural industries

That's it!