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‘Mediated’ and ‘Unmediated’ Discourse
It is important not to confuse ‘spontaneous’ discourse of the kind
discussed in Chapters 3 and 4 with conversations and interviews as repre-
sented in literature and the media. Literary and media texts, and many of
the ‘texts’ considered in cultural studies, can be said to be
mediated
, that is,
they are constructed with an audience in mind. This simple fact is
important to remember, because it fundamentally affects the nature of the
discourse found in these types of text. In ‘unmediated’ discourse, a number
of friends might gossip to affirm their social and group identities. In a play,
novel, film or television programme, a group of characters might be
Using Literary, Media and Cultural Studies
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presented as gossiping – but for reasons that go beyond the negotiation of
group values. The author might be satirising the characters, holding them
up to ridicule, or alternatively, he or she might be demonstrating their high
moral fibre. The gossip itself might simply be a strategy for revealing
hitherto undivulged information, and therefore heightening suspense or
explaining some plot development. The purpose of gossip in mediated
texts is therefore not what it would be in unmediated texts.
The nature of mediated texts means that we cannot simply apply the
discourse rules of unmediated texts to them. The ‘conversation’ between
the guest and host in a televised chat show may seem in some respects to be
like a conversation between old friends, but the presence of a studio
audience and a wider unseen audience means that it has different goals,
and so different rules and linguistic choices will be adopted. Even the
presence of television cameras at a political conference will alter the nature
of the communicative event: as well as being a rallying cry to the party
faithful, the conference will also become a television advertisement for the
unity and coherence of the party. Internal debate may therefore be sup-
pressed and restricted to off-camera events.
The analysis of mediated texts has to take into consideration their
function as entertainment or propaganda. However, mediated texts also
enter into the ongoing social negotiation of what it is to be a member of a
given culture at a particular time. For example, characters in television
soap operas can confirm or even overstep the bounds of social propriety,
and therefore become objects of unmediated ‘gossip’ among viewers, an
activity often fuelled also by tabloid press coverage (Blum-Kulka, 2000:
219–20). A gay relationship, a betrayal, physical violence under duress – all
these mediated events can prompt informal re-negotiation among groups
of viewers about what is acceptable or unacceptable behaviour in society.
In a way, the character in popular fiction, film or television, ‘stands in for’
the absent friend who might also be the subject of gossip. By a process of
transference, the life-style of the actor who plays the character might also
become the subject of gossip. There is therefore an interaction between
some mediated texts and unmediated discourse – the former prompts
cultural debate and perhaps shifts in a society’s attitude to represented
individuals or groups.
I have chosen to look in slightly greater detail below at some mediated
texts from situation comedies and talk shows, partly because these two
media genres are typically played in front of a live audience, which parallels
(and is sometimes used to prompt) the home audience, and partly because
the staples of these media genres (conversations and interviews) parallel the
speech genres discussed elsewhere in this book (Chapters 3 and 6).
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Intercultural Approaches to ELT
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