The Handbook of Media Audiences

Digital media have dramatically increased the nature and diversity of the ways people can access media content, and the bias that audiences occupy a position of “reception” is giving way to an understanding of audiences as media–active. The contributions assembled here offer an expansion of the conceptual frameworks underlying the field and a wealth of research wisdom and expertise for researchers requiring a solid foundation in the complexity of “audience” and “audiences” and of existing research traditions. Placing the emphasis on technologies, theories, research methods and research pragmatics, this handbook brings together leading international scholars to provide a comprehensive overview of the complexity and diversity of audience studies.

Notes on Contributors viii Series Editor′s Preface xiv Acknowledgments xv Introduction 1 Virginia Nightingale Part I Being Audiences 17 1 Readers as Audiences 19 Wendy Griswold, Elizabeth Lenaghan, and Michelle Naffziger 2 Listening for Listeners: The Work of Arranging How Listening Will Occur in Cultures of Recorded Sound 41 Jackie Cook 3 Viewing 62 Shawn Shimpach 4 Search and Social Media 86 Virginia Nightingale 5 Spreadable Media: How Audiences Create Value and Meaning in a Networked Economy 109 Joshua Green and Henry Jenkins 6 Going Mobile 128 Gerard Goggin Part II Theorizing Audiences 147 7 Audiences and Publics, Media and Public Spheres 149 Richard Butsch 8 The Implied Audience of Communications Policy Making: Regulating Media in the Interests of Citizens and Consumers 169 Sonia Livingstone and Peter Lunt 9 New Configurations of the Audience? The Challenges of User–Generated Content for Audience Theory and Media Participation 190 Nico Carpentier 10 The Necessary Future of the Audience … and How to Research It 213 Nick Couldry 11 Reception 230 Cornel Sandvoss 12 Affect Theory and Audience 251 Anna Gibbs Part III Researching Audiences 267 13 Toward a Branded Audience: On the Dialectic between Marketing and Consumer Agency 269 Adam Arvidsson 14 Ratings and Audience Measurement 286 Philip M. Napoli 15 Quantitative Audience Research: Embracing the Poor Relation 302 David Deacon and Emily Keightley 16 Media Effects in Context 320 Brian O’Neill 17 Cultivation Analysis and Media Violence 340 Andy Ruddock 18 Creative and Visual Methods in Audience Research 360 Fatimah Awan and David Gauntlett 19 Locating Media Ethnography 380 Patrick D. Murphy Part IV Doing Audience Research 403 20 Children’s Media Cultures in Comparative Perspective 405 Sonia Livingstone and Kirsten Drotner 21 Fan Cultures and Fan Communities 425 Kristina Busse and Jonathan Gray 22 Beyond the Presumption of Identity? Ethnicities, Cultures, and Transnational Audiences 444 Mirca Madianou 23 Participatory Vision: Watching Movies with Yolngu 459 Jennifer Deger 24 The Audience Is the Show 472 Annette Hill 25 Seeking the Audience for News: Response, News Talk, and Everyday Practices 489 S. Elizabeth Bird 26 Sport and Its Audiences 509 David Rowe Index 527

Virginia Nightingale held the position of Associate Professor with the School of Communication Arts at the University of Western Sydney until her retirement in 2010. Her publications include Media and Audiences: New Perspectives (with Karen Ross, 2003) and  Critical Perspectives: Media and Audiences (with Karen Ross, 2003), and New Media Worlds: Challenges for Convergence (ed. with Tim Dwyer, 2007).

“This book offers helpful background readings for media research courses. Summing up: recommended.”– Choice