Introduction to Audience Studies

• Historically, audiences had to be present. i.e. in a speech
• The printing press and radio allowed for messages to be consumed by many people without their physical presence
• During a play, audiences have an interactive relationship with performers. You can see their responses, i.e. their laughter or disgust.
• You have the option of auditing something, i.e. attending a performance.
• The size of the audience is generally controlled by the setting. E.g. you can only have as many people in a lecture room.
• How does the audience experience a text? We’re experiencing a lecture by typing notes on our laptops, writing by hand, or just listening.
• The relationship between the producer and the audience is imaginary. You don’t know what the audience is doing so it becomes necessary to know what they are doing.
• We concede the media as a way of connecting people who otherwise weren’t involved/paying attention to each other.
• It’s difficult to control what audiences do with the message and it’s even more difficult to control what message a mass audience receives.
• VCRs allowed consumers to watch what they wanted when they wanted via recording.
• Niche audiences (narrowcasting) are important. i.e. specialty channels for sports. Soap opera audiences are different than a nightly news audience—even if it’s the same viewer.
• 1960s-70s: media effects tradition—an idea that people are active and do things with media. The media doesn’t simply do things to people.
• Uses and gratifications: the idea that people use the media to gratify certain needs. They want to satisfy certain conditions. It isn’t the media that is powerful; but rather audiences are using the media for their own goals/needs. Thus, producers give people what they want. à Consumer sovereignty: the consumer is king. Consumers control the consumption. We make particular choices on our own à Looks at effects largely through a quantitative fashion. How many people watch it?
• Reception based research discusses not only audience power, but how audiences get pleasure from certain media. Why is it that people tune in to certain things. à Uses and gratifications suggests people pick and choose from what is available. Reception based research discusses how people formulate and construct meaning.