The ForGotten One
Audience-Hood define to us that everywhere we go in nearly everything we do, nearly everyone is audience to some form of media. The general term reception research refers to this new school of audience thinking according to which “audiencehood” is itself a learned and varied from cultural and social practice.
When describing a ‘passive audience’, they can be described as easily manipulated as well as compliant, meaning they are disposed to agree with others as well as obeying to rules. They can also be described as weak willed as well as following what others think. A ‘passive audience’ is much easier to control and is very easily dominated by a hierarchy. However, an ‘active audience’ are much more engaged than someone who adheres to the passive side of the audience. ‘Active audiences’ are much more involved, full of opinions as well as being in control of what they want. They also don’t feel obligated to do something if they don’t agree with an opinion.
The negative effects involving the ‘passive audience’ members is that ignores people free will as well as disregarding their personalities as well as peoples social upbringing. This is known as ‘The Hypodermic Syringe’.
Negotiated reading is when a member of the audience partly agrees with part of the product. For example Film, documentary and TV programme. Only parts of the message are accepted and other parts of the message are rejected.
Oppositional reading is when the audience are in complete disagreement with the product’s message or setting. Everything in the message is rejected.
“… Media producers have imaginary entity in mind before the construction of a media product.” Looking at this statement from Ien Ang, I can infer that media producers have already three steps ahead before creating their media product. The media producer has to have an idea of how they want their media product to be created. An ‘imaginary entity’ is a product of the human mind, thus, the media producer would need to create this ‘imaginary entity’ in mind before the construction of a media product.
The type of audience that would be considered when using a short film is an ‘active audience’ as this type of audience wouldn’t need to be manipulated as their opinion would be very effective for such a small company to take on board. An ‘active audience’ are much more involved which is beneficial for short film directors as they can take on board the constructive criticism.
Stuart Hall’s Reception Theory:
What is meant by Dominant or Preferred Readings is that the reader fully shares the text’s codes and accepts and reproduces the preferred reading in such a way the code seems natural and transparent. The audiences respond to the product the way the media producers want them to. If a message is decoded according to its dominant reading, the message is left unquestioned.
By Renae West
Active audience:
The complete opposite of a passive audience it is not heavily influenced by critics by media products themselves. This assumes an audience are: choosy, and they will decide what is good. The active audience will prefer to have minds of their own. They will sometimes want to know what the critics think of a film or a news computer game, but mainly help them decide, rather than make up their mind for them.
Active examples: engaged involved responsive, in control free willed
The type of audience that relates to short films is active audience this is because they have a mind of their own whether or not they want to be influenced by the media. They will also want to hear what other has to say before making their own judgements
Stuart Hall’s theory:
When a producer constructs a text it is encoded with a meaning or message that the producer wishes to convey to the audience. In some instances audiences will correctly decode the message or meaning and understand what the producer was trying to say.
Dominant reading is where the audience decodes the message, as the producer wants them to do and broadly agrees with it. For example watching a political speech ad agreeing with it. A preferred meaning is one that might be put in place by th producers, or by the dominant values of society.
Negotiated is where the audience accepts, rejects or refines elements of the text in light of previously held views. For example it is neither agreeing nor disagreeing with the political speech or being interested.
Oppositional is where the dominant meaning is recognised but rejected for cultural, political or ideological reasons. For example total rejection of the political speech and active opposition.
"...Media producers have an imaginary entity in mind before the construction of a media product” the word imaginary entity means a character that is used as the focus of the target audience. This can means that the media producers have a vision before making the film. The companies view audiences as an imaginary entity as a mass rather than a set of individuals. They will often have a typical audience member in mind though.
By Lois Kwakye
Audiencehood:
The word audiencehood means wherever you are or go you are an audience. For example in social media when you browse you are the listeners and absorb information. So this means you are an audience.
Passive audience:
The word passive means accepting and unquestioning. They absorb the media and are controlled by them. These are theories, which states that media products have an effect on the audience, usually bad. For example the cartoon violence in Tom and Jerry would make children into violent people, either straight away, or later on in their lives.
Hypodermic theory is the earliest of the effects theories. It likens watching a programme or reading a newspaper to being injected with new behaviour, beliefs and attitudes.
The passive audience will always take the preferred reading of a text. However, it is difficult to find mass audiences who are totally accepting and uncritical of a text.
Passive examples: includes the mass, uncritical audience for the x factor. They are also known to be easily manipulated, compliant, followers, dominated and controlled.
Audiencehood - A term referring to the overall scope of people consciously consuming a product of media this encompasses all social groups form ethnicities to age and what preferences they have, involving consumption of media products.
The main differences between the two types of audience are the way media representations affect the way information is taken in by the audience. A passive audience would be feed information and would be effected by the concepts and ideas brought forward, where as an active audience would do the exact opposite and would actively look at ways of interpreting media representations.
Len Ang (1991) - ‘…Media producers have an imaginary entity in mind before the construction of a media product.’
The idea that producers have an imaginary entity before the construction of a media product, this supports the idea that media producers already know the effect that their product would have before they make it. This gives the impression that media producers can anticipate the audience they will receive from their product and how they will react to the given media product.
Active Audience - This theory argues that the audience has an active role to ply when it comes to the creation or meaning on a given media text. It goes on to say that because the audience is so diverse, audience consensus can not be influenced by media representations but instead, the audience and their interpretations influence the way media is represented. Active audiences tend to be engaged, involved, responsive and in control.
Passive audience - This refers to the idea that the media text looks to injects ideas and views directly into the thoughts of the audience like a ‘Hypodermic needle’ Thus controlling the way the audience think and behave. The ‘Hypodermic needle theory’ goes onto say that the audience passively receive all the information given to them, without an thought of processing or even challenging the information they are taking in. Passive audiences tend to be; easily manipulated weak wiled and followers. However the problem with this idea is the fact that it ignores peoples free will and the fact that people personalities also differs.
I would argue that you would aim to capture an active audience. This is because we aim the audience and the audience to be engaged, involved and responsive to our short film. Also because concepts in a short film tend to be creative and some times even unconventional so it relies on audience interaction to find out what works and what could be improved.
Dominant Reading - Dominant reading is where the audience agree with the most common and widely accepted interpretations of a given media text.
Preffered Reading - Preferred reading is when and audience to a media texts response is one, which the media producer expects, this tend to be a passive audience and they follow and are controlled be the media product.
Negotiated Reading - Negotiated reading is where the audience partly agrees with the media text. The text is partly accepted and partly regected. They reinterpret the views to fit in with their own opinions and values.
By Jean Rwamihigo
Auidence
By Tyanna Nelson
What is Audiencehood?
When everyone automatically becomes an audience to something whether it is due to going on social media or being interested into a particular subject at school.
What is a Passive Audience?
A passive audience are the people who take on the ideas and views from the media and allow it to control the way they think and behave (Allows the media to have power over them).
A passive audience does not question the message the media is sending, they just assume that it is right.
Some examples of this is through music videos for example how some rappers portray themselves and what they do (smoking) might influence younger people that, smoking may be ‘cool’ because a famous rapper does it in their music video.
What is an Active Audience?
An active audience is the people that have different responses to the media. For example some people may agree and accept the message and others may reject it due to their knowledge and beliefs. Also factors like values, culture, interests, education and experiences allow them to dominate their opinions and what they follow.
What is the difference between a passive audience and an Active audience?
In regards of the medium short films, Active audience would be the target audience as short films are generally produced by smaller companies so they need as much feedback as possible to may help promote their company or short film or look to see what they can improve next time.
Ien Ang (1991) says
