Aveda Institute Chicago ICT Terminology in Media Studies Paper

• I will attach a book once accepted you need to:

• From the Table of Contents, find 2 terms related to ICTs (i.e. technology).
• Write a short definition for each of the terms that you have chosen by summarizing and paraphrasing the text. Each definition should be around 100 words max.

Keywords for Media Studies
Keywords for Media Studies
Edited by Laurie Ouellette and Jonathan Gray
N E W Y O R K U N I V E R S I T Y P R E S S New York
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York
www.nyupress.org
© 2017 by New York University
All rights reserved
References to Internet websites (URLs) were accurate at the time
of writing. Neither the author nor New York University Press is
responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the
manuscript was prepared.
isbn: 978-1-4798-8365-3 (hardback)
isbn: 978-1-4798-5961-0 (paperback)
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the Library of Congress.
New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and
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strive to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to
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Also available as an ebook
Contents
Introduction: Laurie Ouellette and Jonathan Gray 1
30. Ideology: Jo Littler 98
1. Access: Elizabeth Ellcessor 7
31. Industry: Amanda D. Lotz 102
2. Aesthetics: Lev Manovich
32. Infrastructure: Lisa Parks
106
3. Affect: Carrie A. Rentschler 12
33. Interactivity: Tama Leaver
108
4. Appropriation: Beretta E. Smith-Shomade 14
34. Intersectionality: Brenda R. Weber 111
5. Assemblage: J. Macgregor Wise 16
35. Irony: Amber Day
114
6. Audience: Matt Hills 17
36. Labor: Vicki Mayer
115
7. Author: Cynthia Chris
37. Mass: Jack Z. Bratich 119
9
21
38. Memory: George Lipsitz 121
8. Brand: Sarah Banet-Weiser 24
9. Celebrity: Suzanne Leonard and Diane Negra
10. Censorship: Terry Flew
28
39. Myth: Jonathan Bignell 123
40. Nation: Melissa Aronczyk
32
125
11. Citizenship: Laurie Ouellette 34
41. Network: Marina Levina 127
12. Class: Laura Grindstaff 39
42. New Media: Lisa Gitelman 130
13. Commodification: Alison Hearn
43. Ordinary: Graeme Turner
43
131
14. Convergence: Jean Burgess 47
44. Othering: Angharad N. Valdivia 133
15. Copyright: Kembrew McLeod 49
45. Personalization: Joseph Turow 135
16. Cosmopolitanism: Lilie Chouliaraki
52
46. Play: Matthew Thomas Payne 138
17. Data: Melissa Gregg and Dawn Nafus 55
47. Policy: Jennifer Holt 140
18. Discourse: Nico Carpentier 59
48. Popular: John Clarke
19. Domesticity: Mary Beth Haralovich 62
49. Power: Nick Couldry 145
20. Fan: Henry Jenkins 65
50. Production: Derek Johnson 149
21. Feminism: Susan J. Douglas 68
51. Public: Jennifer Petersen
22. Flow: Derek Kompare 72
52. Queer: Karen Tongson 157
23. Gaze: Michele White 75
53. Race: Herman Gray
24. Gender: Rosalind Gill 77
54. Realism: Greg M. Smith
25. Genre: Jason Mittell 81
55. Reflexivity: Mark Andrejevic 168
26. Globalization: Aswin Punathambekar 84
56. Representation: Lisa Henderson 172
27. Hegemony: Justin Lewis 88
57. Resistance: Stephen Duncombe 176
28. Hybridity: Marwan M. Kraidy
29. Identity: Myria Georgiou 94
90
143
153
161
166
58. Sound: Michele Hilmes 180
59. Space: Helen Morgan Parmett 181
v
60. Stereotype: Ellen Seiter 184
61. Surveillance: Kelly Gates 186
62. Taste: Elana Levine and Michael Z. Newman
189
63. Technology: Jennifer Daryl Slack 191
64. Temporality: Sarah Sharma
65. Text: Jonathan Gray
194
196
Works Cited 201
Contributors 223
vi
Contents
Introduction
Laurie Ouellette and Jonathan Gray
Keywords for Media Studies introduces and advances
Curiously, “media” receives scant attention in Wil-
the field of critical media studies by tracing, defining,
liams’s own Keywords, taking up barely more than a
and problematizing its established and emergent
single page. This is likely because Williams, who wrote
terminology. Like the authors of other books in the
about television, the press, and radio, understood me-
New York University Press Keywords series, we take our
dia less as a singular entity than as an integral and mul-
bearings from the Welsh scholar Raymond Williams. In
tifaceted aspect of culture and society—as suggested
Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society (1976/1983),
by his two cross-references to longer entries on “com-
Williams presented a “shared body of words and
munication” and “mediation.” It is nonetheless worth
meanings” for understanding “general discussions
considering what he did say about media, a Latin term
of . . . the practices and institutions which we group
he traces to the sixteenth century, when it conveyed
as culture and society” (15). Less a dictionary or an
a “sense of intervening or intermediate agency or sub-
encyclopedia than a holistic conceptual map organized
stance,” such as between a “sense or thought and its
around words, his book charted the history and usage
operation” (203). In the eighteenth century, the term
of “key” words as a means of “recording, investigating
was adapted to newspapers, to the extent that newspa-
and presenting” problems of culture and society to
pers were understood (by capitalists) as “mediums” for
which they were bound (15). Williams did not set out
advertising. A “conscious technical sense” of distinc-
to define a definitive canon of important terms, or to
tions between print, sound, and vision as media began
fix their significance for all time. Rather, he charted the
to emerge during this time as well. According to Wil-
dynamic relationship between language, knowledge,
liams, the term “media” was not widely used until the
and subjects. By tracing the origins and meaning of
twentieth century, when the plural phrase “mass media”
words across changing social, economic, and political
became common parlance for the new institutions and
contexts, he opened up space to interrogate and disrupt
cultural output of broadcasting, the press, and cinema.
commonsense assumptions about culture and society
Only with this development did the formal study of me-
in the present. Keywords for Media Studies adapts this
dia (initially called “mass communications”) emerge,
approach to the vocabulary of critical media studies.
operating with a “converged” understanding of these
The pages that follow present sixty- five keywords,
three senses of media, says Williams (203).
reflected upon by leading scholars tasked to show how
We can see elements, traces, and rebuttals of these
their meanings, histories, and usage intersect with and
early definitions of media across the entries assem-
inform problems and debates in media and society.
bled in this book. For example, while many scholars
1
approach media primarily as “forms and sign systems”
contextualization and unpacking than we usually grant
(Williams 1976/1983, 203), newer scholarship on medi-
them. Taking cues from Williams, the contributors to
ated affect has revitalized an understanding of media as
Keywords for Media Studies are keen to historicize think-
acting on and between the physical body and the senses
ing about media and society, whether that means not-
(see “Affect,” chapter 3). Assumptions about technologi-
ing a long history of “new media,” or tracing how un-
cal specificity—the notion that different media (print,
derstandings of media “power” vary across time periods
radio, television, the web) have specific properties that
and knowledge formations. We have asked our authors
“take priority over anything actually said or written or
to situate their “key” terms within the interdisciplinary
shown”—are still commonplace, even as many scholars
discipline of media studies, so that this book—in addi-
reject technological determinism (203). As Williams
tion to explicating influential words—chronicles a his-
points out in his entry on mediation, the “modern use
tory of ideas about the objects of academic inquiry and
of media or mass media” continues to assign various de-
the conceptual frameworks in which they have been ex-
grees of power to media institutions to distort the “real”
amined, interrogated, analyzed, and understood. How-
and impose mediated relations (ideology) on social
ever, even more than Williams, we have urged them
consciousness (206). The term “communication,” un-
to go beyond description and summary, to take stock
derstood as early as the seventeenth century as “to make
of media studies now, to intervene in debates, and to
common to many or to impart–an action” (72), was ini-
chart new arguments. This book introduces those new
tially applied to the development of roads, canals, rail-
to the field to some key terms, research traditions, and
ways, and other physical facilities—a focus that lives on
debates, and their contexts and histories, while also
in the analysis of “space” and “infrastructure” in this
offering both these readers and those who have been
volume. Only with the development of “other means of
teaching and researching in the field for years a sense of
passing information and maintaining social contract,”
new frontiers and questions. We’ve often been inspired
he writes, did communication come to refer predomi-
and encouraged by reading these entries, and hope our
nantly to the press, broadcasting, and other mass media
readers will similarly use them perhaps to understand
(72). In long-standing debates about the power of the
the field of play better, yes, but also to see prospects for
mass media, it also is “useful to recall the unresolved
future work.
range of the original noun of action, represented at its
extremes by transmit, a one-way process, and share, a
common or mutual process,” Williams reflected, for the
2
What Is Media Studies?
“intermediate senses—to make common to many, and
Critical media studies is usually traced to the 1940s,
impart, can be read in either direction, and the choice
when theorists associated with the Frankfurt School
of direction is often crucial” (72–73).
cast their gaze on the burgeoning US mass media and
We point to these discursive lineages not to mini-
cultural industries. From the 1970s and 1980s, the criti-
mize profound changes in media and society since
cal study of media developed at rapid pace, influenced
Williams published his Keywords, but to situate the
by literary studies, film theory, medium and technol-
contemporary study of media within a history of ideas
ogy theory, feminist criticism, television studies, and,
manifested in taken-for-granted terms that require more
perhaps most important, British and American cultural
IntroduCtIon
Laurie OueLLette and JOnathan Gray
studies. These varied (and sometimes contentious)
theorizing media now. The sixty-five entries present an
bodies of scholarship differed from the social scientific
expansive guide to the terminology associated with criti-
mass communication tradition that arose in the 1920s
cal media analysis in the broadest sense. Instead of cate-
in their engagement with qualitative analysis, social,
gorizing media in narrow, medium-specific terms (“film,”
cultural, and political theory, and power relations. In
“TV,” “radio”), we have followed Williams’s emphasis on
this book, we understand media studies to be focused
broader conceptual frameworks and modes of analysis
on this critical tradition, which is (and has always been)
(such as “gaze,” “flow,” and “sound”). In addition to
broadly interdisciplinary.
covering familiar media-centric terms such as “institu-
While media studies is (and has always been) an in-
tion,” “technology,” “production,” “representation,”
tellectually diverse endeavor, it has developed recogniz-
and “audience,” we have also chosen terms such as “hy-
able paradigms, traditions, and perspectives that can be
bridity,” “identity,” and “labor” that understand media
mapped for incoming and established scholars. Institu-
within wider social, cultural, political, economic, and
tionalized in university departments of media studies
global contexts. Finally, we have included foundational
as well as designated “areas” within compatible fields
terms for critical media analysis (such as “myth” and
such as communication studies, visual studies, and
“hegemony”) alongside newer analytical terms (such as
cultural studies, critical media studies remains an espe-
“affect” and “assemblage”). As a result, the pages that
cially popular academic inquiry, with introductory and
follow present a comprehensive and forward-looking re-
specialized courses offered at the graduate and under-
source for emerging and established scholars alike.
graduate levels. Indeed, at a time when many academic
Studying media is hard, for despite common usage
disciplines are suffering from reduced enrollments and
that can imply “the media” is a monolithic, singular ob-
diminished institutional support, critical media studies
ject, media are plural and varied. New media constantly
continues to thrive and grow, producing media work-
join the pantheon of “old” or existing media, shifting
ers, critical consumers, and new generations of teachers
the entire landscape at times, or slotting simply into
and scholars. Because the development of new media
age-old patterns at other times. Society itself changes,
technologies, globalization, privatization, and other
thereby revising the stakes or relevance of various media.
sociohistorical factors continues to alter the media
Technological change and/or aesthetic innovation can
landscape, the critical study of media has been forced to
repurpose a medium. Norms of production, distribution,
remain especially innovative, self-reflexive, and vibrant.
delivery, exhibition, and use change. Thus, any study of
While rooted, as Williams insisted, in a discursive past,
the media occurs at a point in time, and all studies are
critical media studies is also experiencing a conceptual
open to revision. This book brings together some of the
renaissance, as scholars and theorists work to keep pace
leading thinkers in media studies to assess where we are
with the transition from mass media to customized, on-
right now, in some cases explaining how we got here,
demand media culture, interactive relationships, and
and in some cases gesturing to possible roads ahead. It
global media flows.
is not a dictionary, aiming to define terms that surely
Keywords for Media Studies maps the enduring con-
all our authors would regard as volatile and ever chang-
cepts and traditions of critical media studies, as well
ing; nor is it an encyclopedia, aiming to give the elusive
as emerging developments and new directions in
totalizing account of a word and promising an equally
IntroduCtIon
Laurie OueLLette and JOnathan Gray
3
elusive objective rendering. Rather, we are inspired by
new. If we hope to see a field in motion, we are more
Williams’s interest in approaching a broad terrain by
likely to witness that mobility in the evolution of defi-
exploring what are the words that matter discursively.
nitions for similar words from 1976 to 2001 to 2005 to
Which words’ complexities need to be understood to in
2017. Thus, for instance, “ordinary” appears in Williams,
turn better understand how media work? We charged
yet Graeme Turner’s entry on “ordinary” in this volume
our authors with presenting these complexities. We
was written in an era of ubiquitous social media and
also charged them with noting where the word is right
reality television that has recalibrated our relationship
now. And we invited them, should they wish, to inter-
(as amateur content providers and audiences) to the
vene in the word’s life, and to call for new or additional
ordinary. “Race” (or, for Williams, “racial”) appears in
approaches.
all four books, yet Herman Gray’s entry here is situated
within the current moment of ubiquitous visibility, biopolitics, and a supposedly “postracial” America. Susan
Comparisons and Selection
Douglas’s entry on “feminism” considers much of the
If one compares our table of contents to those of earlier
same history as does Bennett, Grossberg, and Morris’s
keywords collections in media and cultural studies—not
entry, yet provides updates for the current moment.
only Raymond Williams’s Keywords: A Vocabulary of Cul-
And a whole host of other terms—“audience,” “author,”
ture and Society, but also Tony Bennett, Lawrence Gross-
“citizenship,” “industry,” and “text” among them—are
berg, and Meaghan Morris’s 2005 New Keywords: A Re-
by no means new additions to media studies’ critical
vised Vocabulary of Culture and Society and John Hartley’s
vocabulary, yet the field’s understandings of them have
2011 Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key
shifted considerably in ways that our assembled authors
Concepts—the addition of some words over time might
delineate. We invite readers, if they are interested, to
gesture to their rising currency. Most obviously, as new
track definitions over time and across volumes.
and digital media have played increasingly dominant
4
roles in both society and the analysis of media, a host of
By pointing out continuities and differences across
associated issues have risen to prominence, resulting in
various keywords collections, though, we aim not to
the additions of a cluster of words—among them “access,”
start an odd academic game of Matching Pairs, but to
“convergence,” “copyright,” “data,” “interactivity,” “per-
underline the very point of an exploit such as the cre-
sonalization,” and “surveillance”—that did not appear
ation of a keywords collection. Words can carry layers
in the earlier two books. Less obviously, the increasing
of meaning, and they can be not only sites of conflict,
sophistication of critical scholarship on the intersection
change, or conservatism but key actors in the forces of
of media, the body and identity, and the development
conflict, change, or conservatism. They can be rally-
of new approaches to studying mediated identities and
ing cries that unite, weapons that assault, or salves that
subjectivities has warranted new terms not in any of the
calm and heal. For all their visual simplicity (as with the
three books, such as “appropriation,” “cosmopolitan-
short words “race,” “class,” or “labor”) and even when
ism,” “intersectionality,” “play,” and “reflexivity.”
a lazy dictionary might suggest they are fixed and un-
However, we’d pose that scrutinizing tables of con-
spectacular, some words matter immensely and are any-
tents to see “what’s new” belies much of what is in fact
thing but simple. This book sketches out something of
IntroduCtIon
Laurie OueLLette and JOnathan Gray
a cartography, a relief map of media studies and its own
prominences by defining, discussing, critically engaging
with, and in some cases redefining some of the most important words in the field.
Inevitably, some readers’ favorite keywords won’t appear in these pages. We aimed not to canonize, nor to
suggest that only these words matter. Presented with
finite pages and words, we had to make decisions about
whether friendly concepts might be able to travel together under one heading, and at times about which
words demanded redefinition and which may already
have been handled well elsewhere. Nevertheless, we assembled a group that is simultaneously eclectic, interesting, and austere enough to cover a range of traditions
and research questions within media studies. While we
have offered a brief answer to the question “What is media studies?,” the pages that follow present a heftier and
more engaging answer in aggregate.
In closing this introduction, we offer our thanks to our
authors, for being so easy and fun to work with, and for
allowing us to be appreciative readers, not (just) taskmaster editors.
IntroduCtIon
Laurie OueLLette and JOnathan Gray
5
1
Access
Elizabeth Ellcessor
“Access” is usually understood to refer to the opportunity,
public largely as receivers of media, rather than as pro-
ability, or right to gain entry to a space or possession of a
ducers. Access to the airwaves was limited by licensing,
thing. One of the most common formulations is to have
which ostensibly ensured the public interest and cer-
access to a given object, action, or context. Discussions
tainly reduced the diversity of producers and enabled
of media access have followed this usage, in terms of
the development of broadcast networks and later media
gaining access to the means of production, granting
conglomerates.
access to positive or realistic representations, enabling
Telecommunications law, by contrast, initially estab-
access to telecommunications networks and mass
lished access in relation to availability and affordability
media content. Typically, media access is prioritized in
through concepts of universal service and common car-
matters related to news, politics, and economics, while
riage. Under these provisions, common carriers (such as
it is less commonly made relevant to discussions of
telephone companies) were protected from liability for
entertainment or social media.
the content carried by their networks. This was justified
“Access” has a positive and positivist bent; each of
through a mandate for universal service, whereby these
the examples above presupposes that it is beneficial
carriers would extend access to and use of the network
for people to have access, and that access is a discrete
to all, making telephony a public utility managed by
state that can be identified and achieved. Given these
private interests.
tendencies, it is unsurprising that the use of “access” in
Yet, availability, affordability, and consumer choice
media policies and within media studies has routinely
were insufficient tools with which to include people
conveyed some combination of media availability, af-
with disabilities in the mediated public sphere. For ex-
fordability, or consumer choice. The limitations of such
ample, without specialized hardware, the availability
a discourse of access are evident when we consider US
and affordability of telecommunications were irrelevant
media policies in relation to access and then in relation
to d/Deaf Americans. Similarly, without closed captions
to disability.
or audio description on television, the public interest
From the Communications Act of 1934, which estab-
of d/Deaf or blind viewers was not met. Routinely, laws,
lished broadcasting as a commercial service operating
technologies, and studies of media have played catch-
in the public interest, access to mass media has referred
up, assuming an able-bodied media user and only later
to the ability of individuals to act as consumers, making
considering how people with disabilities might require
choices from available media technologies and content.
different conditions in order to access media (Goggin
“Access” as availability and (limited) choice figured the
and Newell 2003).
7
Disability reveals some of the limitations of domi-
studied, and made the basis of theory. With this per-
nant discourses of “access,” and these limitations ex-
spective, “watching television” ceases to be a taken-for-
tend to any conception of having access to media tech-
granted activity and becomes a variable assemblage of
nologies, affordances, and content. This understanding
screens, remote controls, captions and audio descrip-
of “access” leaves out the infinitely variable material
tions, tablet computers and mobile phones, domes-
and experiential dimensions of access. Media access
tic and public spaces, individual and group practices.
may take many forms; unorthodox means of accessing
Furthermore, “accessing” must take on a subject; any
media may produce new articulations of bodies, tech-
statement about access must consider who is accessing,
nologies, policies, and culture. The volunteer caption-
forcing considerations of diversity and marginalized
ing, informal distribution, and group viewing of films
perspectives by refusing the normativity of an unnamed
by d/Deaf audiences during the mid-twentieth century
subject. In doing this, analyses of media access can make
represented an intervention into cultures of filmgo-
increasingly meaningful interventions in the demo-
ing, the practices of Hollywood, and ultimately federal
cratic roles of media content, technologies, and policies.
policy, as the nonprofit Captioned Films for the Deaf
Like formulations of access as availability, affordability,
was brought under the aegis of the federal Department
and choice, the framing of access as an object can go
of Health, Education, and Welfare in 1958 (Schuch-
only so far. “Accessing” enables deeper, more nuanced,
man 1988). Conceiving of media access as an object or
and more inclusive studies of and interventions in the
state of being to be possessed hides such histories and
ways in which people and media are brought together.
fosters a unitary and potentially exclusionary vision of
what access entails and how to promote it. For instance,
although graphical user interfaces increased access to
personal computing for many people, they created a
barrier for blind users; then, in combating the digital divide, programs promoted access to computers that used
these systems, reinforcing a singular vision of “access”
and further ostracizing those for whom such access was
insufficient. The legacy of such histories is that Americans with disabilities remain significantly less likely to
have access to, or use, digital media.
Media studies needs to move beyond the noun form
of “access” to consider it as a verb. “Accessing” should
be seen as a variable moment or process by which one
may enter a literal or figurative space, acquiring desired
items, activities, or outcomes. If, instead of having access
to something—possessing access—we were to think in
terms of accessing that thing, more versions of access
and subsequent media engagement can be observed,
8
ACCess
eLizabeth eLLcessOr
the means to purchase beautiful designer clothes and
2
home décor items. The Pinterest social network, which
Aesthetics
by images of beautiful clothes, home décor, crafts, fash-
Lev Manovich
ion, party ideas, and so on. The photos that we see
reached a hundred million users in 2015, is dominated
around us every day have been refined in Photoshop to
achieve visual perfection, and cinematography similarly
uses digital tools to control precisely the aesthetics of
The most common meaning of “aesthetics” today
associates it with beauty. We use this term to refer to
every shot and frame.
In fact, digital tools and software workflows that in-
principles and techniques to make something beautiful,
dustry gradually adopted in the 1990s have led to an
and to our experiences of that beauty. It comes from
“aesthetic revolution.” Until that time, many forms of
the ancient Greek aisthetikos, which meant “esthetic,
modern media such as television, cinema, and newspa-
sensitive, sentient, pertaining to sense perception”;
pers had limited ways to control their aesthetics. These
that word was derived from aisthanesthai, meaning “I
media did not always use color, or did not have technol-
perceive, feel, sense.”
ogies to control its nuances. Digital editing tools and
Many human cultures developed explicit principles
the web as a distribution platform changed this. Now
and rules to be used in order to achieve beauty. Such
every pixel, line, frame, face, and body can be edited to
principles may concern proportion, symmetry, har-
achieve the desired aesthetic effect. Never before have
mony, composition, use of colors, narrative organi-
we been surrounded by so much “engineered” beauty
zation, and so on. In between the seventeenth and
and perfection, especially in the visual sphere.
nineteenth centuries in the West, many philosophers
At the same time, the concepts of beauty and aes-
developed theories of aesthetic experience, while art
thetic pleasure have been almost completely neglected
academies were teaching artists the practical principles
in theories of media. One finds little to no analysis of
to make beautiful artworks. In the twentieth century,
media aesthetics in media studies textbooks, or in the
such prescriptive aesthetic systems became less impor-
works of major media theorists after the middle of
tant, but some principles remain widely used (such as
the twentieth century. Scholars in recent decades in
Euclid’s golden ratio). Modernist photographers, artists,
English-speaking countries have focused on the con-
and architects such as Le Corbusier continued to use the
tent of media and their social and political effects, and
golden ratio as fundamental to their works.
often ignored the forms of media artifacts. Thus, for
The concept of “aesthetics” has a unique relation to
example, Jill Nelmes’s (2011) Introduction to Film Studies
media studies. I can’t think of another concept that is so
(564 pages) does not even have “aesthetics” or “beauty”
central to the modern culture industries and yet also to
in the index, while a search of Campbell, Martin, and
the creation of media by individuals—such as the tens
Fabos’s (2011) Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass
of millions of people worldwide today who use digital
Communication (616 pages) returned 5 pages where the
tools to make aesthetically refined photos for posting
word appeared, with no single sections or chapters de-
on Instagram, or the hundreds of millions who have
voted to it. I certainly don’t want to critique these and
9
many other excellent textbooks in media studies. Their
analyze cultural representations either to show how
authors represent the topics, theories, and historical and
they excluded or misrepresented some groups in the
contemporary academic media analyses that are most
past, or to support progressive artists today who want to
influential today, so their omissions of references to aes-
use representations to make society more fair.
thetics and beauty are only because these concepts and
corresponding industry practices are not widely studied
in media and communication theory and history today.
others who are interested in media aesthetics as “for-
This exclusion is unfortunate. Form and the relations
malist” is very dangerous. While today media and art
between form and content are what make art (includ-
critics may associate formalism with a certain tradition
ing modern mass media and user-generated content)
in Western art criticism of the twentieth century (such
a unique type of human communication and experi-
as the works of Clement Greenberg), this label was also
ence. Concern with form and beauty has been funda-
utilized in communist countries to imprison and kill
mental in all human cultures for many thousands of
artists who did not want to create correct representa-
years. Rhythm, composition, patterns or repetitions,
tions. After Russia’s 1917 October Revolution, the new
expectation and variation, systematic use of color, or-
Soviet state was first tolerant of some experiments in
nament, grids, and other methodical ways of organizing
art, as long as they did not contain anything that could
elements of any cultural artifact in space and time are
be taken as “counterrevolutionary.” (The literature that
found in every human culture. Today, all students tak-
could not be published included Dada-like movement
ing studio courses in art, media and graphic design, film,
in Russian poetry, for example.) But already in the 1920s,
television, fashion, and other creative fields are taught
the term “formalism” was used in the Soviet Union to
how to use form effectively, and how to achieve desired
criticize in print and in public debates all those who
aesthetics. And while prescriptive aesthetic concepts
were interested in anything other than ideologically
and rules of beauty are no longer enforced today as they
“correct” subjects (including the representations of
were in the art academies of previous centuries, particu-
workers, building of socialism, etc.), and who did not
lar aesthetic choices and systems (such as minimalism
use traditional (nineteenth-century) realist language.
in design or pleasing background blur in photography
and cinematography) dominate professional fields.
Therefore, if we are interested in historical or contem-
10
These are certainly legitimate ideals. However, labeling
Between 1930 and 1953, many thousands of leading Russian artists were sent to work camps or prisons
or were killed based on such criticism. Often an article
porary media culture and media arts, we need to study
declaring that this or that artist was a “formalist” or had
not only the content of artifacts but also their form.
some “formalist tendencies” was published first in a ma-
However, if you focus too much on “form” in media
jor newspaper, and after that this artist was stripped of
studies, you may be labeled a “formalist.” I assume that
his or her positions, could not find work, and often was
many people who use the label “formalist” assume that
arrested. The term “formalism” continued to be used
media (and the study of media) are about content (or
in a very negative sense by Soviet media and art critics
“representations”), that progressive media artists should
until the end of 1980s. Most communist countries fol-
be creating particular representations to advance some
lowed the examples of the Soviet Union and used the
social or moral cause, and that the job of scholars is to
same practices.
AesthetICs
Lev ManOvich
But this attack on artistic form and use of the term
produce aesthetically refined content and share it
“formalism” to destroy many artists did not mean that a
online—media studies needs to pay equal attention to
communist society rejected all forms of aesthetics. On
these dimensions.
the contrary, once Stalin decided it was time to put arts,
How can we add considerations of aesthetics to me-
culture, and media to work helping to construct a new
dia studies curriculum and textbooks? Given the cen-
society—and, at the same time, to offer hardworking
trality of aesthetics to the contemporary media industry
citizens pleasurable experience—concerns with form
and user experiences, this topic should be given suffi-
and aesthetics became important. In 1930, the Soviet
cient space. Its presentation should not treat aesthetics
government dissolved all independent artistic organiza-
in isolation, but instead show its roles in the history of
tions that united Russian modernist artists, and started
media, structures of media industry, social relations,
promoting “classical” and “realist” aesthetic norms
and other topics.
in arts. Soviet architects began to build monumental
buildings that used rich decorations and followed classical architectural aesthetics (such as the golden ratio).
In cinema, rapid disorienting montage and usual points
of view were gradually replaced by classical Hollywood
film language, and by the focus on beautiful stars adored
by millions. The Moscow Metro, constructed in the
1930s, offered citizens of the capital and visitors an unprecedented aesthetic experience—dozens of stations
featured marble, mosaics, sculptures, and other decorative elements created by the best Russian artists of the
time. Clearly, the future communist state would ideally
have many places like this metro, with every building
and interior designed to offer the best aesthetic experience. If communist leaders had had Photoshop, Final
Cut, Flame, Autodesk, and other contemporary media
software, they would have been required tools for all artists to refine the aesthetics and beauty of their creations,
from paintings to films, photographs, and print.
One can only hope that the field of media studies
will stop conceiving of terms like “formalism” negatively, and begin to study and teach media in ways that
better reflect global media production, environments,
and experiences today. If aesthetics and beauty are so
central for media producers and audiences—including
not only professionals but also millions of people who
AesthetICs
Lev ManOvich
11
Much of the emphasis in media scholarship on affect
3
is on what affect enables and does rather than what it
Affect
of conceptualizing and studying social collectivities and
Carrie A. Rentschler
their structures of affective transmission. It approaches
might mean or represent. Affect theory offers new ways
the experiential qualities of embodiment through the
capacity to feel, move, and be moved and provides a different set of perspectives on what connects collective so-
The concept of affect has opened up the study of
cial bodies, their modes of relating, and their affiliative,
media practices and technologies as carriers and
felt structures of togetherness. Affect theory recenters
mechanisms that articulate, direct, intensify, and orient
the body as media in media studies analysis (see Gregg
feeling within context- specific social and political
and Seigworth 2010) in its phenomenological and dis-
configurations. Affect theory provides a way into
positional relations to technologies and communica-
these configurations, by rethinking and privileging
tion infrastructures (see Lisa Parks, “Infrastructure,”
the felt aspects of everyday life, social change, and
chapter 32).
durable structures of power, in their (in some cases)
12
To study affect requires an ability to interpret the
nonrepresentational aspects. In studying affect,
signs and traces of affect’s communicability, its trans-
scholars aim to analyze what is not typically accounted
missibility (Brennan 2004). Affect tends to be studied
for in media studies: how things feel, for whom, and
via the processes through which it registers and be-
with what potential. As Terri Senft (forthcoming)
comes communicable: as ritualized, as means of trans-
puts it, the concerns of affect theory exceed what can
mission, and as forces for making experiences audible,
easily be located in the traditional study of meaning,
visible, and felt. This requires externalized signs and
representation, symbols, and signs.
markings of affect’s work and structuring presence, its
In The Affect Theory Reader, Melissa Gregg and Greg
structures of feeling. Typical research questions ask
Seigworth define affect as “what arises in the midst of in-
what affect enables, what it moves or makes movable,
betweenness, in the capacities to act and be acted upon.”
what it intensifies, and what it links or articulates. Me-
It is the term given “to those forces—visceral forces
dia practices and communication technologies are cen-
beneath, alongside, or generally other than conscious
tral to these movements and articulations of affect, for
knowing” that “drive us toward movement . . . thought
as Anna Gibbs notes, “media and bodies appear as vec-
and extension,” but can also overwhelm, arrest, and frus-
tors, and affect itself as the primary communicational
trate. Simply put, affects are “forces of encounter” and
medium for the circulation of ideas, attitudes and pre-
“gradients of bodily capacity” (2010, 1–2; see also Ahmed
scriptions for action among them” (2002, 339).
2004). They are not necessarily strong in their intensity,
In film studies and media studies alike, affect theory’s
but different qualities of intensity register the different
approach to the body as medium interprets bodily ges-
work affect does and is doing. For Zizi Papacharissi, affect
tures, faces, and modes of bodily comportment for non-
“is the active ingredient that infuses structures of feeling
verbal markings of affective states of being, a physiog-
with different measures of intensity” (2014, 117).
nomic practice of reading the body, and particularly the
face. Some studies interpret exterior surfaces of bodies
and other modes of expressing feeling, care, anger, rage,
and their proxies for capacities to feel together. As Beth
disappointment, and other shared, and potentially
Coleman (2011) argues in relation to her study of avatars,
collectivizing, emotions via social media (Gregg 2011;
in “putting a face to things” through emoticons and av-
Losh 2014; Papacharissi 2014; Rentschler 2014). Affec-
atars, networked communities create powerful feelings
tive labor has increasingly featured in studies of media
of copresence that, without facialized interfaces, are dif-
production cultures, industry studies, and the un- and
ficult to sustain. Some scholars also draw on the physi-
underpaid labor of social media content creators, par-
ognomic ideal that one can interpret the exterior of
ticipants, and commentators—work often described
bodies, buildings, and other surfaces in order to access
as “labors of love” (which they can sometimes be, but
other inaccessible qualities of affective and emotional
ought not be a reason for undercompensation). Increas-
states of being. Such physiognomic tools of reading are
ingly, work in this area attends to the seemingly banal
used as a means to interpret collective modes of feeling
and unremarkable functions of emerging platforms
and bodily response in groups, such as in photographs
and apps, what Morris and Elkins (2015) call “mundane
that capture similar facial expressions made by on-the-
software.” Apps and other software tools themselves do
scene witnesses to terrorist attacks (Sliwinski 2011).
forms of affective labor, as commodity experiences of
Physical movements and bodily gestures might suggest
comforting sounds, touch-based pulsating color screen
how affective states of being are occupied, carried, and
responses, verbalized affirmations, and mechanisms of
lived, but there is also a risk that media makers, analysts,
routine, order, and quantifiable care.
and viewers might essentialize the body as a machine
The attention to affective labor in media studies,
of affective inscription, a surface of appearances that re-
while long a topic of study for feminist researchers, pro-
veals the truth of shared embodied feeling states.
vides one of the more compelling approaches to affect
Affect is also studied through the lens of emotional
as something labored on and through, and produced by
labor and media work, in recognition that affect is both
laboring bodies. Media studies scholars studying activ-
something that is worked on and something that con-
ist and cultural labor in affective terms, and the role of
stitutes a kind of work. One way scholars study how af-
affect in social mobilization, concretely locate the stuff
fect structures media making and communicative labor
and work of affect in what it does, and what people do
is through the structures of expression that accompany
with it. Through these means, scholars study affect as
this labor and its surrounding public cultures and sites
it becomes communicable—audible, visible, and other-
of meaning making—in training texts, public discourse,
wise palpably felt.
management documentation, interviews, and other re-
Finally, affect theory provides essential tools and
search materials. These texts leave affective marks and
frameworks for robustly analyzing the work that feel-
traces, both in what they say through language, image,
ing and emotions do in bringing people together, and
and sound, but also through how they move, are shared,
shaping and moving social collectives, in the process
and are used. Affective labor gives shape to activist com-
of popular organizing and movement mobilization.
munities and networks that take rhetorical and generic
Scholars such as Lawrence Grossberg (1992) and Linda
form in Twitter scripts, emoticons, tagging, avatar over-
Kintz (1995) examine the cultural resonances that me-
lays, button clicks that message “I’ve got your back!”
dia practices tap into, politically—from youth culture
AffeCt
carrie a. rentschLer
13
and popular music to Christian right book series and
liticization and the capacity to move people (see Ryan
4
1991). These links are made, and revealed, in concrete
Appropriation
organizing strategies that leave documentary and other
Beretta E. Smith-Shomade
intimacy videos— to analyze the links between po-
mediatic trails, in movement texts, training documents,
and marketing plans for Christian publishing houses,
among other kinds of materials. Jennifer Petersen refers
to these materials as “the discursive side of feelings,”
When everyday people talk about appropriation,
those “under-examined parts of political communica-
they use words such as “theft” and “rape”— often
tion and the role of media in politics” that are largely
speaking about how their favorite artist was pirated.
affective in nature (2011, 14). Networked affective pub-
These same terms are used to describe the dilemma
lics also leave digital trails, through hashtags and other
of intellectual property— downloading and hook
devices of aggregation and tonal expression (Mottahe-
snatching reminiscent of a time not so long ago, when
deh 2015; Papacharissi 2014; Rambukkana 2015). To un-
those who paid homage (the Beatles) and those who
derstand this requires that we get behind, analytically,
didn’t (Elvis Presley and Mick Jagger and the Rolling
the forms of activist and cultural labor that summon,
Stones) were endemic to how entertainment industries
gather, train, and direct affective experiences around
operated. Scandals such as payola in radio, voice-overs
collectivized political movements, often in conditions
in film, black music video exclusion in cable, and reality
that are not expressly political. It also suggests that me-
television in general link to greed but also tie directly
dia connectivity is, of itself, an insufficient condition for
to the undergirding notion that if you do not have
collective action.
the means or foresight to copyright your work, or an
audience valued by advertisers to protest, your work
becomes an unintended category of fair use. Moreover,
even when the work is protected, some lives, cultural
producers, and cultures appear to matter less than
others.
One of the central debates around appropriation is
capital: Who gets recognized and remunerated for their
cultural labor? Whose songs, style, and innovation become the raw materials for the next million-dollar advertisement for a major corporation like Nike or Pepsi? What
dominant (read: white) rapper (Iggy Azalea), producer
(Mark Ronson), or filmmaker (Quentin Tarantino) will
next capitalize on the cultural work of black and brown
creative output? Posing these questions should make it
clear that appropriation has material consequences.
14
and popular music to Christian right book series and
liticization and the capacity to move people (see Ryan
4
1991). These links are made, and revealed, in concrete
Appropriation
organizing strategies that leave documentary and other
Beretta E. Smith-Shomade
intimacy videos— to analyze the links between po-
mediatic trails, in movement texts, training documents,
and marketing plans for Christian publishing houses,
among other kinds of materials. Jennifer Petersen refers
to these materials as “the discursive side of feelings,”
When everyday people talk about appropriation,
those “under-examined parts of political communica-
they use words such as “theft” and “rape”— often
tion and the role of media in politics” that are largely
speaking about how their favorite artist was pirated.
affective in nature (2011, 14). Networked affective pub-
These same terms are used to describe the dilemma
lics also leave digital trails, through hashtags and other
of intellectual property— downloading and hook
devices of aggregation and tonal expression (Mottahe-
snatching reminiscent of a time not so long ago, when
deh 2015; Papacharissi 2014; Rambukkana 2015). To un-
those who paid homage (the Beatles) and those who
derstand this requires that we get behind, analytically,
didn’t (Elvis Presley and Mick Jagger and the Rolling
the forms of activist and cultural labor that summon,
Stones) were endemic to how entertainment industries
gather, train, and direct affective experiences around
operated. Scandals such as payola in radio, voice-overs
collectivized political movements, often in conditions
in film, black music video exclusion in cable, and reality
that are not expressly political. It also suggests that me-
television in general link to greed but also tie directly
dia connectivity is, of itself, an insufficient condition for
to the undergirding notion that if you do not have
collective action.
the means or foresight to copyright your work, or an
audience valued by advertisers to protest, your work
becomes an unintended category of fair use. Moreover,
even when the work is protected, some lives, cultural
producers, and cultures appear to matter less than
others.
One of the central debates around appropriation is
capital: Who gets recognized and remunerated for their
cultural labor? Whose songs, style, and innovation become the raw materials for the next million-dollar advertisement for a major corporation like Nike or Pepsi? What
dominant (read: white) rapper (Iggy Azalea), producer
(Mark Ronson), or filmmaker (Quentin Tarantino) will
next capitalize on the cultural work of black and brown
creative output? Posing these questions should make it
clear that appropriation has material consequences.
14
Consumers, audiences, and scholars have argued for
processes of electronic mediation have now seemingly
sampling as a defense against the charge of appropria-
separated culture altogether from place; difference has
tion. Sampling as an artistic function drives both the
become an abstract value that can be taken from specific
rap and the hip-hop industries. The difference, how-
groups and settings and combined and recombined in
ever, is twofold. First, artists typically sample from the
ways that allow . . . magnates . . . to appropriate ele-
same ethnic and cultural mix as those who produced
ments of hip hop culture and sell these elements back
the original track. In other words, sampling and race
into the inner city itself while . . . simultaneously mar-
exist together in respect for the culture. Appropriation,
keted, with overwhelming success, to a White consumer
on the other hand, is the distillation and recuperation
audience” (2005, 148).
of imagery, ideology, beats, style, and sometimes lyrics
Over the past several years, a number of controversies
of not only another artist but, more often than not, of a
over appropriation have raged in the popular press. The
culture different from the taker’s own. For example, Jus-
idea that the righteous anger around appropriation and
tin Timberlake’s dance (as Madonna’s did decades prior)
oppression should be checked by the same dominant
and Miley Cyrus’s twerk borrow heavily from black and
culture doing it furthers the damage appropriation does.
brown men and women—creative and otherwise.
Media studies needs to question what is at stake when
Many contend that the most egregious examples
media “represent” ethnic culture. What do the con-
of appropriation happen in the wearing of a costume.
tinuing changes and shifts in technology transnation-
Whether the costumes are donned by college students
ally mean for understanding and appreciating divergent
hosting pimps and hoes parties (code: black), or folks
cultures? What do filmic homages to black and brown
at a Laverne Cox party (code: trans and black), or plain
movements, histories, and people couched in white
cowboys and Indians play (code: racist from way back),
savior motifs mean for day-to-day interactions? Media
parody becomes the de facto defense of appropriating
studies scholars have understudied appropriation. Ad-
culture read as non-normative and/or foreign. The ma-
dressing some of the conundrums that appropriation
terial consequences of this play are real. In other words,
poses may help enrich and broaden other areas of the
questions of origin and belonging such as “where are
discipline.
you really from” (code: Asian or Latino) are tied to the
ease with which identity can be performed. Such injury
as a result of appropriation leads to perceived incompetence, denied opportunity, and heightened rationales
for fear.
Appropriation is to the twenty-first century what the
1980s culture wars were to the originators of hip-hop—a
fight for recognition and respect and a reflection on origins. To this end, some culture war discourse still lingers
in contemporary debates on appropriation, particularly
the boundaries around parody and pastiche. Michael
Giardina and Cameron McCarthy contend, “increasing
ApproprIAtIon
beretta e. sMith-shOMade
15
a myriad of devices and bodies, note their affects, in-
5
tensities, and speeds, and consider how these material
Assemblage
conversations, tweets, and more as a collective assem-
J. Macgregor Wise
blage of enunciation.
arrangements of bodies are stratified with codes, apps,
Along the second axis of the assemblage are relations
of territorialization and deterritorialization, that is, on
the one hand, the ways the assemblage is being orga-
“Assemblage” is the common English translation of the
nized and stabilized and, on the other hand, the ways
French term agencement, used by philosopher Gilles
that it is coming apart, its elements being carried away.
Deleuze and radical psychoanalyst Félix Guattari to
Territory becomes especially important in understand-
theorize the arrangement and organization of a variety
ing both the contingent and infrastructural aspects of
of heterogeneous elements (1975/1986, 1980/1987). The
mobile media assemblages.
concept of assemblage has proved generative in media
The idea of assemblage has been important for the
studies in its articulation of both the discursive and
“material turn” in media studies (Packer and Wiley 2012;
material aspects of media, and in its consideration of
Parikka 2010). Rather than studying the meaning of a
media as arrangements of humans and nonhumans.
text (a tweet or online video), this scholarship looks
It is important to note that Deleuze and Guattari’s
16
at its arrangement and circulation among other mes-
approach to philosophy is one that emphasizes imma-
sages and codes through particular contexts of produc-
nence over transcendence, multiplicity over individual-
tion and reception as well as networks, software, and
ity, and becoming over being. Assemblages are not static
hardware, the affordances of which contribute to and
structures but events and multiplicities; they do not re-
shape what the message can do. Materialist media stud-
produce or represent particular forms but rather forms
ies understands both humans and nonhumans (such as
are expressed and each expression is the emergence of
codes, routers, and mobile screens) as having agency in
something creative and new.
this assemblage. This uptake of assemblage has utility in
Assemblages have four dimensions. Along one axis
recent work theorizing mobile media, new forms of tele-
the assemblage stratifies or articulates what Deleuze
vision, media and social movements, and surveillance.
and Guattari (1980/1987) call collective assemblages of
Three final points with regard to the concept of as-
enunciation with machinic assemblages of bodies. Col-
semblage: First, it is not enough to dissect or map an
lective assemblages of enunciation consist of a regime of
assemblage’s elements. We must consider its capacities:
signs, of “acts and statements, of incorporeal transfor-
what an assemblage can do, “what its affects are, how
mations” (88). Machinic assemblages are assemblages
they can or cannot enter into composition with other
of bodies, actions, and passions, “an intermingling of
affects” (Deleuze and Guattari 1980/1987, 257). Second,
bodies reacting to one another” (88). When thinking
assemblages are not accidental or just contingent but
about media from this perspective, we need to take into
purposeful. “It is not simply a happenstance colloca-
account a series of processes with both human and non-
tion of people, materials, and actions, but the deliber-
human components. We need to draw the lines between
ate realization of a distinctive plan (abstract machine)”
(Buchanan 2015, 385; see also Wise 2011). And, third, to
to simply add up or combine the elements that media
6
studies usually considers (texts, technologies, individu-
Audience
als) and leave it at that. N. Katherine Hayles reminds
Matt Hills
think with the concept of assemblage it is not sufficient
us the concept of assemblage is a critique of the idea
that a unified subjectivity preexists events: subjectivity
is produced by the assemblage and not assumed in its
construction (2012, 24).
As Kate Lacey has observed, there is “an inescapable
collectivity suggested by the word ‘audience’” (2013,
13–14). Indeed, Raymond Williams’s Keywords, despite
not including the term, analyzes what might be
meant by the audience within an entry on “masses,”
conveying the cultural and political ambivalences
that have historically surrounded the mass audience.
The “masses,” we are told, can be “a term of contempt
in much conservative thought, but a positive term in
much socialist thought” (Williams 1976/1983, 192).
Where the former has often viewed mass audiences as
lacking in good taste, rationality, and expertise, the
latter has instead thought of the mass as standing in
for “the people” and the “popular,” that is, acting as a
force for democracy. Sonia Livingstone argues that “in
audience research, both meanings of audience retain
some purchase” (2005, 23)— sometimes audiences
represent a problem to be criticized, and sometimes
they are a force to be celebrated. In New Keywords, David
Morley holds on to the importance of audience as
collectivity, contrasting physically copresent audiences
with “the mass audience for contemporary forms of
broadcasting, which perhaps today supplies us with
our primary sense of what an audience is” (2005, 8).
However, Morley indicates that the mass audience
can no longer be assumed to unify media consumers
in space and time. Instead, “cross- border forms of
broadcasting often now bring together audiences of
people who may be geographically dispersed across
17
(Buchanan 2015, 385; see also Wise 2011). And, third, to
to simply add up or combine the elements that media
6
studies usually considers (texts, technologies, individu-
Audience
als) and leave it at that. N. Katherine Hayles reminds
Matt Hills
think with the concept of assemblage it is not sufficient
us the concept of assemblage is a critique of the idea
that a unified subjectivity preexists events: subjectivity
is produced by the assemblage and not assumed in its
construction (2012, 24).
As Kate Lacey has observed, there is “an inescapable
collectivity suggested by the word ‘audience’” (2013,
13–14). Indeed, Raymond Williams’s Keywords, despite
not including the term, analyzes what might be
meant by the audience within an entry on “masses,”
conveying the cultural and political ambivalences
that have historically surrounded the mass audience.
The “masses,” we are told, can be “a term of contempt
in much conservative thought, but a positive term in
much socialist thought” (Williams 1976/1983, 192).
Where the former has often viewed mass audiences as
lacking in good taste, rationality, and expertise, the
latter has instead thought of the mass as standing in
for “the people” and the “popular,” that is, acting as a
force for democracy. Sonia Livingstone argues that “in
audience research, both meanings of audience retain
some purchase” (2005, 23)— sometimes audiences
represent a problem to be criticized, and sometimes
they are a force to be celebrated. In New Keywords, David
Morley holds on to the importance of audience as
collectivity, contrasting physically copresent audiences
with “the mass audience for contemporary forms of
broadcasting, which perhaps today supplies us with
our primary sense of what an audience is” (2005, 8).
However, Morley indicates that the mass audience
can no longer be assumed to unify media consumers
in space and time. Instead, “cross- border forms of
broadcasting often now bring together audiences of
people who may be geographically dispersed across
17
great distances, to constitute diasporic communities of
various sorts” (2005, 9).
18
Such audiences become altered kinds of producers of
meaning in addition to being consumers, and so hybrid
Thinking about media audiences, then, seems to
terms such as “produsage,” blending “production” and
involve evaluating the cultural-political character of
“usage,” have sprung up to account for new ways of au-
these groupings. At the same time, audiences have
diencing (Bruns 2008, 215), along with a focus on the
been said to fall into different categories on the basis
“paratexts” that audiences create (Gray 2010). These can
of whether they are copresent in space and time (the
include online reviews (Frey 2015) or comments (Rea-
physical audience), copresent in time but dispersed
gle 2015), as well as fan fiction, fan vids, or GIFs (Booth
across different spaces (the mass audience), or scattered
2015). However, we need to avoid exaggerating a sense of
across different temporalities and sites (the fragmented
media transformation, as if “simple” and “mass” audi-
or individualized audience). A tripartite taxonomy of
ences have been displaced by “diffused” audiences in-
audiences has thus become common (Sullivan 2013, 2),
cessantly busy shaping user-generated content via Web
with one of the most influential versions of this to be
2.0. And we should avoid implying that “linear” media
found in Nicholas Abercrombie and Brian Longhurst’s
have been entirely supplanted by “on-demand cultures”
Audiences (1998). Abercrombie and Longhurst analyze
of audience activity linked to the likes of Netflix and
“the simple, the mass and the diffused” audience (159).
Amazon Prime. Some of the time we may choose to
While the “simple” audience means that which is
“binge watch” or “media marathon” TV shows (Glebatis
copresent at events, and the mass remains emblematic
Perks 2015, ix), but we may combine this with attend-
of large-scale TV audiences watching at the same time
ing live events such as gigs, going out to the cinema,
according to “linear” scheduling models, the “diffused”
or collectively watching “event” TV when it is initially
audience represents something more than simply frag-
broadcast, such as a Dancing with the Stars/Strictly Come
mentation in line with “nonlinear” video-on-demand
Dancing final. Rather than viewing audience types as a
or time shifting. Rather, Abercrombie and Longhurst
rigid taxonomy or a reductive narrative of media “eras,”
are interested in how being an audience member has es-
we need a far more empirical, nuanced, and theorized
caped the spatiotemporal boundaries of the moments
sense of how and when these modes interact. As Aber-
in which we consume media. We are now audiences
crombie and Longhurst caution, it is important to ad-
more of the time, whether this involves reading news
dress the processes that connect simple, mass, and dif-
about TV shows or film franchises we follow via social
fused audiences.
media, tweeting and blogging about our favored me-
With the mainstreaming of social media/Web 2.0, we
dia consumption and fan objects, watching trailers via
can argue that such interactions between simple, mass,
YouTube, or so on. In a pervasive media culture, audi-
and diffused audiences have become more intense. Take
ence identities are not simply enacted in the spaces and
the UK television premiere of BBC TV’s flagship drama
times in which we encounter specific media texts—they
Sherlock and its special episode “The Abominable Bride,”
have become performances of identity that stretch out
which aired on New Year’s Day 2016. Audiences could
long before and after such encounters, and hence the
watch this as part of a mass audience, or they could
term “diffused” audience.
catch up with the show via the BBC iPlayer, forming
AudIenCe
Matt hiLLs
part of a diffused audience. The episode attracted rat-
encountering a media text within seven days, assuming
ings of over eleven million people, making it the most-
a weekly schedule or cutoff of TV viewing that rolls on
watched TV program in the United Kingdom across
to following episodes.
the festive period. But fans also had the option to shift
Audiences can also use social media to migrate from
from a mass audience position and enter “simple” audi-
“simple” audience modes to those with “mass” or “dif-
ences by choosing to view “The Abominable Bride” at
fused” currency, for example tweeting photographs
cinemas.
taken at a red-carpet film premiere or a preview screen-
By choosing to share Sherlock in-person with an an-
ing. In some cases, audience tweets can be picked up by
ticipated audience of like-minded viewers—as well as
the mass media and recirculated within entertainment
treating its cinema release as an elevation and valida-
news stories (this happened in media responses to awk-
tion of the show’s brand—fans could move between
ward representations of feminism in “The Abominable
“mass” and “simple” audiences, with this consumer-
Bride”); in other cases, tweets and videos can circulate
oriented choice effectively acting as a badge of fan
as “spreadable media” within the “networked audience”
distinction, and separating fans out from the mass of
(Jenkins, Ford, and Green 2013; Marwick 2013, 213).
Sherlock’s viewers. But as well as shifting between “mass”
But if so-called simple, mass, and diffused audiences
and “simple” audiences as a way of performing their
have increasingly become modes that audience mem-
dedication to Sherlock—the cinema that I attended in-
bers can move across by using social media or making
cluded a number of cosplaying fans dressed up in Vic-
specific consumption decisions, then Web 2.0’s dif-
torian costumes—audiences could also migrate from
fused audience—where viewers continue to perform
a “diffused” to a “mass” audience position. This move-
their audience identities over time—has also made audi-
ment was possible via the sharing of online reviews and
ences increasingly visible to one another. Media studies
tweets within a “zone of liveness” (Crisell 2012, 45, 93)
typically conceptualizes audiences as collectivities for
following transmission.
particular texts, such as studying The Lord of the Rings
Such a “massification” of Sherlock’s fragmented au-
audiences (Barker and Mathijs 2008) or reality TV au-
dience is not strictly unified in time, however, as these
diences (Skeggs and Wood 2012). But there is a notable
viewers can watch the episode at different and indi-
paradigm shift associated with the rise of social media
vidualized points after initial broadcast. Yet UK TV rat-
and “diffused” audiences: audience communities can
ings now factor in this partial erosion of the “linear”
(and do) now encounter and confront one another far
schedule by counting viewers who watch time-shifted
more readily.
recordings up to a week after transmission; this results
I am no longer simply an audience for media texts;
in a “consolidated” Broadcasters’ Audience Research
I also consume other audience members’ consumption
Board (BARB) rating as opposed to the initial “overnight”
of other media, and as part of fan communities I engage
count of those who watched at the time of broadcast
with other fan communities: reading reviews, blogs,
(the US Nielsen ratings system likewise includes “live
Facebook groups, and forums, for example. It is strik-
plus 7” figures). These quantifications of the “mass” au-
ing, then, that although media studies has deployed a
dience therefore stretch the concept to include those
concept of intertextuality for many years as part of its
AudIenCe
Matt hiLLs
19
20
understanding of media culture, there has been little
routinely than ever before, attending “to television’s
development of any comparable sense of interaudi-
intersubjective viewing practices . . . [and] watch[ing]
ences whereby audiences are analyzed as relating to
in conversation—direct and variously mediated—with
other audiences. It is commonplace to consider texts in
other viewers” (Shimpach 2010, 58). Media audiences
dialogue with other texts (adaptation, genre, satire), yet
are not silos of interpretation cut apart from one an-
still seems unusual to analyze audiences not only in re-
other, emerging around isolated media texts. However,
lation to texts but also transversally, if you like.
reading many prior audience studies, one might be for-
Scholarship has begun to focus on “anti-fandom”
given for thinking that was the case. But studying in-
(Gray 2003), where diffused audiences—sometimes
teraudiences “distances us . . . from the normal media
known as “haters”—perform their visceral dislike of
studies assumption that what audiences do . . . is already
particular media texts online via hate sites or commen-
a distinctive set of media-focused practices rather than
taries. Such dislike often spills over into an othering of
an artificially chosen ‘slice’ through daily life that cuts
the audience for the disliked text, which is assumed to
across how people actually understand the practices in
lack taste, knowledge, or even rationality: young wom-
which they are engaged” (Couldry 2014, 217).
en’s culture from Twilight to One Direction has been
At the same time, we need to be aware that many
patriarchally and problematically dismissed in this
claims are made on behalf of and in relation to audi-
fashion. And work has also considered “inter-fandom”
ences; ratings and box office figures are presented as
(Hills 2012), where fans of one media text denigrate
evidence of brand value or popularity. And some inte-
fans of another, such as older, male Doctor Who fans
raudience interactions can mean projecting what other
being dismayed by the allegedly hysterical “squeeing”
viewer groups are like in order to dismiss them, for ex-
of younger female Sherlock fans. But despite such de-
ample assuming that soap audiences think the actors
velopments in audience studies, there has yet to be a
are the characters, or presuming that horror audiences
systematic theorization of interaudiences and viewers’
straightforwardly enjoy representations of gore and
meaning-making relationships to other (imagined and
immorality. Audiences may seem ever more visible to
mediated) audiences, across media and even across na-
us within the world of social media, but this visibility
tional boundaries.
masks the fact that “no representation of ‘television [or
Audiences should no longer be defined only in re-
other media] audience,’ empirical or otherwise, gives us
lation to the media texts they read, but should also be
direct access to any actual audience. Instead, it evokes
approached as a matter of interaudience interactions,
‘fictive’ pictures of ‘audience,’ fictive not in the sense of
coalitions, and otherings. This is one crucial lesson of
false or untrue, but of fabricated, both made and made
the tripartite division into simple, mass, and diffused
up” (Ang 1991, 34–35). We can never gain access—either
audiences—the more we carry particular audience iden-
as scholars or social media users— to the entirety of
tities with us through mediatized culture and via user-
an audience. It isn’t even clear what this would mean:
generated content, the more we engage with other peo-
what boundaries or parameters would we have to posit
ple’s audiencing alongside “official” media content. As
to contain this “full audience”? Instead, audiences are
a result of this everyday textualization of other people’s
always a kind of fiction or construct, as Ien Ang (1991,
views, we find ourselves watching “in common” more
35) has argued.
AudIenCe
Matt hiLLs
But this does not mean that the study of audiences is
to analyze and challenge how representations of audi-
7
ences are used by media industries, as well as how audi-
Author
ence discourses are deployed in interaudience interac-
Cynthia Chris
futile. Quite the reverse, it means precisely that we need
tions, or by authorities and pundits. How are audiences
characterized or gendered; how are their behaviors culturally valued or denigrated? Theorizing the audience
thus means, among other things, critiquing forms of
By some measures, media studies has not had a
cultural power that can seek to naturalize constructed
strong tradition of foregrounding authorship, in
images of specific audiences.
comparison to literary and film studies’ robust and
even contentious traditions. At times, those traditions
have influenced media scholarship. But in analyses
of television, video games, social media, transmedia,
and other forms, some media scholars have set aside
the preoccupation with singular authors that is
commonplace throughout literary and film studies.
In doing so, we have regularly instead made visible
the interplay of corporate imprimatur, creative and
technical personnel, and active audiences. And yet
other media scholars have engaged with author
theories in a limited manner, adapting them to
television’s mode of production, and focusing on a
small set of individual auteurs. Why is the author so
categorically emphasized in regard to some media
texts and products—and not others? That is, why is an
author? Why has media studies taken approaches that
differ from those of our apparent disciplinary cousin,
film studies, or what has been at stake in our limited
engagements with those approaches? What is gained,
and what may be lost, in each approach? The answers
to each of these questions are quite entangled.
In the postwar period, French film critics embraced
both the resurgence of European filmmaking and an
influx of Hollywood films that had been in short supply during World War II. In the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma, Francois Truffaut and other critics championed
21
But this does not mean that the study of audiences is
to analyze and challenge how representations of audi-
7
ences are used by media industries, as well as how audi-
Author
ence discourses are deployed in interaudience interac-
Cynthia Chris
futile. Quite the reverse, it means precisely that we need
tions, or by authorities and pundits. How are audiences
characterized or gendered; how are their behaviors culturally valued or denigrated? Theorizing the audience
thus means, among other things, critiquing forms of
By some measures, media studies has not had a
cultural power that can seek to naturalize constructed
strong tradition of foregrounding authorship, in
images of specific audiences.
comparison to literary and film studies’ robust and
even contentious traditions. At times, those traditions
have influenced media scholarship. But in analyses
of television, video games, social media, transmedia,
and other forms, some media scholars have set aside
the preoccupation with singular authors that is
commonplace throughout literary and film studies.
In doing so, we have regularly instead made visible
the interplay of corporate imprimatur, creative and
technical personnel, and active audiences. And yet
other media scholars have engaged with author
theories in a limited manner, adapting them to
television’s mode of production, and focusing on a
small set of individual auteurs. Why is the author so
categorically emphasized in regard to some media
texts and products—and not others? That is, why is an
author? Why has media studies taken approaches that
differ from those of our apparent disciplinary cousin,
film studies, or what has been at stake in our limited
engagements with those approaches? What is gained,
and what may be lost, in each approach? The answers
to each of these questions are quite entangled.
In the postwar period, French film critics embraced
both the resurgence of European filmmaking and an
influx of Hollywood films that had been in short supply during World War II. In the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma, Francois Truffaut and other critics championed
21
new generations of directors who often doubled as
studio executives—producers, such as Irving Thalberg at
screenwriters, and whose works displayed persistent ex-
MGM—as authors responsible for “house style” (1988).
pressive styles and themes: among them, Max Ophuls,
Others explore collaborative and collective modes of
Jean Renoir, and Robert Bresson (Truffaut 1954/1976,
authorship typical throughout media production but
16). British film scholars including Peter Wollen (1972)
often obscured by the practice of designating individual
allowed for oppositions and ruptures within an oeuvre,
authors commensurate with corporate branding strate-
among other complications. Still, film studies—taking
gies, copyright regimes, and institutionalized creative
its cue not only from these influential scholars but from
hierarchies. As Jonathan Gray states unequivocally,
the film industry itself, which develops authorship as
“Nothing has a single author” (2013, 93). This direction
a kind of branding strategy—fundamentally recognizes
has proven enormously rich, developing as production
the director as the primary authorial agent.
studies (see Caldwell 2008; Mayer, Banks, and Caldwell
Interdisciplinary media and communication studies,
with roots in sociology, psychology, and social theory,
authoring roles of both above- and below-the-line labor.
long privileged other approaches. A dominant tradition
Yet another direction for the study of media authorship
within communication studies has focused on media ef-
reframes the audience as an authoring partner. Stuart
fects and the role of the audience—not the author—in
Hall offered a model in which, at the point of “encod-
making media. Striking out in another direction, The-
ing,” authorial creativity is practiced within “routines of
odor Adorno identified the “culture industry” as an au-
production, historically defined technical skills, profes-
thorial agent—one that is profit-seeking and routinized
sional ideologies, institutional knowledge, definitions
rather than expressive, and mechanistically marked by
and assumptions, assumptions about the audience
“an eternal sameness” (1967/1975, 14). If Adorno excised,
and so on” (2001, 167). At the point of “decoding,” the
to a fault, human subjects at the site of production, he
viewer (or reader, or listener) makes meaning shaped by
also laid groundwork influencing generations of schol-
available linguistic and cultural referents, social posi-
ars concerned with how industrial conditions shape
tion, and other factors (Hall 2001, 168–69).
mass culture.
22
2009b), and accounting, often ethnographically, for the
Following Hall, scholars have found the authoring
Later, other influential theorists sought to decenter
roles of the viewer/player/user particularly conspicuous
the biographical author, reminding us that the role
in interactive and narratively open-ended forms such
is historical, ideological, and not inevitable (Barthes
as video games and those dependent on user-generated
1967; Foucault 1969/1984). Subsequently, media stud-
content. In the former, the player makes narrative-
ies continued to explore diffuse and layered modes
twisting choices within a defined universe. In the latter
of authoring. Following a spate of corporate merg-
case of so-called social media, the user appends con-
ers in the 1980s and 1990s, many scholars intensified
tent to a corporate platform. Some scholars—such as
scrutiny of the exercise of corporate power in the film
Axel Bruns, who recognizes each social media user as
and media industries. For example, Jerome Chris-
a producer—champion “participatory culture” as de-
tensen’s notion of the “corporate studio” as a nonper-
mocratizing (2008, 256). Others persuasively argue that
son author (2012, 13) draws on Thomas Schatz’s work
digital media corporations readily exploit users’ imma-
on the Hollywood studio system, which identified
terial and largely unpaid labor (Andrejevic 2013a). After
Author
cynthia chris
all, “the new Web is made of the big players, but also of
to recognize the social structures that shore up such re-
new ways to make the audience work”—by occupying
strictions. Inevitably, authors do not stand alone—and
the role of author (Terranova 2000, 52).
cannot be understood in isolation from the conditions
Even as scholars create new models accounting for
authorship in interactive and social media, others bor-
of production, tactics of collaboration, and audience response that shape their work in any medium.
row directly and indirectly from auteurism. In television,
for example, all but a few innovative producers, such as
Norman Lear and Aaron Spelling, long remained largely
obscure in both popular and scholarly discourses. Many
have argued that television has, in recent decades, displayed tremendous aesthetic and narrative complexity
(Mittell 2015), and both popular and scholarly critics
laud some of its producers, now known as “showrunners.” But the medium is not solely composed of the
likes of Matthew Weiner’s Mad Men and David Chase’s
The Sopranos, the products of some of the most acclaimed men working in the medium; I choose the gendered examples purposefully, given their status in a still
relatively exclusionary canon.
The notion of a canon brings us back to one of the
questions that motivated this inquiry: why is an author?
Inarguably, the category of author—in the form of director, writer, showrunner, or game designer—is useful:
useful to media industry marketing machines, and useful to scholars analyzing bodies of work. But it is only
one of many possible approaches to studying media. If
critics and scholars over-valorize a few individuals’ bodies of work, we may reproduce hierarchies of taste and
power, and underestimate the diversity and vastness
of any particular medium. Alternatively applied, as
Patricia White argues, the authorship framework may
allow for “act[s] of historical retrieval”—even, the designation of new auteurs—where “women’s access to the
means of production has been historically restricted”
(2015, 2–3). Of course, it is not only female authors but
an array of marginalized creative subjects who may be
excluded from critical canons. It takes other methods
Author
cynthia chris
23
were not the only species branded to signify ownership.
8
United States and elsewhere were branded not only to
Brand
mark ownership for slave owners, but also, and perhaps
Sarah Banet-Weiser
more importantly, to signify that African slaves were
People have also been branded as property; slaves in the
considered property, nonhuman objects to exchange
and profit from in an economic market.
Industrialization—the emergence of mass produc-
The brand is typically understood as the cultural and
tion in the nineteenth century alongside changes in
emotional domain of a commercial product, or the
technologies (including printing and design), trans-
cultural expression of a company or corporation (and
portation, and labor practices—ushered in a new era of
increasingly of traditionally noncommercial entities,
branding, when commodities began to take on cultural
such as religious and nonprofit organizations). The
“value” because of the way in which they were imaged,
brand is the recognizable, regularized, and standardized
packaged, and distributed in an increasingly competi-
“message” of a company, the result of a complex
tive commercial landscape (Arvidsson 2006; Lury 2004;
“branding strategy” (often called marketing). The
Moor 2007). Mass production allowed for more goods
success of a brand often depends on its stability, and
to be produced in a cost-effective way, so companies saw
ability to maintain over time a coherent narrative and
a need to distinguish their products as quality goods;
recognizable expression. In more economic terms,
branding was the mechanism to achieve this. Impor-
the brand is a way for a company or corporation to
tantly, branding in the era of mass production expanded
distinguish itself from the competition, a way of
the consumer base for all kinds of products, and thus
standing out in a clutter of advertising, marketing,
helped establish the contours of a mass market. Brand-
and products. In the contemporary cultural context,
ing became a shorthand, a way of recognizing products
branding is not limited to products, but ideologies,
and companies through a repeated and regularized logo
feelings, and the self are also branded (Banet-Weiser
or trademark.
2012).
24
The brand depends on communication and media
While the brand is often associated with the Indus-
technologies. A convergence of modern factors—such
trial Revolution and the emergence of mass production
as the invention of photography and typewriters, a ris-
and mass consumption, branding was an important
ing literacy rate, the rise of mass media, the increase in
part of earlier forms of commerce and exchange (Moor
railways, the emergence of the telephone, and more ef-
2007). Before the brand signified a particular signature
ficient postal systems—all greatly facilitated the success
of a company, it was seen to denote ownership of prop-
of brands.
erty. In the United States of the eighteenth century,
In the mid-twentieth century, companies recognized
branding was the process of creating and distributing a
the importance of the brand as having cultural as well
brand name that was protected by a trademark. This was
as economic value, and leveraged branding as a way to
signified most overtly by the branding of cattle so that
market to a mass culture, one that took shape in a con-
ranchers could differentiate their own herds. Yet cattle
text framed by immigration, social and cultural conflict,
and world wars (Moor 2007). Brands took on a role that
constraints on how corporations could brand and ad-
extended beyond mere economics; during a time of cul-
vertise to consumers. As Naomi Klein (2000) has argued,
tural and political upheaval, brands became functional
during this time, corporations and businesses began to
in emotional as well as economic ways. Following World
concentrate less on manufacturing and more on the
War II, federal housing policies that privileged white
marketing of goods, labor began to be outsourced from
middle-class families, suburban development and the
the United States in significant numbers, and branding
subsequent marginalization of racial and ethnic com-
began to take on a heightened economic significance
munities to urban spaces, the ideological solidification
and cultural value. The cultural economy of advanced
of the nuclear family, the role that white middle-class
capitalism, ever more rapid innovations in technologies
women played in the wartime workforce, and the new
and user interactivity, and more sophisticated marketing
and increasingly normative presence of the television
provides an environment that among other things en-
in the privatized American home all played significant
ables brand strategies in its production of goods, services,
roles in the shifting public and private terrain of con-
and resources. These cultural dynamics create a context
sumer culture and were important in establishing the
in which not only are commodities branded, but iden-
brand as a normative expression not just of consumer
tities, difference, and diversity are managed, contained,
products, but also of emotional and cultural identity
and even designed as brands. Brand cultures facilitate
(Coontz 1992; Lipsitz 1998; Weems 1998). Market-driven
“relationships” between consumers and branders, and
networks of communication, such as mass magazines,
encourage an affective connection based on “authentic-
broadcast television, Hollywood films, and advertising,
ity” and sincerity. That is, rather than being targeted as
facilitated relationships between political and social
buyers in a purely economic sense, consumers within
identities and consumption behavior, a practice that
brand culture are urged to establish a relationship and
only increased as new markets—for women, African
experience with brands that is personal and intimate, an
Americans, and families—were created and then capi-
essential element of their everyday lives.
talized upon (Cohen 2003; Cross 2002; de Grazia and
In the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries, it
Furlough 1996). During this time, major companies
became clear that advertising and brand managers were
like Procter & Gamble, General Foods, and Unilever de-
developing new strategies to capture the attention of
veloped more sophisticated brand strategies and man-
ever more savvy consumers by appealing to affect, emo-
agement, as the competition among similar products
tion, and social responsibility. In fact, the definition
intensified.
of the contemporary “consumer” points not simply to
In the later twentieth and early twenty-first centu-
what kinds of purchases one might make; more than
ries, branding began to fulfill an even greater role in the
that, the “consumer” is a political category or kind of
United States (and Europe), in part because the election
citizenship (Banet-Weiser 2007; Cohen 2003). And,
of conservative governments in the Britain and the
consumption itself is part of what one is, part of the
United States ushered in an era of privatization and de-
complex framework that constitutes identity. In the
regulation. This shift meant, among other things, that
contemporary terrain of global, national, and narrow-
corporations were considered in a similar way as indi-
scale marketing, brands have begun to assume increas-
viduals in a “free market,” so there were fewer regulatory
ingly complex sets of political and activist functions
BrAnd
sarah banet-Weiser
25
(Arvidsson 2006; Lury 2004). Within the multidimen-
to “empower themselves” or Special K cereal implores
sional contexts of branding, marketers are increasingly
women to “own it.”
turning to campaigns that encourage consumers toward
The brand is different from a commodity. While
highly cathected, deeply emotional, and personal rela-
ever more sophisticated in advanced capitalism, com-
tionships to brands, so that products bear what is called
modification remains a relatively static process (though
in market speak “love marks” (Roberts 2005).
its results may be dynamic). To commodify something
Brands are not merely part of economic strategies,
means to turn it into, or treat it as, a commodity; it
but cultural spaces that are often difficult to predict and
means to make commercial something that wasn’t pre-
characterize precisely. Brands, as “love marks,” mean
viously thought of as a product, such as music or racial
to invoke the experience associated with a company or
identity. Commodification is a marketing strategy, a
product, a story they tell to the consumer, and perhaps
monetization of spheres of life, a transformation of so-
even a kind of love for oneself. But the story surpasses
cial and cultural life into exchange value. The process of
any tangible product, and becomes one that is famil-
branding, however, is more complex and dynamic than
iar, intimate, personal: a story with a unique history.
commodification. Branding is clearly inextricable from
Brands become the setting around which individuals
commodification, but it is also not merely its extension,
weave their own stories, where individuals position
and is more expansive than turning something into a
themselves as the central character in the narrative of
commodity.
the brand: “I’m an iPhone,” or “I drink Coke.” While
As Viviana Zelizer (2011) reminds us, economic ex-
brands are materially visible and often audible through
change is organized in and by cultural meanings. But
symbols, logos, jingles, sound, smell, and design, the
contemporary brand culture also comes at this dynamic
definition of a brand exceeds its materiality. In many
from the opposite direction: cultural meanings are orga-
ways, commodities have always been bound up in social
nized by economic exchange. The process of branding is
life. But the contemporary brand is different. The brand
created and validated in these interrelated dynamics:
is also a cultural outlook, a way of understanding and
developing a brand entails the making and selling of im-
shaping the world that surrounds us.
material things—feelings and affects, personalities and
A brand is the perception, the series of images,
26
values—rather than actual goods. It engages the labor of
themes, morals, values, feelings, the essence of what
consumers, so that there is not a clear demarcation be-
will be experienced, a promise. Together, these char-
tween marketer and consumer, between seller and buyer.
acteristics consolidate to project a version of authen-
It is the extension of marketing to arenas of life thought
ticity. Because a brand’s value extends beyond a tan-
to be outside, and sometimes even oppositional to, the
gible product, the process of branding is different from
market (such as branded social activism). Significant to
commodification. The process of branding impacts
media studies, the process of branding also involves the
the way we understand who we are, how we organize
mediation of human action through technology, where
ourselves in the world, what stories we tell ourselves
within digital spaces boundaries of power are blurred,
about ourselves—and importantly, it is increasingly
potentially engendering new relationships that take
through our relationship with brands that we feel au-
shape within branding logic and language. In a contem-
thentic and “real,” such as when Dove soap tells women
porary moment dominated by social media and micro
BrAnd
sarah banet-Weiser
celebrity, branding is intimately connected to media
in the traditional sense of being a business owner or in-
spaces. These entangled discourses are all part of the
vestor, but as an entrepreneur of the self, a category that
process of branding.
has exclusive hints to it but also gains traction as some-
Celia Lury notes that one of the key stages in late
thing that ostensibly can apply to anyone (Rose 1999).
twentieth-century branding practices “is linked to a
At the same time, digital technologies and other media
changed view of the producer-consumer relationship:
have also facilitated the emergence of “networked pub-
no longer viewed in terms of stimulus-response, the
lics,” where networks between individuals help form
relation was increasingly conceived of as an exchange”
collective communities, such as those revolving around
(2004, 24). This changed relationship requires labor on
feminist, gay, or environmental issues, to name but a
the part of both consumers and marketers, and cannot
few (boyd 2008).
be explained as commodification, or as the incorpora-
The collapse between business brand strategy and
tion of cultural spheres of life by advanced capitalism.
personal identity construction has logic in an eco-
As Tiziana Terranova (2000) has pointed out, explaining
nomic context where the individual is privileged as a
the labor of consumers as commodification or corporate
commodity, and where cultural and social life is increas-
appropriation usually presumes the co-optation of an
ingly organized and experienced through the terms and
“authentic” element of a consumer’s life by a marketer:
conditions of business models. Within this context, we
the use of songs of revolution to sell cars on television
witness the development of an increasingly normative
commercials, for instance, or manufacturing T-shirts
brand of the self, or self-branding. As the brand be-
emblazoned with “This is What a Feminist Looks Like,”
comes seemingly more diffuse, permeable, and there-
which are then sold at chain retail stores. The brand
fore wider-reaching, there is also a continuing blurring
here also functions as part of one’s political identity, ex-
of distinctions between and within “products” and “ser-
panding its reach beyond consumption of products.
vices” so that the dynamic of commercial exchange is
Understanding the brand in twenty- first-century
Western culture requires a complex frame of analysis,
increasingly understood within a framework of affective
relationships, engagement, and sociality.
where incorporation is, in Lury’s words, “not about
This is evidenced in a common marketing slippage
capital descending on authentic culture but a more im-
between people and brands, where brand managers in-
manent process of channeling collective labor (even as
sist that “brands are like people” and “people are like
cultural labor) into monetary flows and its structuration
brands.” This dynamic emerges in force within the var-
within capitalist business practices” (2004, 38–39). This
iegated practices and policies of neoliberal capitalism.
channeling of labor into capitalist business practices is
The marketization of social life and the individual in-
precisely what mobilizes the building of brand cultures
dicates that economic practices have been retooled in
by individual consumers.
efforts to reach individuals in ways previously levied
Alongside the increasing emotional components of
the brand, twenty-first-century consumer culture fo-
by the state or culture, involving key strategies of emotional engagement, authenticity, and creativity.
cuses on the individual entrepreneur, “free” to be an
activist, a consumer, or both. The brand is increasingly
important to this newly imagined subject, defined not
BrAnd
sarah banet-Weiser
27
for celebrity discourse as well as the financialization of
9
public knowledge about celebrities and new relations
Celebrity
neurial self-branding.
Suzanne Leonard and Diane Negra
between celebrity, neoliberal subjectivity, and entrepre-
Many of the modes and mechanisms of contemporary
celebrity originate in the prehistory o…