This course seeks to offer a theoretical background on the development of the studies on mass media and social media audiences. It sets the context of the different ways of approaching the social and cultural issues around the relationship of audiences with the media, from the perspective of the current media and communicational landscape. The course uses empirical studies of a variety of media, formats and audience practices, taking global and local contexts into consideration.
At the end of the course, students should demonstrate the following skills:

• To be familiar with and understand the different approaches to the study of media reception;
• Insert the different theories on media audiences in their socio-historical contexts;
• Reflect on the relevance of the concepts of ‘publics’, audiences’ and ‘fans’ in relation to different media and cultural objects;
• Critically analyze everyday media and cultural objects and practices through a problematisation grounded on audience theories.