ABSTRACT
Our motivation in this chapter has something to do with the way in which our idea of how audiences are ‘produced’ – by media and some traditions of academic thought – concentrates on and produces a very passive characterisation. Of course, there is an obvious ‘passivity’ to being an audience member, in the fact that media products are things produced ‘out there’ by companies which we’re only interested in when we want them, or believe that we want them. For most of us, ‘activity’ appears to require little more than switching on the television, or browsing the internet or a rack of magazines at the newsstand. One way of seeing our role as audience members, therefore, is to see us as making a selection and then sitting back and enjoying the show!
