PREP Please watch The Avengers chapters 3 and 4, ready for questions in class tomorrow.
In class, we have looked at a selection of clips to support our understanding of the period, in particular, cultural, social, political and historical contexts.
In class, we analyse how both Steed and Peel are represented and what the appeal of the programme is for audiences.
We consider audience theory: how audiences use media to gratify needs.
The Uses and Gratifications audience framework offered by Blumler and Katz suggests that audiences use media to gratify needs for:
- escapism, entertainment, diversion
- surveillance (finding out what's going on in the world)
- forming relationships (both with on-screen figures and in real life through sharing pleasures with friends & family)
- shared values and beliefs (we identify with certain people as heroes, hope that villains will be defeated, want a particular set of values to be restored and so on)
