Key Theory - Steve Neale - Theories Around Genre

Key Theory - Steve Neale - Theories Around Genre

• Why does genre exist?
• To set categories in between media texts. 
• To know your target audience.
• To get building blocks and make the media product that the audience expects.
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• Who benefits from generic classification?
• The media product maker would be benefited from this as they would have set roles to follow so they have conventions to follow so it is easier. 

• What are the advantages of genre?
• Allows audiences to classify films.
• Allows audiences to easily find films they enjoy.
• Gives audiences expectations.
• Producer has a route to follow, it gets films and tv shows made, utopia had no set genre so not a lot of people watched it which ended up in it being cancelled. 
• Allows you to completely rule out certain genre's if you know for a fact you will not like it. 

• What are some disadvantages?
• Gives audiences expectations which could be let down due to its set genre.
• False expectations.
• People can still make terrible films and name it in a certain genre so people will still watch it but be disappointed from this poor quality.

Steve Neale's - Theory

Neale believes that genre is essentially instances of 'repetition and difference'. He suggested that texts need to conform to some generic paradigms to be identified within a certain genre - but must also subvert these conventions in order to not appear identical.