The problems and possibilities for audience research
This paper sets out to ask 'what next' for audience research. 'Audience reception analysis', 'reception studies' or 'audience ethnography' emerged and developed, with considerable success, from a convergence of hitherto opposed research traditions during the 1980s (Corner, 1991; Livingstone, 1995). Audience studies currently face a paradox in which many interesting papers, especially those reporting empirical observations, are being published, while simultaneously there exists a body of criticisms which have largely gone unanswered. This then seems an appropriate moment to consider the achievements, problems and future direction of audience reception