Representation and Power

The understanding of power remains incomplete without the understanding of the concept of hegemony. The concept of power, hegemony and representation are intertwined in the sense that hegemony is the practice of exercising power by generating consensus a gaining their legitimacy. Media and representation has been one of the most contentious aspects of such representation which is reflective of the legitimisation of ideas by the powerful groups. Representation in the popular media is argued to be the dominant ideas. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the understanding of power and representation by referring to the case study of the prominent events of the celebration of the Australian day. It is to understand the aspects of representation of power in the media. The impact of the Australian day celebration has been chosen for the purpose of the study in order to understand the underlying impact of the hegemonic power and ideas of the dominant ideas.

Running head: REPRESENTATION AND POWER
REPRESENTATION AND POWER
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1REPRESENTATION AND POWER
Introduction
The understanding of power remains incomplete without the understanding of the concept of
hegemony. The concept of power, hegemony and representation are intertwined in the sense
that hegemony is the practice of exercising power by generating consensus a gaining their
legitimacy. Media and representation has been one of the most contentious aspects of such
representation which is reflective of the legitimisation of ideas by the powerful groups.
Representation in the popular media is argued to be the dominant ideas. The aim of this paper
is to evaluate the understanding of power and representation by referring to the case study of
the prominent events of the celebration of the Australian day. It is to understand the aspects
of representation of power in the media. The impact of the Australian day celebration has
been chosen for the purpose of the study in order to understand the underlying impact of the
hegemonic power and ideas of the dominant ideas.

2REPRESENTATION AND POWER
Discussion
It is significant to not the fact that the media has been the sole repository of maintaining
power relationship and maintaining hegemonies. This process is associated with the
development of the long chain of interactions and activities of the public relationship
professionals, strategic communicator, the journalists, the lobbyists and most importantly the
advertisers (Czepczynski). Hence it is justified to argue the fact that representation and power
is the representation of the hegemonic power. For example, the celebration of the Australian
day one such controversial issues that has raised number of debates. The idea of January 26th
as the national day has been contested over a long period due to the fact the representation of
the Australian history has been reflected in a way that has not only shaped the way the
process of national building. This paper will be analysing the case study of Australian day
celebration since it is important to understand the nuances of power and representation.
Understanding the significance of the Australian day is important to relate how power and
hegemony has shaped the process throughout the course of history. It is important at this
juncture to mention the striking difference between the speeches delivered by Bob Hawk and
Paul Keating. In case of the former speech, it is significant to note that it was the celebration
of completion of the 200 days of British colonisation. The representation of the national
identity of “who is an Australian”? Such representation of national identity ignores to refer to
those who have been inhabitation the land prior to the British occupation of the same. While
in case of Keating’s speech, the imposition of national identity is acknowledge the fact that
celebration of the national day is important to recognise the atrocities and violation of the
legal rights of the aboriginal identity. What is crucial here to understand is that colonial
history has been challenged by Keating due to the fact that changing mode of the time was
important to understand that the celebration of the national day as the day of colonisation by
the British is needed to be changed and challenged. The representation of the Australian

3REPRESENTATION AND POWER
identity as essentially one of hegemonic representing of the colonial identity was challenged
in the later part of the history. It is to be argued that this juncture that the role of political
decision makers and the decision makers. However what has triggered the debate over the
long period of history is the period of history is the fact that projection of the hegemonic
representation of the national identity has been based on the biased and partisan
understanding of the national values that has been largely excluding of the values of the
aboriginal population. The celebration of the national day has been representation of the
hegemonic ideas of the ruling groups; however the celebration day has been meaning
different things to different people. This has largely ignored the need of acknowledging the
celebration of the day for the aboriginal population. Post 1938, the celebration of the
Australian day has been challenged by group of aboriginal people who believed that such
celebration is not reflective of the values of the indigenous population. The hegemonic ideas
of forced identity has been reflecting the idea that the national identity of Australians have
been solely based in the “ white man’s” ideas and values since it is not inclusive of the
values and identities of these population. The struggle between the Australian days with that
of the emerging idea of “invasion day” have been the basic pillars of the challenge against the
hegemonic ideas of the ruling elite. Hence it is to be argued that the celebration of this day
has been possible due to the legitimisation of the popular consensus. Such issues were
challenged by the emerging idea of the independent nation of Australia and affirming the
celebration of colonisation. This is the celebration of the day of national identity sought by
the conscious effort of the political decision makers is deep rooted and it is a result of the
process of centuries of effort by the political strategist. The hegemonic consensus as it is
called has been challenged by the intense protest of the people. Irrespective of the large scale
protest against the celebration of the Australian day, there have been those in favour of the
day due to the victim of the hegemonic ideas of the government.

4REPRESENTATION AND POWER
In this context, it is important to understand the representation of this hegemonic idea in the
media; for example, the lamb on advertising is the product of the values and result of the
process of socialisation. The development of the social media has been shaping the public
imagination in the ways they have made sense of the world. Our day-to-day activity has been
largely shaped by the interplay of power relationship since human beings are directly
impacted by the process of the media representation. Power has been shaping the popular
imagination to such an extent that the meaning changes with the change in the dominant ideas
of that time (Laclau). The role of media with the that of representation of the hegemonic
ideas have been defined as the social process that is an interplay of number of factors like
the encoders, decoders and the final receivers(Czepczynski). The development of the
common cultural atmosphere is shaped by the process of creating the new meaning every
now and then. This has been the process of setting the common sense and a dominant cultural
identity. However it is not to deny the fact that the role of the dominant ideology has been
shaping the impact of power and representation(Menga).
To summarize the following points, it is significant to note that hegemony is one of the
representational strategies of presenting the dominant ideas and the process of legitimising
the ideas in terms of gaining the majority of the people. From the above discussion of the
celebration of the Australia day, it can be referred that the celebration of the day has been
engulfed the initial popular imagination of the people even though it raised number of debates
in the academic discussion. Moreover the celebration of the national day has been shaped by
the values and beliefs of the dominant ideas of the British history. The national identity has
been shaped by the predominant views of the British legacy and history. However it has been
changed in number of ways due to the emergence of another set of predominant values of the
aboriginal population which questioned the hegemonic status quo of the popular media.

5REPRESENTATION AND POWER
Conclusion
This discussion can be summed up in the following points: the role of the media has been the
one of the key aspects of representing the dominant and hegemonic ideas of time. Hegemonic
ideas have been shaping the way people perceive the world since development of the
hegemonic consensus is the process of legitimising the ideas and values of the ruling elites.
Such ideas have been challenged in number of grounds by the population who has been
against the popular ideas of time. Representation and power are the two intertwined process
that is largely shaped by the process of the hegemonic ideas of time. It is not to deny that the
media has been one of the weapons of delineating the popular idea of time even though the
surge of change has questioned the dominant ideas of time. Hence it is to be argued that the
power and representation are a result of the multidimensional aspects of the hegemonic
interplay of elements.
Reference
Czepczynski, Mariusz. Cultural landscapes of post-socialist cities: representation of powers and
needs. Routledge, 2016.
Laclau, Ernesto. "Democracy and the Question of Power." Habitus: a sense of place. Routledge,
2017. 69-83.
Menga, Filippo. "Reconceptualizing hegemony: The circle of hydro-hegemony." Water Policy 18.2
(2016): 401-418.