One way of encapsulating the eld of study has been through systematics, such as Figure 8.1, which identied the main stages of the process of communication and the audience research traditions associated with each. Another way of taking stock has been to identify historical milestones – studies that dened inuential ways of conceptualizing and empirically examining various stages of communication. By way of introduction, this chapter revisits some of the milestones of audience studies, as received – and sometimes overlooked – in later research.