How are different social
groups represented in the sequence you have analysed? What role does the use of
media language, signs and signifiers have in constructing and presenting these
representations as real?
There
are many social groups represented in Stranger things, one prominent one is
teenagers. The group of boys (Mike, Will, Dustin and Lucas) are represented as
the stereotypical geeky boys. They love to play their make-believe board game Dungeons
and Dragons. This is stereotypical of young children to play with toys and
board games that were typical in the 1980s. As they are represented as nerds,
then we expect them to be playing these games rather than doing sports, playing
outside etc. Mike said to his mum that they had spent 10 hours playing the game
straight in the basement of mikes house, which gives them the representation of
nerdy/geeky. There is also the representation of the older teen. The Byers
family clearly are not well off in terms of money, so Jonathan, the older
brother, has to act as the mother when Joyce is out working. This is challenging
the stereotype of old teenagers as lazy as he has to help out with the family.
He has to cook breakfast, get Will up and ready for school and has to have a
job to help with the family finances.
Another
social group in Stranger Things is Mothers, especially Joyce Byers. Will’s mum
is a very prominent character in the first episode as we see her look for will
and how she is coping with him going missing. Joyce is a single mum who has to
look after her two sons with no help. We can see she is struggling to cope and
everything is quite frantic in the Byers household. She is struggling to get
everything organised and maintain a structured family unit. Though we can see
how caring she is and how much she loves her son. She reacts in a very
distressed way when finding out Will is missing, a reaction we would expect
from any mother if their son went missing. We can see by her facial expressions
and general worried demeanour, that she is desperate to find her son and would
do anything to find him. This is again shown in the scene with Hopper, the
zoomed in shot of the type writer with the word ‘MISSING’ in the foreground suggests
this is very serious and this increases the intense atmosphere. We can see the
mum is clearly stressed and nervous as she is very fidgety while smoking, a way
for her to calm down.
Another
social group represented in this episode is the police, especially the sheriff.
The sheriff is Hopper, who is represented as the stereotypical lazy American policeman.
We see this in the first time we see him, the lengthy shots which pan across
his home show a messy house, with fags and drink everywhere. It shows that he
is clearly struggling, but he does not want to show his feelings and get help,
which is something that is believed to be true in the media as men are not
expressive like that. This is again shown in the scene of him in his office
with Joyce. There are messy papers everywhere and he doesn’t look ready to hear
what Joyce has to say.
