Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Since 1997 Representation has been the key go-to textbook for students learning the tools to question and critically analyze institutional and media texts and images. This long-awaited Second Edition :

* update and refreshes the approach to theories of representation by signalling key developments in the field

* addresses the emergence of new technologies and formats of representation, from the internet and the digital revolution to reality TV

* includes an entirely new chapter on celebrity culture and personalisation, to debates about representation and democracy, and involve illustrations of an intertextual nature, cutting across various technologies and formats in which ′the real′ or the authentic makes an appearance

* offers new exercises, new readings, new images and examples for a new generation of students

This book will once again prove an indispensible resource for students and teachers in cultural and media studies.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Acknowledgements (p. xii)
• Introduction (p. xvii)
• Chapter 1 The Work Of Representation (p. 1)
• 1 Representation, Meaning and Language (p. 1)
• 1.1 Making meaning, representing things (p. 2)
• 1.2 Language and representation (p. 5)
• 1.3 Sharing the codes (p. 7)
• 1.4 Theories of representation (p. 10)
• 1.5 The language of traffic lights (p. 11)
• 1.6 Summary (p. 13)
• 2 Saussure's Legacy (p. 16)
• 2.1 The social part of language (p. 18)
• 2.2 Critique of Saussure's model (p. 19)
• 2.3 Summary (p. 20)
• 3 From Language to Culture: Linguistics to semiotics (p. 20)
• 3.1 Myth today (p. 24)
• 4 Discourse, Power and the Subject (p. 26)
• 4.1 From language to discourse (p. 29)
• 4.2 Historicizing discourse: discursive practices (p. 31)
• 4.3 From discourse to power/knowledge (p. 32)
• 4.4 Summary: Foucault and representation (p. 35)
• 4.5 Charcot and the performance of hysteria (p. 36)
• 5 Where is 'the Subject'? (p. 39)
• 5.1 How to make sense of Velasquez' Las Meninas (p. 40)
• 5.2 The subject of/in representation (p. 42)
• 6 Conclusion: Representation, meaning and language reconsidered (p. 45)
• References (p. 46)
• Readings for Chapter One (p. 48)
• Reading A Norman Bryson, 'Language, reflection and still life' (p. 48)
• Reading B Roland Barthes, 'The world of wrestling' (p. 50)
• Reading C Roland Barthes, 'Myth today' (p. 52)
• Reading D Roland Barthes, 'Rhetoric of the image' (p. 53)
• Reading E Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, New Reflections on the Revolution of Our Time (p. 54)
• Reading F Elaine Showalter, 'The performance of hysteria' (p. 56)
• Chapter 2 recording reality: documentary film and Television (p. 60)
• 1 Introduction (p. 60)
• 2 What do we Mean by 'Documentary'? (p. 62)
• 2.1 Non-fiction texts (p. 62)
• 2.2 Defining documentary (p. 64)
• 3 Types of Documentary (p. 66)
• 3.1 Categorizing documentary (p. 66)
• 3.2 Alternative categories (p. 71)
• 3.3 Ethical documentary filmmaking (p. 74)
• 4 Dramatization and the Documentary (p. 75)
• 4.1 Scripting and re-enactment in the documentary (p. 75)
• 4.2 Docudrama (p. 80)
• 5 Documentary - An historic genre? (p. 81)
• 5.1 'Postdocumentary'? (p. 81)
• 5.2 Docusoaps (p. 83)
• 5.3 Reality TV (p. 89)
• 6 Natural History Documentaries (p. 90)
• 6.1 Documenting animal life (p. 90)
• 7 Conclusion (p. 96)
• References (p. 97)
• Readings for Chapter Two (p. 100)
• Reading A Bill Nichols, 'The qualities of voice' (p. 100)
• Reading B John Corner, 'Performing the real: documentary diversions' (p. 103)
• Reading C Derek Bousé, 'Historia fabulosus' (p. 115)
• Chapter 3 The Poetics and the Politics of Exhibiting Other Cultures (p. 120)
• 1 Introduction (p. 120)
• 2 Establishing Definitions, Negotiating Meanings, Discerning Objects (p. 122)
• 2.1 Introduction (p. 122)
• 2.2 What is a 'museum'? (p. 122)
• 2.3 What is an 'ethnographic museum'? (p. 127)
• 2.4 Objects and meanings (p. 128)
• 2.5 The uses of text (p. 132)
• 2.6 Questions of context (p. 133)
• 2.7 Summary (p. 134)
• 3 Fashioning Cultures: The poetics of exhibiting (p. 134)
• 3.1 Introduction (p. 134)
• 3.2 Introducing Paradise (p. 135)
• 3.3 Paradise regained (p. 146)
• 3.4 Structuring Paradise (p. 148)
• 3.5 Paradise: the exhibit as artefact (p. 150)
• 3.6 The myths of Paradise (p. 152)
• 3.7 Summary (p. 156)
• 4 Captivating Cultures: The politics of exhibiting (p. 157)
• 4.1 Introduction (p. 157)
• 4.2 Knowledge and power (p. 157)
• 4.3 Displaying others (p. 159)
• 4.4 Museums and the construction of culture (p. 163)
• 4.5 Colonial spectacles (p. 167)
• 4.6 Summary (p. 170)
• 5 Devising New Models: Museums and their futures (p. 171)
• 5.1 Introduction (p. 171)
• 5.2 Anthropology and colonial knowledge (p. 172)
• 5.3 The writing of anthropological knowledge (p. 172)
• 5.4 Collections as partial truths (p. 173)
• 5.5 Museums and contact zones (p. 177)
• 5.6 Art, artefact and ownership (p. 180)
• 6 Conclusion (p. 184)
• References (p. 186)
• Acknowledgements (p. 191)
• Readings for Chapter Three (p. 192)
• Reading A John Tradescant the younger, extracts from Musaeum Tradescantianum (p. 192)
• Reading B Elizabeth A. Lawrence, 'His very silence speaks: the horse who survived Custer's Last Stand' (p. 195)
• Reading C Michael O'Hanlon, Paradise: portraying the New Guinea Highlands (p. 199)
• Reading D James Clifford, 'Paradise' (p. 203)
• Reading E Annie E. Coombes, 'Material culture at the crossroads of knowledge: the case of the Benin "bronzes'" (p. 206)
• Reading F John Picton, 'To see or not to see! That is the question' (p. 211)
• Chapter 4 The Spectacle Of The 'Other' (p. 215)
• 1 Introduction (p. 215)
• 1.1 Heroes or villains? (p. 216)
• 1.2 Why does' difference' matter? (p. 224)
• 2 Racializing the 'Other' (p. 228)
• 2.1 Commodity racism: Empire and the domestic world (p. 229)
• 2.2 Meanwhile, down on the plantation ... (p. 232)
• 2.3 Signifying racial 'difference' (p. 233)
• 3 Staging Racial 'Difference': 'And the melody lingered on ...' (p. 237)
• 3.1 Heavenly bodies (p. 243)
• 4 Stereotyping as a Signifying Practice (p. 247)
• 4.1 Representation, difference and power (p. 249)
• 4.2 Power and fantasy (p. 251)
• 4.3 Fetishism and disavowal (p. 253)
• 5 Contesting a Racialized Regime of Representation (p. 259)
• 5.1 Reversing the stereotypes (p. 260)
• 5.2 Positive and negative images (p. 262)
• 5.3 Through the eye of representation (p. 263)
• 6 Conclusion (p. 267)
• References (p. 270)
• Readings for Chapter Four (p. 272)
• Reading A Anne McClintock, 'Soap and commodity spectacle' (p. 272)
• Reading B Richard Dyer, 'Africa' (p. 276)
• Reading C Sander Gilman, 'The deep structure of stereotypes' (p. 278)
• Reading D Kobena Mercer, 'Reading racial fetishism' (p. 280)
• Chapter 5 Exhibiting Masculinity (p. 288)
• 1 Introduction (p. 288)
• 2 Conceptualizing Masculinity (p. 294)
• 2.1 Plural masculinities (p. 295)
• 2.2 Thinking relationally (p. 295)
• 2.3 Invented categories (p. 298)
• 2.4 Summary (p. 298)
• 3 Discourse and Representation (p. 299)
• 3.1 Discourse, power/knowledge and the subject (p. 299)
• 4 Visual Codes of Masculinity (p. 301)
• 4.1 'Street style' (p. 302)
• 4.2 'Italian American' (p. 305)
• 4.3 'Conservative Englishness' (p. 307)
• 4.4 Summary (p. 310)
• 5 Spectatorship and Subjectivization (p. 311)
• 5.1 Psychoanalysis and subjectivity (p. 312)
• 5.2 Spectatorship (p. 314)
• 5.3 The spectacle of masculinity (p. 315)
• 5.4 The problem with psychoanalysis and film theory (p. 316)
• 5.5 Techniques of the self (p. 317)
• 6 Consumption and Spectatorship (p. 318)
• 6.1 Sites of representation (p. 319)
• 6.2 Just looking (p. 320)
• 6.3 Spectatorship, consumption and the 'new man' (p. 321)
• 7 Conclusion (p. 322)
• References (p. 324)
• Readings for Chapter Five (p. 326)
• Reading A Steve Neale, 'Masculinity as spectacle' (p. 326)
• Reading B Sean Nixon, 'Technologies of looking: retailing and the visual' (p. 330)
• Chapter 6 Genre and Gender: The Case of Soap Opera (p. 335)
• 1 Introduction (p. 335)
• 2 Representation and Media Fictions (p. 336)
• 2.1 Fiction and everyday life (p. 336)
• 2.2 Fiction as entertainment (p. 338)
• 2.3 But is it good for you? (p. 340)
• 3 Mass Culture and Gendered Culture (p. 341)
• 3.1 Women's culture and men's culture (p. 341)
• 3.2 Images of women vs real women (p. 342)
• 3.3 Entertainment as a capitalist industry (p. 343)
• 3.4 Dominant ideology, hegemony and cultural negotiation (p. 344)
• 3.5 The gendering of cultural forms: high culture vs mass culture (p. 345)
• 4 Genre, Representation and Soap Opera (p. 347)
• 4.1 The genre system (p. 347)
• 4.1.1 The genre product (p. 347)
• 4.1.2 Genre and mass-produced fiction (p. 349)
• 4.2 Genre as standardization and differentiation (p. 349)
• 4.3 The genre product as text (p. 351)
• 4.3.1 Genres and binary differences (p. 353)
• 4.3.2 Genre boundaries (p. 353)
• 4.4 Signification and reference (p. 355)
• 4.4.1 Cultural verisimilitude, generic verisimilitude and realism (p. 356)
• 4.5 Media production and struggles for hegemony (p. 357)
• 4.6 Summary (p. 361)
• 5 Genres for Women: The case of soap opera (p. 361)
• 5.1 Genre, soap opera and gender (p. 361)
• 5.1.1 The invention of soap opera (p. 362)
• 5.1.2 Women's culture (p. 362)
• 5.1.3 Soap opera as women's genre (p. 363)
• 5.1.4 Soap opera's binary oppositions (p. 363)
• 5.1.5 Serial form and gender representation (p. 364)
• 5.2 Soap opera's address to the female audience (p. 366)
• 5.2.1 Talk vs action (p. 368)
• 5.2.2 Soap opera's serial world (p. 368)
• 5.3 Textual address and the construction of subjects (p. 369)
• 5.3.1 The ideal spectator (p. 369)
• 5.3.2 Female reading competence (p. 371)
• 5.3.3 Cultural competence and the implied reader of the text (p. 373)
• 5.3.4 The social audience (p. 374)
• 6 Conclusion (p. 376)
• 6.1 Soap opera: a woman's form no more? (p. 376)
• 6.2 Dissolving genre boundaries and gendered negotiations (p. 378)
• References (p. 383)
• Readings for Chapter Six (p. 385)
• Reading A Tania Modleski, 'The search for tomorrow in today's soap operas' (p. 385)
• Reading B Charlotte Brunsdon, 'Crossroads: notes on soap opera' (p. 387)
• Reading C Su Holmes and Deborah Jermyn, 'Why not Wife Swap?' (p. 389)
• Index (p. 391)