Hegemony theory in the analysis and reading of films

An American soldier quietly climbs a metal ladder on top of a concrete block to adjust the hooks of an automatic crane, before an Iraqi sniper's bullet reaches him from afar, killing him.

Confusion prevails among the soldiers in the place, and it is the same feeling that startled other American soldiers - including a sniper - watching the situation from the top of one of the buildings, as they discovered that they were looking for the Iraqi sniper in the wrong direction.

Then the American sniper uses his magnifying glasses in the opposite direction to tell his soldiers that he has discovered something at a distance of about two kilometers.

The soldiers hesitate to shoot due to the distance, but he takes permission and shoots, killing the Iraqi sniper on the spot in the movie "American Sniper" by American director Clint Studd in 2014.

The "media hegemony" theory can provide a clear explanation for reading this crude film and many similar films.

The summary of this theory - according to the British Oxford University reference - is that the elite controls the media and that the media promotes the dominant ideology.

The film is based on the memoirs of an American soldier - named Chris Kyle - who worked as a sniper during the Iraq war.

The film sparked outrage among Arab viewers when it was shown, for presenting a chauvinistic vision glorifying the American forces that invaded Iraq in an illegal war without a mandate from the United Nations.

American actor Bradley Cooper in the movie "American Sniper" (communication sites)

Although the focus of the film revolved around the psychological conditions experienced by the American recruits, its portrayal of all that is Iraqi as evil and treacherous aroused the ire of the Arabs and their criticism.

The film still represents a sign of the Western narrative about the occupation of an Arab country, which the youth of Iraq remember with regret because the voice of their suffering did not reach the world cinema.

That is why the Iraqi director Ahmed Yassin al-Darraji mentioned it in his recent interview with the Irish newspaper "The Irish Times", and that it is one of the works that has been stuck in his mind since its presentation, in the framework of the newspaper's presentation of models of Iraqi creators who are trying to present their vision to their country.

Here, the media hegemony theory can provide a clear explanation for reading this crude film and many similar films.

The summary of this theory - according to the British University of Oxford reference - is that the elite controls the media and that the media promotes the dominant ideology.

It is a theory derived from the Marxist school, specifically the ideas of Antonio Gramsci.

Gramsci was a well-known Italian activist and theorist who tried to explain the failure of socialist movements in Europe at the beginning of the twentieth century before the rise of fascism.

He considered that not only the formal and coercive power of the state maintains capitalist societies, but there is another level of hegemony represented in complex cultural and ideological processes to ensure popular approval of the existing system.

This theory has been - and still is - very popular among analysts, critics, and even among ordinary viewers, even if they do not know its roots, because it offers a number of easy and simple explanations.

It presents the dichotomy of the perpetrator and the victim, or the oppressor and the oppressed.

It may be useful in describing some cases, some media, or films.

But considering it as a criterion by which all contemporary human products are measured, including literature, arts and society movement, it is a great abbreviation and an inaccurate description of the historical and civilizational circumstance that we are going through.

If we want to respond to films that offend the image of Arabs and Muslims, we produce an alternative cinematic that puts them in a positive image, but this is not the best response to the imbalance of hegemony because this alternative will overlook many of the aesthetic and self-directive elements and cultural accumulations that are major components of Western cinema.

Criticism of the generalization of dominance theory

Many American films that deal with the conflicts of the US army abroad can fall within the framework of hegemony, but not all American films are made with the aim of domination, because this assumes a degree of careful control over every cinematic product, which is not true.

It also assumes that the media and films are courses of study and that the audience is a group of young, unconscious children, which is also not true.

Here, it is not possible to deny the existence of hegemony as one of the aspects of the current civilizational balance that is inclined in favor of the Western powers, but describing this hegemony and the way it influences and resists it is what needs another description and anatomy.

The left-wing thinker Stuart Hall - a British of Jamaican origins - came up with a new concept of cultural hegemony that is described as post-Gramscian, as he believes that there is a role for the audience, and that the viewer is not passive and develops his own meanings when watching any work.

This reading takes place through 3 methods: dominant reading, oppositional reading, and negotiating reading of the texts presented to him

, whether in written, visual, or audio form.

He called his theory encoding and decoding, and argued that the audience had the power to decipher the creative works presented to them in the media.

In the first reading, it is the identification between the audience and the message it receives encrypted without any modification, and the second reading assumes its opposition to it, and the third is entering into a negotiation with the content of this message.

British left-wing Jamaican thinker Stuart Hall (networking sites)

Therefore, the absolute surrender of the theory of hegemony in interpreting, reading and analyzing films makes one confined between the first and second readings, either accepting or opposing it.

In the case of the opposition, the aim of what he aspires to is to reject this hegemony without an alternative action, which is a negative act.

In other words, if we want to respond to films that offend the image of Arabs and Muslims, and that depict them in a negative image, we produce an alternative cinematic that puts them in a positive image. They are major components of Western cinema.

Realizing the essence of modern cultural hegemony - and cinema at the heart of it - requires realizing two things: the first is that there is internal opposition to this hegemony, for example in Britain there are directors such as Ken Loach and in the United States Michael Moore and others who have artistic independence, creative excellence, a broad audience and content Cinematic exhibitions of Western cultural hegemony.

The second thing is that rationalizing dealing with this hegemony does not mean unconditional acceptance of it, but rather correcting the angle of view from negative action to positive action and from mere rejection to exploration.