The Voice CSP: case study blog tasks

Language and contexts

Homepage

Go to the Voice homepage and answer the following:

1) What news website key conventions can you find on the Voice homepage?

-recognisable logo "the voice"

-well established brand "40 years"

-unconventional Faith section in comparison to other newspaper brands 

-home bar

-the penguin logo is a big publisher logo

-search bar 

-articles

-big pictures 

2) What are some of the items in the top menu bar and what does this tell you about the content, values and ideologies of the Voice?

the home bar has news, sports, lifestyle, entertainment, competition, opinion, faith

These subjects imply that The Voice is comprehensive and makes sure to cover a variety of subjects. Additionally, they present news articles from a black viewpoint, and their views and ideals about the black community are highlighted in the part titled Black parent-child experiences of racism affect whole family's mental health, new study.

3) Look at the news stories on the Voice homepage. Pick two stories and explain why they might appeal to the Voice's target audience. 

Black disabled face additional hurdles

24th October 2023

 THREE QUARTERS of Black Brits believe that Black disabled people face an additional layer of discrimination in society.

this article exports how the Black disable people face more decimations as they receive discrimination fir being both racism and discrimination the article mentions statics and mentions representations

Race ‘more important’ than religion

24th October 2023

The finding that 51 percent of those polled picked the identity as a Black person over their faith will come as a surprise to some religious leaders who preach that their identities as children of God should come first.The Black British Voices (BBV) survey, the largest study into social attitudes in the UK’s Black community, also found more respondents saying they were ‘spiritual’ than ‘religious.’ That may be an indication that ‘Black consciousness’ emphasises the spiritual connection with the earth and ancestors, and the belief in a ‘higher power’ is not always limited to the God of a particular faith or denomination.The widespread belief within Black communities that we are a more ‘spiritual people’ is underscored by rising attendance in the expanding evangelical churches, and increasing numbers converting to Islam.

4) How is narrative used to encourage audience engagement with the Voice? Apply narrative theories (e.g. Todorov equilibrium or Barthes’ enigma codes) and make specific reference to stories on the homepage and how they encourage audiences to click through to them.

The voice will often emphasise the ability of their articles to repair our disequilibrium and offer consumers a new equilibrium. In this way, Todorov's narrative theory is quite a useful framework to understand how newspapers appeal to the audience.ifestyle section

Now analyse the Lifestyle section of the Voice and answer the following:

1) What are the items in the sub-menu bar for the Lifestyle section and what does this suggest about the Voice audience?

-fashion and beauty

-food 

-health and wellbeing 

-relationships

-travel

this suggest that it explore cultural conventions which links to blumber and katz theory uses and gratification theory as the audience would experience personal identity.

 

2) What are the main stories in the Lifestyle section currently?

NHS Launches Campaign To Tell Patients About the Support Available at GP Practices

25 October 2023

Answers on vaccines

18 october 2023

3) Do the sections and stories in the Voice Lifestyle section challenge or reinforce black stereotypes in British media?

I believe that there is a challenge to sterotypes as despite the common misconception that black people are unsuccessful, there are a lot of inspiring tales of black success on The Voice. For instance, Beats and Bands' founder is inviting all of you to visit and experience the excitement for yourselves.

4) Choose two stories featured in the Lifestyle section – how do they reflect the values and ideologies of the Voice?

Supporting our children’s health

this reflects taking the wellbeing of the community for looking out for younger ages 

The Importance of Boundaries in Trauma Healing

this again reflects the wellbeing of the community and gives suggests on how to take care of yourself which makes sure that the audience are able to connect with the newspaper.

Feature focus

1) Read this Voice opinion piece on black representation in the tech industry. How does this piece reflect the values and ideologies of The Voice?

Embracing a bold, Black British future in the tech industry means giving our community the opportunity to thrive and flourish in an environment where authenticity and talent is appreciated and celebrated. We, the Black British community continue to shape the culture and inspire innovation. It is important to understand that diversity and inclusion go hand in hand – you cannot have one without the other.

2) Read this feature on The Black Pound campaign. How does this piece reflect the values and ideologies of The Voice?

 it will be made available at no cost to consumers who demonstrate their support at Black Pound Day’s two Westfield stores, which proudly showcase a curated collection of over 150 Black businesses. Notably, Black Pound Day has successfully elevated the visibility of more than 1,500 British Black-owned businesses through its comprehensive directory and marketplace, including those participating in the Wray Forward program.

3) Read this Voice news story on Grenfell tower and Doreen Lawrence. How might this story reflect the Voice’s values and ideologies? What do the comments below suggest about how readers responded to the article? Can you link this to Gilroy’s work on the ‘Black Atlantic’ identity?

Speaking to Channel 4 News last week, Lady Lawrence said: “Had that been a block full of white people in there, they would have done everything to get them out as fast as possible and make sure that they do what they needed to do.” She added: “Nobody wanted to mention the word ‘race’ in the whole thing. [Because] when I saw the residents who lived in that block, to me it was under no doubt around the racism that existed at that time.

Social and cultural contexts - 40 Year of Black British Lives

Read this extract from The Voice: 40 Years of Black British Lives on rapper Swiss creating Black Pound Day (you'll need your Greenford Google login to access the document). Answer the following questions:

1) What is Black Pound Day?

Swiss  went on to create the first black pound day, An event aimed at celebrating Black-owned businesses and giving the Black community a financial and emotional boost, after the racial inequality in the UK evident by the protests that followed Floyd's death.

2) How did Black Pound Day utilise social media to generate coverage and support? 

The inaugural Black Pound Day attracted support from the high profile celebrities and quickly became the top-trending topic on Twitter in the Uk.

3) How do events such as Black Pound Day and the Powerlist Black Excellence Awards link to wider social, cultural and economic contexts regarding power in British society?  

 The Powerlist was established in 2007 when Michael Eboda, a former Editorial Director of Ethnic Media Group, left to start his own company, Powerful Media. Initiflly billed as a role model guide for young people, The Powerlist published a list of the UK's 100 most influential men and women of African, African Caribbean and African American heritage. Using his contacts in government Eboda managed to secure then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown for the inaugural launch, a feat that was to set the bar for the publication going forward. The following year, the Powerlist was launched at 10 Downing Street. At that time, Black people outside the realms of sport and entertainment were rarely given any recognition. Men and women such as Damon Buffini, Tom Ilube, Ric Lewis, Karen Blackett, Ken Olisa and Jacky Wright, all of whom have been hugely successful and influential in their respective sectors, were barely known until the Powerlist spotlighted them as number one on the list

Audience

1) Who do you think is the target audience for the Voice website? Consider demographics and psychographics.

-black Caribbean's

-working/a bit of middle class 

-aspirers, strugglers 

black Britons 

-older adults 

2) What audience pleasures are provided by the Voice website? Apply media theory here such as Blumler and Katz (Uses & Gratifications).

personal identity- can relate and reflect on things that the audience have gone through 

surveillance- as they do articles to educate and inform people 

 

3) Give examples of sections or content from the website that tells you this is aimed at a specialised or niche audience.

-The Black British Voices (BBV) survey, the largest study into social attitudes in the UK’s Black community, also found more respondents saying they were ‘spiritual’ than ‘religious.’

-BLACK BRITISH people who suffer from a long-term health condition have poorer experiences of health care, according to a latest report.

4) Studying the themes of politics, history and racism that feature in some of the Voice’s content, why might this resonate with the Voice’s British target audience?

We might claim that Black people in Britain have this feeling because of the thought that they have been "scattered." Black Britons maintain their unique cultural values and customs while still being British, according to the concept of "liquidity of culture." Some people experience discrimination even after being born and reared in Britain and are questioned, "Why don't you go back to your home country?" They will consequently be able to relate to The Voice's content since they are aware of the effects of racism and have personal experience with it.

5) Can you find any examples of content on the Voice website created or driven by the audience or citizen journalism? How does this reflect Clay Shirky’s work on the ‘end of audience’ and the era of ‘mass amateurisation’?

when the audience take to themselves to address issues on social media like the George Floyd incident that blew up on social media as the audience addressed the issue creating  a way for the family to receive a sort of justice.

Representations

1) How is the audience positioned to respond to representations in the Voice website?

The audience is set up for a favourable reaction. The Voice gives its viewers the chance to view the world without the biased and racist lenses of mainstream British media.

2) Are representations in the Voice an example of Gilroy’s concept of “double consciousness” NOT applying?

The Voice exclusively uses black people's perspectives to offer its news and content. This means the audience are able to perceive the world through their own eyes.

3) What kind of black British identity is promoted on the Voice website? Can you find any examples of Gilroy’s “liquidity of culture” or “unruly multiculturalism” here?

The Voice appears to take benefit of the fact that most of its audience and readership would come from outside of the country, especially from Africa, Caribbean etc. Ads that promote sending money to foreign nations are used to emphasise this. This is closely related to Gilroy's theory of the "liquidity of culture" because it highlights the sense of displacement that some Black Britons may experience because, even though they live in Britain, their families are probably still there. As a result, their identity is shaped by their travels rather than by their place of origin.

4) Applying Stuart Hall’s constructivist approach to representations, how might different audiences interpret the representations of black Britons in the Voice?

Oppositional reading -They may consider The Voice to be a joke because they have spent years being subjected to derogatory stereotypes about black people

Preferred readings- There is a platform for black people to be valued and feel that there success is heard and represented in a positive way

5) Do you notice any other interesting representations in the Voice website? For example, representations or people, places or groups (e.g. gender, age, Britishness, other countries etc.)

Gender-positive portrayals of women are prominent, showing them as competent people who are making an effort to pursue a range of career paths.

Age - the representation of black youth being imaginative people trying to improve their community as opposed to the stereotypically negative image of them being aggressive and trouble making.

Industries

1) Read this Guardian report on the death of the original founder of the Voice. What does this tell you about the original values and ideologies behind the Voice brand? 

"My husband died suddenly, and we are all absolutely distraught at the loss of such a great man," said Mrs McCalla, who was by her husband's side when he died.

"He was a loving father and husband, and will be sadly missed." Born in Jamaica, McCalla trained as an accountant at Kingston College, moved to London in the 1970s and started working on leftwing newspaper the East End News, where he helped edit a double-page spread called the Voice aimed at black readers. He had the idea of expanding the column into a weekly title for black Britons and in 1982 founded the Voice newspaper. The paper and the mini publishing empire that grew up around it quickly came to be regarded as a pillar of the black community in Britain and made McCalla a millionaire. "I decided deliberately to have a newspaper that targeted people who were born here and had spent most of their lives here," said McCalla in a rare TV interview in 1992. "In doing so I had obviously captured a niche market, a market of people who had never had a voice before." The Voice, dubbed "the black Sun", has never shied away from controversy, building up a reputation for campaigning against racism and injustice.

2) Read this history of the Voice’s rivals and the struggles the Voice faced back in 2001. What issues raised in the article are still relevant today? 

The Voice's early sales were poor, but it was buoyed by job adverts from the newly aware London boroughs, which were willing to pour in money to satisfy their consciences, regardless of the response. Sales eventually rose, and by the start of the 1990s the Voice had its circulation officially audited at 45,000 - a figure which was proudly printed on the front page each week above the masthead. Nothing, it seemed, could stop the inexorable rise of the Voice - not even a challenge from me, its former assistant editor, when I launched a competitor, Black Briton, in 1991. Unable to break the Voice's  stranglehold on advertising, Black Briton folded after a year and by December 1993, Voice sales reached 51,318. But a few months later, the sales figure mysteriously disappeared from the front page, and observers began to realise something was going wrong. Sales began to slump and by the end of 1996 when another rival, the New Nation, was launched, circulation had dropped by 20%. Despite a shaky beginning, which caused the Nation to be sold on after less than a year to a local newspaper group, it slowly turned the corner. It joined a group with three other ethnic-minority newspapers, giving it strength in numbers; its owners were bought out by the giant Trinity-Mirror; and it is now widely regarded as the country's best-quality black paper. And as if to confirm the Voice's decline it decided not to have its sales figures audited last year, having seen a drop to 30,000 in 1999.

3) The Voice is now published by GV Media Group, a subsidiary of the Jamaican Gleaner company. What other media brands do the Gleaner company own and why might they be interested in owning the Voice? You'll need to research this using Google/Wikipedia or look at this Guardian article when Gleaner first acquired The Voice.

The Gleaner Company has bought full ownership of the Voice and Young Voices magazine from the family of Mr McCalla, who died two years ago, in an all-share deal. Since then the weekly paper, which launched the journalistic career of Martin Bashir, has suffered a decline in advertising revenue and increased competition.

The buyer publishes six titles in Jamaica, including The Gleaner, which was first published in 1834 and is the oldest newspaper in the Caribbean. 

4) How does the Voice website make money?

Despite a shaky beginning, which caused the Nation to be sold on after less than a year to a local newspaper group, it slowly turned the corner. It joined a group with three other ethnic-minority newspapers, giving it strength in numbers; its owners were bought out by the giant Trinity-Mirror; and it is now widely regarded as the country's best-quality black paper. And as if to confirm the Voice's decline it decided not to have its sales figures audited last year, having seen a drop to 30,000 in 1999.

 5) What adverts or promotions can you find on the Voice website? Are the adverts based on the user’s ‘cookies’ or fixed adverts? What do these adverts tell you about the level of technology and sophistication of the Voice’s website?

Usually, they are fixed advertisements. This demonstrates how low-tech the Voice is and how much less advanced it is in comparison to most contemporary websites. It appears that the Voice are either unable to function at such a high level of technology or do not have the resources to do so, as evidenced by the fact that they do not use customer data to create targeted or personalised advertisements.

6) Is there an element of public service to the Voice’s role in British media or is it simply a vehicle to make profit?

I believe that it is used as a platform for the black community to feel appreciated, through there low budget videos and interviewer it may suggest that they aren't receiving much profit but are voicing the opinions.  

8) How has the growth of digital distribution through the internet changed the potential for niche products like the Voice?

I believe this is because people are realising how important it is to understand different points of view, and because they can now access content more easily, niche products like The Voice are likely to gain more recognition.

9) Analyse The Voice’s Twitter feed. How does this contrast with other Twitter feeds you have studied (such as Zendaya's)? Are there examples of ‘clickbait’ or does the Voice have a different feel?

-Compared to Zendaya's Twitter feed, The Voice's feed features a lot more clickbait.

-mainly images and videos 

-less texts 

10) Study a selection of videos from The Voice’s YouTubechannel. What are the production values of their video content?

-low budget production costs 

-bad editing 

-low camera quality

This is reflected in there views as they dont gain much views.