Understanding Media Users

Tony Wilson is Associate Professor, Faculty of Economics and Business, at University Malaysia Sarawak, and Associate Research Fellow, Global Cities Institute, at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

• Acknowledgments viIntroduction 11 A Passive Audience? Structuralist and Effects Studies 72 The Active Audience: Speaking Subjects 293 Perceiving is Believing: From Phenomenology to Media User Theory 464 Meanings Are Ours: Reader Response and Audience Studies 595 The Projecting Audience: From Cinema to Cellphone 746 A Phenomenology of Phone Use: Pervasive Play and the Ludification of Culture 947 Selling on Screen: From Media Hermeneutics to Marketing Communication 1128 Buying Brandscapes: A Phenomenology of Perception and Purchase 1309 Consumer-Citizens: Crossing Cultures in Cyberspace 146Conclusion: Media User Theory: Going Beyond Accumulation of Audiences 173References 176Index 204

“I admire Wilson's synthetic approach to audience study and the attention he gives to the burgeoning field of cell phones, computer screens, and video games since in the past most audience study material has been focused on film and television.” (PsycCRITIQUES, March 2009) "As a pioneering study of phenomenological media analysis … Wilson's book serves as a useful introduction to this emerging field of research, as well as offering a brief and scathing overview of the wider context of audience studies in which his work is situated. As such, the book will be of interest to scholars from a wide variety of fields and disciplines." (M/C Reviews, February 2009)