Audiences
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Contents
Audience: General definition
The terms, derived from the Latin audire (to hear) and its derivative audientia, are used in two general ways today :
1. Most frequently used in various contexts to refer to assembled spectators, viewers or listeners at a public event such as a play, film, concert, lecture or meeting
2. Largely used in the British/European context, to refer to a formal interview with a person in authority, e.g. the King or Queen, the Pope, the President, etc.
This article focuses on the first meaning.
As used in South Africa
The English word audience, though strictly speaking meaning "a group of listeners", is broadly used in South Africa in the sense outlined above. However, radio listeners are more usually called listeners and viewers of TV and film often as viewers.
Like the English term, the Afrikaans equivalent term gehoor (derived from the Germanic roots of the word "hoor", i.e. "to hear" and strictly speaking meaning "to have heard"), also tends to be used for theatrical performances of all kinds, sometimes also for other forms of entertainment. However, radio listeners are more usually called luisteraars (literally "listeners") and viewers of TV and film as kykers ("viewers").
However, there are other terms as well, for instance spectators (however is reserved for sporting events, the term listeners for radio and the term viewers for TV.
Theatre audiences
The nature and role of the audience
Audience participation
Film Audiences
The nature and role of the audience
Radio audiences
The nature and role of the audience
Television audiences
The nature and role of the audience
Audience studies
Audience studies in South Africa
Theatre audiences
Film Audiences
Radio audiences
Television audiences
Sources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audience_reception
https://www.google.co.za/#q=Audience+studies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_audience_theory
Susan Bennett 1990. Theatre Audiences: A Theory of Production and Reception. London and New York: Routledge.
Hauptfleisch 1997.
Snowball et al.
Sources
Go to South African Theatre/Bibliography
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