ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the concept of the text as a way of focusing on and analysing the meaning of media output. It explores the ways in which media make meaning, by defining and using tools of rhetorical analysis and then semiological analysis. Likewise, in interpreting the text as a ‘creative’ and meaningful product of the various media, the learners aim to go beyond mere description in order to articulate fully what it has to say to us about the world. Thus, media products come in a range of guises and make meaning through a variety of means, with many purposes, as part of a relationship between producer and consumer. Therefore, the learners can see that texts and textual meanings are always contextualised. In each case meaning is inflected first and foremost by the manner and mode of communication. Ultimately, the aim of media in organising meaning is to get audiences to pay attention, and so aid cognition.
