What is 'the intentional fallacy'? Illustrate with examples from different media why it is problematic to equate the meaning of a text with its author's intentions.

Guidance

For general guidance about what is expected in your essays for this module, see the general criteria.

What Key Features Do I Look For? Familiarity with relevant texts Evidence - the stronger the better Argument - coherent and balanced Theoretical discussion - relation to relevant theories Understanding of relevant concepts Reflexivity - reflections on methodology Examples - insightfully analysed Style - readability and effective presentation

Please remember to avoid footnotes and to include an alphabetical list of 'References' which have been cited in the text (not a Bibliography of anything you have read for the essay). This list should include author's names, date, book titles (in italics), place of publication and publisher. Within the text always cite author's surname, date and page number. Double-space your text and number your pages. For more detailed notes on writing essays in this department, click here.

Advice for this particular assignment: When you search for academic sources do not limit yourself to the discussion of the intentional fallacy by literary theorists (who originated the concept) but consider the broader issue of communicative purposes (those of the 'sender' and 'receiver' don't necessarily match, and ultimately the sender has no control over how a work will be interpreted). In film, the topic is discussed in relation to the concept of the 'auteur' (so look for 'auteur theory'). Compare and contrast the entries for related topics in various dictionaries of communication, media or film as well as of literary theory. Note that even if it is a fallacy to equate the 'meaning' of a text with what the author intended it to mean, in all acts of communication we routinely infer the 'sender's' likely intention.

Note also that this is an assignment for which the inclusion of relevant pictorial illustrations is strongly recommended. These should be inserted electronically into your Word document rather than cut-and-pasted in. You can scan such illustrations in from print sources, save them from disk-based sources, download them from online sources (such as my Powerpoint slides) or even create them from scratch in a graphics package. Use them to help you to make points more effectively. Label each one, 'Figure 1' etc. and add a caption.

Some suggested reading

• Chandler, Daniel (2007) Semiotics: The Basics (2nd Edn.). London: Routledge
• Chandler, Daniel and Rod Munday (2011) Dictionary of Media and Communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press
• Danesi, Marcel (1994) Messages and Meanings: An Introduction to Semiotics. Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press
• Danesi, Marcel (1999) Of Cigarettes, High Heels and Other Interesting Things: An Introduction to Semiotics. London: Macmillan [a wide-ranging elementary introduction]
• Fiske, John (1990) Introduction to Communication Studies. London: Routledge.
• Schramm, Wilbur (1974) 'The Nature of Communication Between Humans'. In Wilbur Schramm & Donald F Roberts (Eds) The Process and Effects of Mass Communication (2nd edn). Urbana, IL: University of Chicago Press [although he doesn't mention the intentional fallacy he does discuss communicative purposes]
• Thwaites, Tony, Lloyd Davis & Warwick Mules (2002) Introducing Cultural and Media Studies: A Semiotic Approach (formerly Tools for Cultural Studies: An Introduction). London: Palgrave (very readable Australian application of semiotic principles)
• Wimsatt, William K. & Monroe C. Beardsley (1946) 'The Intentional Fallacy', Sewanee Review vol. 54: 468-88; revised and republished in William K. Wimsatt & Monroe C. Beardsley (1954) The Verbal Icon: Studies in the Meaning of Poetry. Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, pp. 3-18.