Audiences
Recap
When
media text producers profile their audience they take into account AUDIENCE
DEMOGRAPHICS
(class/economic
status, gender, age, geographical location) along with their viewing
preferences/needs.
There
are mass or mainstream audiences
basically
large audiences who consume mainstream or popular culture (Marxist would claim
that this audience is largely made up of the ‘working class’), such as
Hollywood films, Eastenders, reality TV, Premiership football, simple
Hollywood, tabloids
and
niche audiences
A niche
audience is smaller than a mass audience but usually very influential. E.g.
those that Marx would define as upper class/middle class, who controlled the
media and may wish to see ‘high culture’ programs. Hence the launch of BBC Four
for those who wish to hear/see artistic high culture programs.
Niche
audiences don’t have to be this group though, they can be any small, dedicated
group who advertisers feel are worth targeting or creating products for.
Examples
could include, certain films (e.g. 'adult' movies - which can not really be
called ‘high art’), fishing magazines, farming programs, underwater knitting!
In
other words, text producers think about the following before developing a
text...
1)
What social class will the primary target audience fall under?
2)
What gender is the primary target audience?
3)
What age will the primary target audience be?
4)
What nationality will the primary target audience be?
5) What
values do the primary target audience have? (Ideology).
6) Audience
appeal - what will the primary target audience be looking for in a text? (UGT).
They then
think about how they can best represent their primary target audience through;
genre,
narrative, characters, cast, locations, cinematography, sound, editing,
advertising etc.
If you are
answering a question on audiences…
THE FOUR C’S (cross-cultural consumer
characteristics):
This is one
of the earliest, but still most popular, ways of profiling audiences. It
profiles the audience in terms of wants and needs, not simply demographic. The
categories are as follows:
• Mainstreamers (this
is the largest group. They are concerned with stability, mainly buying
well-known brands and consuming mainstream texts).
• Aspirers (they
are seeking to improve themselves. They tend to define themselves by high
status brands, absorbing the ideologies associated with the products and
believing their status alters as a result).
• Succeeders (people
who feel secure and in control – generally they are in positions of power. They
buy brands which reinforce their feelings of control and power).
• Reformers (idealists
who actively consume eco-friendly products and buy brands which are
environmentally supportive and healthy. They also buy products which establish
this ‘caring and responsible’ ideology). Individuals (highly media literate,
expects high-production advertising and buys product image not product,
requires high-profiling sophisticated advertising campaigns).
The
consumer would look to the text for one or more of these reasons:
Uses and Gratification Theory:
This
theory is the opposite of effects theory because it relies on the premise that
audiences have free will and choose to consume certain things for different
reasons. The theory was developed in the 1960s and was in expanded in 1974 by
Blumer and Katz who suggested a series of possible reasons why audience members
might consume a media text:
• Diversion (escape
from everyday problems - emotional release, relaxing, filling time etc.)
• Personal
relationships (using the media for emotional and other interactions
e.g. substitution soap opera for family life OR using the cinema as a social
event).
• Personal
identity (constructing their own identity from characters in media
texts, and learning behavior and values – useful if trying to fit into a new
country/culture)
• Surveillance (information
gathering e.g. news, educational programming, weather reports, financial news,
holiday bargains etc).
This can
lead you on to ….
Stuart Hall deals with ‘Reception Theory’
study which determines how different audiences view the same text.
He found
that the way audiences interpreted a text generally fell under one of the
following:
• A preferred
reading; of the text most likely to be received by the intended target
audience who share the same ideologies (people read it as the creators intended
– this is the closest to the hypodermic needle).
• An oppositional
reading; generally by people who are not in the intended target
audience (they reject the meaning intended and receive an alternative meaning).
• A negotiated
reading; basically accept the meaning but interpret it to suit their
own position/ideologies.
Then you
can discuss TWO STEP FLOW ….
Which suggests
that information does not flow directly from the text into the minds of its
audience unmediated but is filtered
through "opinion leaders" who then communicate it to their less
active associates, over whom they have influence.
Which can
bring you on to
Mediation
and how the text tries to involve an audience through
Mode of
Address, persuasive, emotive language
Don’t
forget dominant ideology
Marxists are likely to find evidence in the modes of address of almost every text
that confirms evidence of a class divided society in which workers are
exploited by capitalists.
Feminists are likely to find evidence in the modes of address of almost every
media text that there are assumptions about gender.
Always write a conclusion no matter how
small.
