Tune In, Log Out is an ethnographic study of an Internet soap opera fan group. Bridging the fields of computer-mediated communication and audience studies, the book shows how verbal and non verbal communicative practices create collaborative interpretations and criticism, group humor, interpersonal relationships, group norms and individual identity. While much has been written about problems and inequities women have encountered online, Nancy K Baym's analysis of a female-dominated group in which female communication styles prevail demonstrates that women can build successful online communities while still welcoming male participation. In addition, a longitudinal look at the development of fan group allows an examination of the endurance of the group’s social structure in the face of the Internet’s tremendous growth. Lively and engaging, Tune In, Log Out provides an entertaining introduction to issues of online and audience community.

The Soap Opera and its Audience: TV for the Less Intelligent?

The Soap Opera and its Audience: TV for the Less Intelligent?

The soap opera and its audience: TV for the less intelligent?

The people I encounter in daily life—colleagues, students, neighbors, babysitters—often find it hard to believe that I watch soaps. As one of my students recently put it, “I had to change my stereotype of soap opera fans because my professor is a soap opera fan and she has a Ph.D.” Without debating the relationship between a Ph.D. and intelligence, her comment and those of the others indicate a pervasive cultural stereotype that soap operas are vapid and so too are their fans. That soap operas merit a stereotype at all indicates how omnipresent in cultural life they have become. Even those who do not ...

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