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Audience Theory With Egs and Quotes
Audience Theory With Egs and Quotes
Audience Theory With Egs and Quotes
THEORY
A LEVEL MEDIA STUDIES
CONSUMPTION OF MEDIA
There are different ways of consuming media texts
Primary media
(texts demand close and concentrated attention from audience, eg.
Films in cinemas)
Secondary media
(texts provide a background for an audience who are often doing
something else at the same time and are distracted, eg. Radio and
some TV programmes)
Tertiary media
(texts that are consumed by audiences who are almost unaware of
their own engagement with the media, eg. Advertising or radio
stations broadcasting in shops)
Stresses power
of AUDIENCE
over media
producers
Audience
research
and pretesting
MarketLiberalism
Perspective
Audience preference
decides what media
texts are produced
PoliticalEconomy
Perspective
Media is
produced
to appeal
to
advertisers
Information is
unmediated
HYPODERMIC
NEEDLE MODEL
TWO STEP FLOW
MODEL
Dating
from 1920s
Passive audience
Stuart Halls
Encoding/Decoding
model
Texts have
preferred
meaning
Also
called the
limited
effects
paradigm
RECEPTION THEORY
Blumler and
Katz 1974
USES AND
GRATIFICATIONS
THEORY
PASSIVE AUDIENCES
Effects Theory
Some commentators see the media as a sinister and insidious
force.
The Frankfurt School (Adorno and Horkheimer) a group of
Marxist intellectuals developed a critique of the mass media after
expressing horror at the success of Nazi Germany propaganda.
They argued the media had considerable power over the
behaviour and beliefs of the audience.
The passive audience soak up the empty promises of mass
entertainment, becoming willing victims who both produce and
consume the products of consumer capitalism.
The audience are powerless to resist the effects of media
messages.
ENCODING/DECODING
Stuart Hall drew upon the Gramscian hegemony theory in
developing the encoding/decoding model.
He wanted to focus on how dominant ideological messages
can be resisted or reinterpreted by audience members.
At the encoding stage, the producers of texts create
messages (codes) which they expect their viewers/readers to
understand.
When the audience come in contact with the text, we decode
the messages to create meaning.
Fundamentally, media messages are POLYSEMIC they
contain numerous possible interpretations.
However, we can be steered towards a preferred reading of a
text.
Stuart
Hall
Preferred,
Negotiated
and
Oppositional
readings of
media texts
For
example
Or.....
You may disagree
Or.....
You may think that big macs do taste
good, but Ill only have them every
now and again
Oppositional Rea
The preferred
reading is the
reading media
producers hope
audiences will
take from the
text.
Audience members
from outside the
target audience may
reject the preferred
reading,
receiving their own
alternative message.
Negotiated reading is
when audiences
acknowledge the
preferred reading, but
modify it to
suit their own values
and opinions.
What is the
PREFERRED
reading?
The
NEGOCIATED
reading?
The
OPPOSITIONAL
reading?
ACTIVE AUDIENCES
The Uses and Gratifications Theory
The audience has a set of needs (Blumler and Katz 1975)
Diversion
Integration & Social Interaction
Personal identity
Surveillance/Information
We use the media to gratify our needs.
We actively seek out media products that we really want.
Links with liberal-pluralist perspectives (consumers hold the
power over producers)
To combat
loneliness
allows audience to
perceive
themselves to be
part of an
IMAGINED
COMMUNITY
Relaxation
The need
to be part
of a
group
The need to
identify with
characters
and
scenarios
GRATIFICATION
4) DIVERSION
We use the media for enjoyment, relaxation or just to fill time.
DYSTOPIAN