Audience Theory : The Cultural Studies

Approach to Audience

According to Morley the audience take an active role when reading and viewing media instead of a passive role so it is important to think about how the audience will be effected by the video and how they may view certain themes and events.

How might the audiences read the values expressed in your music video and print work in a preferred, negotiated and oppositional way?
I think the target audience our video is aimed at will be able to view the story in a preferred way as it is a theme that the audience can relate to. The theme of people not fitting in, being different and finding it hard to find a job are all issues that teenagers and young adults can relate to. I don't believe that the audience can negotiate within this theme however they may view it in an oppositional way as they may find it hard to relate to the characters as circus freaks and may not relate or pity there story line.

What are you going to do to encourage the target audience to take a preferred reading?
To encourage our target audience to relate to the video more and have a preferred reading of the video we will use a cast that are of a similar age group and keep a modern twist on circus look. It will also include places that the audience can relate to.


What type of person may take an oppositional view?
People that are not our target audience may take an oppositional view. An older audience may feel that they are being portrayed unfairly as they do not accept the circus freaks into society however I feel this would only be a handful of viewers.


Perspective on Audience


This is the theory by David Morley that attempts to understand how the media may influence the audience. Although he also encouraged researchers to understand the nature of certain audiences.

This approach tries to understand the intended effects of media texts, but also sees the audiences as active and that different audiences will differ in how they read the values in a media.

• Preferred or dominant reading: The audience recognize the values being offered by the text and accepts them as natural and correct.
• Negotiated reading:The audience recognize the values in the text as legitimate and accept them in general, but adapt their reading of the text to fit in with their experiences and interests.
• Oppositional reading:The audience understands the values in the text, but disagrees with them and rejects them.