1:27 p.m.
Dear all,
This is a quick reminder that next week we have an extended IMS seminar, starting at 9.00,
where I, Signe, will present and discuss my thesis draft. Kim Christian Schrøder,
Department of Communication and Arts, Roskilde University, Denmark, professor in Audiences
and Mediated Life, is the opponent.
If any of you have not received the thesis, and want to have a look at it before the
seminar, please email me at ims at lnu.se.
Abstract:
This thesis is an audience reception study of film music and animation film, centered
around the ways that animated characters are constructed as psychological beings which
children can understand and identify with – as if they were real humans. The analysis
considers the narrative context of a character but is particularly focused on the musical
and multimodal construction of a character, meaning particular attention is put on how
character traits are communicated by the use of music, voice, colours, camera perspective,
etc. This analysis of the construction of characters is then compared to actual child
audiences’ expressions of their experiences and interpretations, obtained through
observations and interviews, in order to highlight how children understand and relate to
the material they are presented to.
Understanding and interpreting an animated film is conditioned by the structure of that
film, but interpretation is also conditioned by the communicative situation and social
position of the audience, as well as personal experiences, and as such no ‘absolute’
interpretation can be made, not even within a uniform group. This does not mean that we
shouldn’t aim to understand how people process and relate to media, however, or to
understand how children experience the animated films that are so immensely popular,
overflowing our mainstream culture. By analysing the multimodal semiotic potential of
three selected films, Frozen (2013), Up (2009) and Shrek the Third (2007), and comparing
these analyses with children’s multimodal expressions (children often communicate through
gestures or by humming or signing, necessitating multimodal interview transcriptions) of
their understandings and opinions, it is the goal of this thesis to shed light on the ways
that children relate to and use filmic form, particularly music, in negotiating the
content, particularly characters, of the film, in a process where meaning is created in
the active reception process of a child in a communicative situation
The seminar is on the 21 April. Note that it starts 1 hour early at 9.00 CEST. As always
the seminar will be on zoom: https://lnu-se.zoom.us/j/940933326
I hope to see many of you there!
Best wishes,
Signe – on behalf of myself and of IMS
Signe Kjaer Jensen
PhD student in Comparative Literature
Centre for Intermedial and Multimodal Studies (IMS)
Linnæus University
Department of Film and Literature
351 95 Växjö
Sweden
https://lnu.se/personal/signe.kjaerjensen/
signe.kjaerjensen at lnu.se<mailto:signe.kjaerjensen at lnu.se>
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