Audiences for Michael

• Audience positioning.

Audiences are not passive, we are active.

Texts are polysemic.

Text producers encode texts according to their own ideology.

The encoders include: Editors, journalists, photographers and designers.

Encoding is done through visual and technical codes, language and mode of address.

Some ideologies from Marie Claire magazine (October 2007 featuring Angelina Jolie)

• Looks and appearance are important
• Other people's opinions of you are important
• Feeling good about yourself and having self confidence is important
• Strong independent women should be celebrated - women hold positions of authority and influence
• Emotions and feelings should be discussed and reflected upon
• Celebrities are people too - with feelings and vulnerabilities
• Women need guidance to help them make the right choices
• Women are maternal
• A fashionable look is important but people (children) shouldn't be harmed in attaining this look
• Materialism

You can also discuss the Hollyoaks extract we looked at or the promotional poster for Kidulthood. (See your own task responses.

Audiences are positioned through the use of camera shots, angles and framing.

Humour and sometimes colloquial language or slang.

• Audience responses

This does not necessarily mean that an audience will accept and agree with these ideologies.

Stuart Hall should be applied when the question asks you about responses.

There are a few important things to remember about the three different positions that we can take.

Preferred Reading

Is not just about 'liking' a text - you must understand what the purpose of a text is and agree with its ideologies and the messages it carries.

Oppositional Reading

Is not just 'disliking' a text - there are many reasons why someone may take an oppositional reading - but whatever these reasons are, the audience member must understand what the intentions of the text are, but reject them.

Negotiated Reading

Can be the case whereby an audience member agrees with some ideologies and not others, but it can also be the case where the audience doesn't fully understand the intentions of the text - or is confused about the purpose of the text.

Readers of Marie Claire might take an Oppositional Reading, which might include...

• Rejecting materialism
• Believing that there are more important things in life than appearance
• Believing that having fashionable clothes is more important than knowing where the clothes come from
• It doesn't matter what others think of you so long as you are happy with yourself

• Audience appeal

Media texts appeal to audiences using a variety of methods:

Technical and audio codes - fast paced editing in an action text or bright colours in a gossip magazine

Language and mode of address - Voice over in a horror genre film may attract an audience with promises of a horrific narrative. 

Subject specific lexis

Hyperbole

Imperatives

Quotes to make the text authentic

Elipsis may put answers in the audiences head. 'Got Milk?'

• Audience categories

Here you can consider Psychometric profiles which deal with values and interests, lifestyles of the audience. 

The 4 C's - Mainstreamers, aspirers, reformers, succeeders.

Demographic profiles 

NRS - A, B, C1, C2. D, E

• Audience construction

This is to do with enigmas that keep the audience hooked. 
This is to do with use of celebrity to endorse a product or be a spokesperson for a campaign.

Magazines use the cover, sell lines and cover lines on its front to construct a clear idea of who the audience is.