The “relevance” of cultural identity in audiences' interpretations of mass media

Get real!: Cultural relevance and resistance to the mediated feminine ideal

“…Relevance has been proposed as a key concept in studies that focus on the way life circumstances (e.g., race, social class, or sexual orientation) of an audience segment helps structure meaning that audience takes from the media (Cohen, 1991;Lind, 1996;Morley, 1980).…”

Modes of Reception: A Consolidated Analytical Framework

“…However, other research has identified similar "clustering" effects linked to gender (Hobson, 1980;Morley, 1986;Brown, Childers, Bauman, & Koch, 1990;Livingstone, 1994;Zwaga, 1994), race and ethnicity (Brown & Schulze, 1990;Jhally & Lewis, 1992;Schlesinger, Dobash, Dobash & Weaver, 1992;Gillespie, 1995;Hunt, 1997), and age (Comstock, Chaffee, Katzman, McCombs & Roberts, 1978;Barwise & Ehrenberg, 1988;Press, 1991b;Willis, 1995;Riggs, 1996). Further, a growing body of work highlights connections between divergent receptions and social group memberships that disrupt traditional sociological categories, including political interest (Morley, 1980a;Fenton, 1990a and1990b;Roscoe et al, 1995), moral and/or political belief (Condit, 1989;Press, 1991a;Liebes & Ribak, 1994), experience of male violence (Schlesinger, Dobash, Dobash & Weaver, 1992), degree of feminist consciousness (Ford & Latour, 1993), sexual orientation (Cohen, 1991;Feuer, 1995), religious culture (Hamilton & Rubin, 1992;Stout, 1994;Valenti & Stout, 1996), and personal psychological characteristics (Livingstone, 1990).…”

From magic bullets to shooting blanks: Reality, criticism, andBeverly Hills, 90210

“…Further audience analysis research needs to examine the discourse of other demographic groups to analyze the extent of this phenomenon and whether this is exclusively an American phenomenon. Future researchers should also explore, whether, as Cohen's (1991) and Lind's (1996) studies imply, members of marginalized groups (whose members generally are more conscious of their own marginalization than the women in this study seem to be) tend to read entertainment texts more critically. Additionally, researchers also need to explore whether, as D'Acci (1994) suggests, feminist consciousness is a prerequisite for critical interpretation of patriarchal texts.…”

“…Several studies of marginalized American groups also suggest that some Americans are more than willing to criticize media texts that relate to their own oppression. For example, Cohen's (1991) study found that gay men are more willing than straight men and women to deconstruct a teleplay about gay issues. Lind (1996) found that African American viewers interpreted a news story about racial discrimination as far more relevant than did white viewers, and Bobo (1995) demonstrated that African American women analyze films and books about African American women in-depth.…”