Does the image dominate contemporary mass media society and does it matter?
Combined with semiotic signification, the images of contemporary mass media, in the form of advertising, cinema, television and print media form a nexus of meaning with the viewer at the centre. As suggested by Stuart and Elizabeth Ewen in Channels of Desire: Mass Images and the Shaping of American Consciousness (1982), such images become both reflective and creative, at once providing a mirror on and a foundation for the simulacra of modernity such as lifestyle and consumer aspirations. (more…)
