The Validity of Audience Ethnography in Media Reception Studies : A Cognitive Approach to Academic Discourse

Abstract

Central Theme The aim of this article is to discuss and evaluate the validity of a newly emerging research trend, "audience ethnography", in the field of media reception studies. "Audience ethnography" is regarded as a new approach to the question of reception, reading, and decoding of media discourse. In D.Morley's formulation, this qualitative and descriptive mode of analysis has widely been adopted by British and European scholars since 1980s, and the consequence of this kind of research is under question at present. This article attempts to offer a new examination of "audience ethnography" from a historical and comparative point of view. In order to do so, it widely reviews not only the argument posed by "audience ethnographers", but also the response from the scholars in other schools, including "uses and gratifications approach". Based on this stand point, the article is shaped by two specific objectives. First, as a theme, it attempts to consider "audience ethnography" in the context of academic research history. It, conversely, sheds new light on other research traditions for audience and reception, by comparing with this new trend. Second, a new approach to the study of academic research history is proposed. Especially, a mode of analysis utilizing "cognitive models" is suitable for clarifying the logical structure observed in academic discourse. This means that paying attention to the conceptual schemes which frame chronological transformation of theoretical paradigms for reception over time-span, a holistic picture of theoretical discussion becomes obtainable. Content These objectives are pursued by the following steps. 1) Internal analysis roughly summarizes the general traits of "audience ethnography". Using qualitative methods such as in-depth interviews and discourse analysis, this kind of projects shares the concern for the reception in social context. Further, "audience ethnography" is characterized by two features, illustrated by "ethno" (studies of specific audience groups, categorized by ethnicity, class, gender, etc.) and "graphy" (qualitative and descriptive monography). On the one hand, "graphy" part reflects theoretical requirement after the surge of structural analysis, and is exemplified by the works by D.Morley and J.Radway. On the other hand, "ethno" part is related with changes in the ways of media reception, resulting from the globalizing tendencies of population and communication flows. A number of comparative analysis is conducted to study reception of American TV program Dallas in several foreign countries. Especially, the achievements by E.Katz and T.Liebes, and I.Ang are considered to form another important feature of "audience ethnography". 2) External analysis compares several authors' viewpoints, which try to examine "audience ethnography" in the background of different research paradigms in reception studies. 2-1) Evolution model (by D.Morley) situates "audience ethnography" as the final form in the development of effects research, uses and gratifications research, encoding/decoding model, and psychoanalysis. 2-2) Convergence model (by K.Shrφder) sees "audience ethnography" as a product of convergence in two different research trends: empirical, social science paradigm and critical communications research paradigm. 2-3) Concurrent model (by K.Jensen and K.Rosengren) advocates a dynamic states of coexsistence of five traditions: effects research, uses and gratifications research, literary criticism, cultural studies, and reception analysis. In part, "audience ethnography" is categorized in the last three or one tradition listed above. 2-4) Revisionist model (by J.Curran) criticizes Morley's view, and suggests a revival of 1940s and 1950s

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