Week 7

In chapter eight of ‘Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context’ (Long and Wall, 2012), I believe the key arguments to be how the media produces audiences, as well as looking at the link between the media text and the audience.

   Audiences are the consumers of any particular media text; they tend to be branched off into sub categories depending on the text and its intended reader. For example, a poster promoting new underwear may have been intended to engage a female audience, but the way the producer has shot the image and makes the model look also attracts a male audience, even though the product itself is not relatable.

   Media organisations produce audiences. Us ourselves are part of an audience, even if we do not see it ourselves, or identify ourselves with one audience in particular. We are oblivious to the millions of other engaging into the same text. For example, when we tune into large events such as the Olympics. When looking at audiences in terms of social groups, we look deeper in terms of race, religion etc, and if that becomes a factor when decoding a text. Gay Times for example does not have to be read by only gay people, but is targeted that way by the producer.

   Audiences are more than a concept, and media institutions rely on the actual individuals that make up an audience. They need them and need to know about them. Word of mouth between consumers of the text is fundamental for texts to gain recognition and eventually higher audience numbers. A media text does its research and targets its audience accordingly. We can also think of ideas of audience being produced through ways media scholars have researched them. Media consumers are attracted and influenced by what they see, so therefore they react to what they see and what you have targeted at them. For example, early uses of propaganda influenced people to go to war and feel an obligation to partake in what they were encouraging.

   This links to my researched text ‘Visual Methodologies’ (Rose, 2016) in which discusses photography audiences and the analysis of visual culture. It discusses how we see audiences and looks at social media platforms and the development of digital methods. This has made me think differently about interpreting photographer’s work, and how they may not have an intended audience in mind, but create one through the people who are attracted by their work. They then gain more of an audience as they work grows more popular, or they stick to their niche audience.

   One option for undertaking research is a questionnaire asking people their opinions on who they think the target audience is for certain texts.

Bibliography:

1.     Long, P; Wall, T (2012) ‘Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context’ pg. 274-299

2.     Rose, G (2016) ‘Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to Researching with Visual Materials’