Includes bibliographical references. / This thesis investigates children's gaming relationships with peers in out-of-school settings, and explores their interpretation of digital games as gendered media texts. As an interdisciplinary study, it combines insights from Childhood Studies, Cultural Studies, Game Studies, domestication and performance theory. The concept ludic gendering is developed in order to explain how gender "works" in games, as designed semiotic and ludic artefacts. Ludic gendering also helps to explain the appropriation of games through gameplay, and the interpretation of gendered rules and representations. The study expands on audience reception research to account for children's "readings" of digital games. Social Network Analysis (SNA) is used to study gaming relationships. Combining SNA with broadly ethnographic methods provided a systematic way of investigating children's peer relationships and gendered play.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 218-236). / In 1994, South Africa was emancipated from apartheid, and in 1996, a new democratic Constitution was released. This charter envisioned a progressive society and placed emphasis on equality, multiculturalism, reconciliation and freedom. The state targeted the cultural industries, including cinema, to carry this new vision to the nation. The problem, however, was that the production, exhibition and distribution infrastructure inherited from apartheid was not only dominated by Hollywood, but also exclusively catered for the white sector of the nation. This monopolised, racially skewed structure continues to pose an obstacle to the dissemination of progressive identities and the sustainability of local cinema. Through an analysis of relevant film policy, industry structure and specific cinematic texts, this study aims to trace the intersection between the dynamics of national identity representation and South Africa's political and economic position as a developing nation in the global marketplace. The research presented took place over a period of three years (2007-2010) and incorporated both quantitative and qualitative methods.

Includes abstract. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 273-289). / This thesis chronicles the emergence of men's lifestyle magazines within South Africa between 1997 and 2007. It aims to contextualize the emergence of these magazines within the broader South African context and position each magazine as representing a nuanced masculine ideal to the mainstream male readers. This thesis then offers a critical reading of two more marginal men's lifestyle magazines, namely, MaksiMan (2001-2007) and BLINK (2004-2007).

Includes bibliographical references (p. 305-338). / This thesis examines representations of food in twenty-first century media, and argues that the media obsession with food in evidence today follows directly from U.K. and U.S. post-war industrial and economic booms, and by the associated processes of globalisation that secure the spread of emergent trends from these countries to the rest of the so-called Western world. The theoretical frame for the work is guided in large part by Guy Debord's Society of the Spectacle (1967), which follows a Marxist tradition of examining the intersection between consumerism and social relationships. Debord's spectacle is not merely something to be looked at, but functions, like Marx's fetishised commodity, as a mechanism of alienation. The spectacle does this by substituting real, lived experience with representations of life. Based on analyses of media representations of food from the post-war period to the present day, the work argues against the discursive celebration of globalisation as a signifier of abundance and access, and maintains, instead, that consequent to the now commonplace availability of choice and information is a deeply ambiguous relationship to food because it is a relationship overwhelmingly determined by media rather than experience. It further argues that the success of food media results from a spectacular conflation of an economy of consumerism with the basic human need to consume to survive. Contemporary celebrity chefs emerge as the locus of this conflation by representing figures of authority on that basic need, and also, through branded products (including themselves), the superfluity of consumerism. The subject of the work, therefore, is food, but the main object of its critique is media. Food media from World War 2 to the World Wide Web is about the commodification of history and politics, through food, and the natural (super)star of this narrative is the modern celebrity chef.

Includes bibliographical references. / Using Dayan and Kat's theory of "media events" - those historic and powerful live broadcasts that mesmerise mass audiences - this thesis assesses the socio-political effect of live broadcasting on South Africa's transition to democracy and the effects of such broadcasts on post-apartheid nationhood. The thesis follows events chronologically and employs a three-part approach: firstly, it looks at the planning behind some of the mass televised events, secondly, it analyses the televisual content of some of the events; and thirdly it assesses public responses to events, as articulated in newspapers at the time.

The portrayal of film characters' inner experience ensures a level of audience engagement often precluded in primarily plot-driven narratives. Yet, there is a prevailing notion that interiority is the exclusive domain of literature. To counter this pedagogy, the thesis explores how filmmakers can externalise dream; the unconscious; emotional journeys, and the realm of the imagination through cinematic language. The study draws on a theoretical framework that incorporates psychoanalytic film theory, neo-formalism and literary theory, and which engages to some extent with authorship. The compatibilist methodological approach draws on these modes of analysis, while systematically bridging theory and practice. The thesis dovetails with a creative component - the screenplay of Zinzi and the Boondogle, a children's feature film. Through this case study, the thesis examines the largely undocumented relationship between film theory and analysis on the one hand, and screenwriting and film production on the other. The research explores a number of areas germane to the screenplay, starting by uncovering innovative ways in which dreams can illuminate character interiority. It finds that animation, in its ability to render visible the metaphysical, is a compelling means of screening inner processes. Jan Svankmajer blends live action filmmaking with animation to bespeak the interpenetration of the conscious and unconscious realms. Hayao Miyazaki uses anime to construct otherworldly realms that reflect adolescent girls' rites of passage. In films that draw on African storytelling, animation is shown to make manifest the imaginative realm. Finally, the adaptation of the screenplay Zinzi and the Boondogle into a novel tests ways in which cinema and literature can divergently - but equally - evoke characters' interior lives. The thesis counters the pedagogy which insists that film is suited only to external action. Rather, the research reveals potent cinematic means of evoking oneiric and fantasy lives - bridging the traditional chasm between film theory and praxis and inviting further meetings between these discourses.

In this mini-dissertation, I investigate the manifestation of the political is personal, or rather the structural as personal, by examining what women's experiences within the city of Cape Town reveals about structural, social, and political structures as they relate to safety. This is done through critically reflecting upon both the participatory creation process and conducting a qualitative content analysis of each episode of the web series Thinking Safety that I produced as the creative research component of this masters dissertation. The creation of this series used an interdisciplinary design-based ethnographic research methodology to prompt actionable discussions around the physical manifestations of the lack of structural safety. This paper explores the ways in which this methodology renders women's experiences more perceptible in its exploration of the tangible aspects of how safety and unsafety is experienced. The creative research explores the space between participants' realities and an imagined space of absolute safety and deliberates upon their responses that frame their experiences in relation to social, structural constructs, and spaces. Participants answer specific pre-researched questions that inquire upon safety, spatial navigation, responsibility and design and these responses are creatively compiled in the experimental web-series Thinking Safety which is reflected upon in this paper. This research reveals how the lack of structural safety has led to a distortion of the notion of responsibility as both patriarchal culture and state neglect has exacerbated the unsafety of women in Cape Town. Structural constructs are also viewed as being deliberately created, through the existence of harmful social-cultural norms and this neglect of structural responsibility. Safety mechanisms are then derived from the participant's responses, which deliberate upon imagination, responsibility, visibility, and ethical interdependency as mechanisms for safety creation. This conceptual imagination of safety co-creation is then presented as a purposeful idealisation of democratised and co-developed futures. This paper therefore explores the democratic potential of participatory design-based ethnographic filmmaking, in its expressions of the supressed aspects of our experiences and the potentials for their transformation.

The following paper aims to explore and analyse the consequential impact of how interracial and cross-cultural relationships are portrayed in film. It highlights the perspectives of those who have subjective lived experience within interracial relationships through first-hand research. Further explanation is provided towards how these findings have shaped the approach to developing Diverse Love, a point-of-view style autobiographical documentary depicting my own experience in an interracial relationship. To achieve this, a mixed-methods approach has been employed; combining primary academic research through small-sample questionnaires, reviews of relevant literature or media and a reflective writing journal, as a supplementary narrative to the ideas and topics presented in Diverse Love. Throughout both the creative and written aspects of this project, the core motivation has been to accurately and authentically represent my own lived experience as a white English woman in an interracial marriage with a black South African man. To ensure I was creating a piece of work which addresses a socio-political need and to recognize the context in which it will be placed, I start by briefly outlining South Africa's more recent history, with a specific focus on race politics. Delving into the process behind creating the film, whilst understanding the key themes of interracial love, we both learn about the challenges that can be experienced, as well as celebrate the positive interactions. This is further complimented by interviews with other interracial couples who share their experiences with stereotypes, and how they feel this is represented in visual media. As there is limited research previously undertaken on this topic, it was important to not only include my perspective, but also the opinions of others, to address commonly occurring prejudices. To create a well-rounded piece of writing, I also explored through academic research the themes of documentary and the topics of race. The key conclusions drawn from this research indicate a significant lack of representation of interracial couples in film and that the majority of portrayals follow stereotypes and are not accurate to the lived experiences. There is also a lack of academic analysis on films which exhibit themes of interracial relationships, with the majority of papers focused on discussing Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (Kramer, 1967). Not only that, many of the studies are situated within the context of American film or political context and neglect to represent a global audience, as well as being outdated and in need of a more current lens. This study adds value to the field asit blends elements of personal experience with academic research, within a niche and under-represented topic. This gives an in-depth and emotive result, with an overarching recommendation that the film industry can look to evolve, ensuring a more diverse and accurate representation of in the interracial relationships portrayed.

This thesis examines personal branding practices by Swedish sports journalists on the social media platform Twitter using Goffman’s theatre metaphor, Brems et al’s four dilemmas’ journalists face by branding the self and Mellado & Hermidas model for journalistic roles on social media. More closely, it examines how Swedish sports journalists build their personal brand on Twitter, and which of the modern journalistic roles is the most occurring among Swedish sports journalists on the same platform. It does so by combining a quantitative content analysis with four in qualitative interviews with sports journalists. The content analysis was performed on the ten most followed Swedish sports journalists, analyzing ten tweets per person, making the total number of tweets 100. The interviews were semi structured and varied between 30 and 40 minutes. Previous research has shown Sweden to be a good place for these types of studies, considering the use of the internet and digital media is amongst the highest in the world, and the Swedish media has been early to adopt new technologies.  The study shows that most Swedish sports journalists build their personal brand mostly by adapting a professional role on Twitter, mainly sharing their journalistic content, and interacting with their followers. One of the main results is also the hard-to-find balance between personal and professional for sports journalists on Twitter, considering most of them work with their personal interest.  Keywords: Personal branding, sports journalism, Twitter

This thesis aims to shed light on how contemporary Egyptian culture is represented in video games. Egypt, being part of the Middle East, and given its ancient history, has become subject to many stereotypes and tropes and falling into the realm of Orientalism. This thesis builds on previous works concerning representations of the Middle East, focusing on the representation of contemporary Egypt. In light of the problematic nature of stereotypes and Orientalism towards the Othering of the minorities, I conducted a close reading of two games depicting Egypt, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 from a western perspective and The Race 2: The Last Chase from a native perspective, comparing them in the process, to highlight the different approaches native and non-native designers used in their representation of contemporary Egypt. The analysis shows that the American game, although it tried to give an “accurate” representation of Egypt by modeling a close replica of the Ramses Station in Cairo, still managed to use Orientalist visuals and stereotypical elements in its depiction. On the other hand, the Egyptian game relied on everyday life aspects and references relating to the native. Finally, I suggest a few guidelines for game designers wanting to achieve respectful representation to follow to avoid alienation of the represented Other.