1. Audience Responses
Preferred Reading
This is when an audience understands and agrees with the message given in a
media product. For example when the audience reads a piece of text from a
magazine they will fully understand the message what the text is saying to the
reader. This is from the Reception Theory by Stuart Hall. For
example using one magazine cover to demonstrate Preferred
ReadingCosmopolitan- This magazine puts across the message to the
audience that this magazine is aimed at women and is about
Sex, fashion, makeup and love. It shows this by having girly
colours and words on the cover. Like ‘Spice it up’, ‘Eye
makeup’ and ‘First Date Rules.’
I have the same interests in what this magazine projects
onto its audience. I want to read about first date rules and
Miley Cyrus. This makes me want to read the magazine even
more because I am a fan of Miley Cyrus. I am understanding that this a
magazine for girls so this will make me want to read it because I can see that
the magazine cover is pink and has a idol on the front which a lot of girls look up
to.
Negotiated Reading
The audience accept the preferred reading but this preferred reading is
modified buy interests experiences and they interpret in their own way.
This is from the Reception Theory by Stuart Hall. Again using
one magazine cover, the example of negotiated reading is:
Cosmopolitan- I’m a big fan of Miley Cyrus so her on the cover would make me buy
the magazine. I interpret the magazine cover myself because I am a fan of Miley
Cyrus this makes me want to read the magazine more. Someone who is not a fan of
Miley Cyrus may look at this cover and not want to read the magazine or buy it
because purely because this singer is on the front. It can be interpreted in a good
way or a bad way that this is the cover and in my opinion it is a good way.
Oppositional Reading
Oppositional is the opposite reading depending on your own values and
backgrounds. This is the opposite message the product gives. This is also
from the Reception Theory by Stuart Hall. An example of this is…
Cosmopolitan- I don’t think women should be showed on the cover
looking so perfect when in reality no one is perfect because I like who is
on the cover this makes me want to buy the magazine. I don’t like about
this that women can be airbrushed and edited and girls look at these role
models and think that we must look like that. This is all edited and no one
has perfect airbrushed skin and perfect hair. I like who is on the cover
and I think that it is important to have a women with such talent on front
of a very popular magazine because she works hard for her fame

2. compared to these role models off realty shows who do not work hard and
girls still look up to them. These are the girls that should not be on the
covers of these magazines.
Participatory Culture
This is when the audience is invited to interact with the media and be
involved with it. They can ‘have their say’ and feel a more personal aspect
about the media they are interacting with. This has become popular with
the use of social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Participatory
media can include blogs, tagging, hashtags, music-photo-video sharing,
podcasts and video blogs. These audiences are very active as they
interact with the media and the ideas; it is a direct way to have your say
on things. For example – Xfactor on Itv. This show is very popular and it
invites people to vote for their favourite acts and has an app where you
can join along and comment on what you think of the acts. An after show
is available for people to watch where they can ring in the show and tweet
and their tweets get read out to the public and opinion’s shared to the
public.
Radio one have a show on called Dan and Phil which I listen to on my
laptop. This show allows you to use a hashtag on twitter to get involved
with discussions and you can text into the show and request songs and
say hi to the celebrity guest they have this allows me to interact in a
more personal way with what I am listening to.
Cultural Competence
Media texts require audiences to have a certain level of cultural
understanding. This means they must have an understanding of language
used in media to be able to interpret the symbols and signs used. We can
understand meanings in symbols and signs used but this might not
always be the case for people in different cultures from ours.
The representation of the colour Green is different and varies in lots of
countries. In the UK the colour green in represented as Lucky, spring,
new life, Greed and jealousy. Whereas in China the colour green is
represented as Fertility, Hope, Exorcism and disgrace.
A cow in our culture is something that we eat and it’s just a common farm
animal where as in a Hindu culture they see cows as a religious animal
where they don’t eat it and they adore them.
Clothes/films/ songs can have different cultural understanding. Different
cultures have different understandings about how clothes and what
clothes are worn for example in the travelling cultures young traveller
girls wear very outrageous provocative clothing which shows them in
sexual way and shows a lot of flesh and this is normal in this culture. It’s
just the normal travelling girl attire. Whereas in normal British culture
these types of clothes are seen as non respectful clothing
And only flusey kinds of girls wear this type of clothing who wants the
wrongs kinds of attention. As you can see the same type of clothing are

3. the same but are seen in different types of ways to two very different
cultures. In an Indian culture some films they cannot watch because they
contain scenes that are against their religion. This is also the same for
music and songs because some songs can contain lyrics, which cultures
can find offensive for example a song in America culture got banned
because the lyrics reflected a tragedy that happened in American and
they offended.
Fan Culture
Fan culture describes and audience taking an active role in the creation of
an existing media product. This includes fan fictions of alternative endings
to their favourite films, TV shows and books or what they would like to
happen to their favourite characters. Fan fiction is now very popular
because of the means of social networking where people can share their
fan fiction and their ideas of this fan culture of theirs.
People who vlog on YouTube have a massive fan culture such as Zoella
and Marcus Butler and Dan and Phill. The fandom of these British
YouTube create stories including these vloggers and create collages,
drawings and mashups of them.
I am a big Fan of the TV show skins and I follow a Fan culture on them
through Instagram and Twitter. Where I have followed a lot of the pages
that are about this TV show and I retweet quotes, pictures and videos
that are about this TV show.