Conceptualizing Global Justice Audiences of Alternative Media: The Need for Power and Ideology in Performance Paradigms of Audience Research

Author: Atkinson Joshua  

Publisher: Routledge Ltd

ISSN: 1071-4421

Source: The Communication Review, Vol.8, Iss.2, 2005-04, pp. : 137-157

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Abstract

The following essay examines the development of paradigms of the audience used in mass communication research and the problems that occur when audience performance perspectives such as the Spectacle/Performance Paradigm (SPP) are utilized to examine resistance groups or protest groups as audiences of alternative media. The SPP provides excellent insight into the functions and performances of the audience in everyday modern life, but this is problematic whenever such perspectives are used to examine protest groups—particularly global justice movements. The essay concludes by providing some ideas on how to introduce power and ideology to the SPP and social constructionist views of alternative media audiences through feminist standpoint theories.