lnwh

Question 1

product context

Answer 1

• Spin-off from the long-running BBC Radio 4 daily magazine programme, Woman’s Hour.
• Broadcast once a month, late at night, is presented by Lauren Laverne and features a number of female panellists.
• Each episode focuses on a particular theme relevant to its female audience e.g. ‘home’ and ‘forgiveness’.

Question 2

historical context

Answer 2

• First broadcasted in the 1940s
• Late Night Women’s Hour features frank and open discussion, and demonstrates societal shifts and increased gender equality although some of the issues raised reflect the fact that society is not yet completely equal.

Question 3

Recent technological change and media production, distribution and circulation and the impact of digitally convergent media platforms:

Answer 3

• The broadcast offers a number of ways to explore recent changes to the radio industry in relation to digital technology such as the profound changes that have been brought about by switching from analogue FM radio to digital audio broadcasting (DAB).
• A brief history of radio before the mid-1990s should allow learners to appreciate the significance of podcasting and listening to broadcasts on digitally convergent platforms such as computers and smartphones.
• Late Night Woman’s Hour has an 11 p.m. broadcast timeslot.
• Audiences can now listen on devices other than radios and download podcasts to enjoy at their leisure which means the time a broadcast airs live might be less significant.
• DAB technology affords broadcasters more freedom. The late-night slot (after the watershed) allows broadcasters freedom to make challenging or controversial content in the knowledge that it can still reach audiences

Question 4

how media producers maintain varieties of audiences:

Answer 4

• Lauren Laverne, host, is associated with alternative music from her career
• Laverne’s relative youth and reputation for being outspoken and irreverent might be seen as a deliberate attempt to create controversy (at least in comparison to other Radio 4 content) surrounding some use of bad language and the content in some episodes of this show.
• LNWH has been designed to suit Laverne’s persona rather than being a broadcast she has been asked to present

Question 5

theory
power & media, curran and seaton:

Answer 5

• Late Night Woman’s Hour challenges the idea that media is controlled by a small number of companies driven by the logic of profit and power.
• Whilst the BBC is inarguably a large, significant company, the nature of PSB and the content of the broadcast seem to be at odds with the “logic of profit and power”.
• The license fee frees BBC producers from the pressure to generate profit and the way in which this impacts the content of their broadcasts.
• Supports theory as socially diverse patterns of ownership help create conditions for varied and adventurous productions.

Question 6

social and cultural context

Answer 6

• A gendered discussion of the broadcast is likely to benefit from some context regarding the changing roles of women in the UK over the past 70 years.
• Woman’s Hour was originally broadcast in the 1940s, life in the UK for women now focuses on the shifts from the 1950s housewife towards the independence of young women in the 1960s and comparing this with present day

Question 7

How audiences are grouped and categorised by media industries:

Answer 7

• Offers clear examples of audience grouping and content being developed for specific (possibly niche) audiences.
• Challenges the established audience of radio 4, the audience might include the obvious gender bias, the presence of Lauren Laverne and the nature of the content.
• The gender bias of the show could be explored by considering the traditional male audience of Radio 4 and the likelihood that these men would listen to the show
• Similarly, the presence of Lauren Laverne (with her indie music background) and the “edgy” content of the show could be explored against the traditional demographic of Radio 4.

Question 8

How audiences interpret the media, including how and why audiences may interpret the same media in different ways:

Answer 8

• media texts are composed of only female members (even Loose Women for instance has male guests) and how this might be unsettling or alienating for male listeners.

Question 9

How media organisations reflect the different needs of mass and specialised audiences, including through targeting:

Answer 9

• A return to the remit of PSB here could invite discussion about the BBC and attempts to produce content for all audience demographics.

Question 10

theory
reception, hall

Answer 10

• There may be some particularly interesting oppositional readings (largely in relation to a perceived masculine response). A gendered approach may consider the lack of male representation
• In 2014 the BBC famously introduced a ban on all male TV and radio panels to offset dominance.