212 IMIKOS
meaning in co-production between text and reader or viewer. Text analysis ofdiscrete,
aesthetic products such as films remains possible; however, we must always
specify which textual materialisation the analysis refers to (the cinema film, the
extended DVD version, and so on). Furthermore, future analysis has the task of
bringing to light the relationships of the different textual materialisations to one
another, and to the narrative, the dramaturgy, and the aesthetic presentation. The
consequences for audience studies are graver, since "under these contemporary
conditions ofmedia culture it has therefore.arguably become impossible to clearly
isolate out what the meaning of a single, specific, bounded text would be."23
Consequently, audience studies are no longer concerned simply with investigating
the meaning of a film such as RotKfor different audiences, but with investigating
the processes that have contributed to making it a part of the circulation
ofmeanings in cultural and social contexts. For this purpose, audience studies must
make use ofa variety ofmethods in order to be able to examine RotK as a cultural
and social phenomenon. Classic text analysis is one such method, because only it
can expose how the dramatic, narrative, and aesthetic structures ofthe film involve
the viewers in the co-production ofmeanings. Yet it must be combined with methods
of audience studies in order to focus on the audience's side of this coproduction.24
Moreover, it must also focus on the institutional conditions, the
intertextual frames, the social and cultural conditions ofthe viewers' life-world and
their everyday lives, as well as on the social discourses with which the co-production
ofmeanings shares a mutual relationship. Ultimately the goal is to discover what
meanings are generated under what social and cultural conditions between discrete,
aesthetic products and varied, socially structured and culturally socialised audiences.
The example of The Lord ofthe Rings as a film trilogy adaptation of the books by
J. R. R. Tolkien, composed of the individual films The Fellowship ofthe Ring, The
Two Towers, and The Return ofthe King, their various DVD versions, the other primary
texts such as the computer game, and secondary texts such as film reviews and
the Internet forums, has illustrated what challenges audience studies face in the
world ofdigitised media. As both texts and society become more differentiated, the
importance of audience studies will continue to increase, and text analysis will be
just one part ofthem.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Our Methodological
Challenges and Solutions
MARTIN BARKER, ERNEST MATHUS, AND ALBERTO TROBIA
Because ofthe scale ofits ambitions, the Lordofthe Rings project was always going
to face some tough methodological challenges. The project was to be big-combining
a sweeping search ofmarketing and ancillary materials around the film with a
worldwide audience survey and follow-up in-depth interviews. The questions we
were posing were also ones that, by and large, had been addressed only speculatively
up to this point. So the work ofmaking them operational-just how do you make
the topic of"fantasy" researchable, just for one?-was itselfa task. The research was
international, with research groups in twenty countries. We wanted to examine how
the film's reception was shaped by the cultural conditions in different countriesanother
big question. We needed to explore these processes across time-people's
history with this story, from book, through rumours and predictions, to their experience
in the cinema, and how they thought about the film afterwards. Perhaps most
importantly, we wanted the project to go beyond certain barriers that we felt our field
ofresearch was hitting. It is fine to show variety and complexity in the responses to
things such as films, but it isn't enough. We wanted to be able to disclose patterns
and connections. And we wanted to do all these in ways that ensured that other academics,
and those fascinated byTolkien's story, would feel they could be confident
in our findings.
These are the jobs that methodology does. Methodology is, ifyou will, the accuc
mulated wisdom of researchers about how to travel sure-footedly from having
interesting general questions to developing structured means ofgathering, organ"
214 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
ising, and analysing materials that can answer those questions. Methodology is not
a mechanical toolbox. Any serious research project has to weigh a whole series of
things. From available resources, what can be attempted? Given that choices must
be made, what are the most urgent questions? What can be learnt from the best of
existing research? Where has it not yet gone? We would argue that a great deal of .
methodology comes down, less to right and wrong procedures, although these are
important, than to bold choices among possibilities. Along the way come the points
where researchers can dip into the available "rule books" on how to do various bits
as reliably as possible.
How we met out methodological challenges is the topic of this final chapter.
A good number of those challenges were foreseen, and our solutions-as good as
we could make them, after long 'rounds of debate-were built into our research
design. In some cases, we had to solve difficulties "on the fly." But methodology is
also about opportunities. Ifa project is designed to answer only one question, that
is as far as it can take you. Sometimes it is possible to design research that might
contribute to an indefinite number ofquestions. This is what we tried.
Ofcourse no researcher begins with a blank slate. Every good piece ofresearch
begins by estimating the state ofthe field(s) on which it draws and learns from the
strengths and weaknesses ofwhat has already been done. In our case, that was particularly
the broad field of audience research.
THE CURRENT STATE OF AUDIENCE RESEARCH
Our sense is that media audience research is on the cusp of a set of changes. And
we hope to be among the influences that help mould where it goes. It would be hard,
even without space restrictions, to characterise fairly the many diverse currents that
are at present flowing within audience research, let alone discuss them all fairly. In
this short section we cannot get near this. With an apology to all the kinds ofwork
here missed or marginalised, our aim is to paint a working portrait ofthe main current
traditions and paradigms ofaudience research, which says something about the
available concatenations of theories and concepts (how to think about "the audience"),
questions (what the primary interests and concerns are), methods (typical
ways ofinvestigating), and objects (what kinds ofaudience most interest researchers).
In many countries, despite its theoretical poverty, moralistic conceptualisations,
and methodological narrowness, the mass communications tradition still
stands strong, examining those "masses" that are currently provoking "public concern."
This is the strand ofwork still widely beloved of governments, policy bodies,
and public commentators, .and that gets much funded as a result. Its influence
has undoubtedly declined-but without really being replaced. Its main sociological
"alternative" (the quotation marks signal our hesitations), the uses and gratifications
approach, still has adherents, but hardly constitutes a force now. In and
around these, influential figures like George Gerbner have cast long shadows.
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I21 5
Elsewhere, the European tradition ofreception theory has generated important concepts
such as "interpretive community," but long stayed firmly textual. Only quite
recently has it, primarilyin the United States (and in film studies), moved from textual
elaboration to empirical research, through the work of such people as Janet
Staiger and Barbara Klinger. But beyond these, with perhaps two exceptions, the
picture is one of variety (which is good) but less elaboration and conversation
(which is bad). The two exceptions have to be the contributions ofPierre Bourdieu
and of Stuart Hall.
Bourdieu's conceptualisations ofculture have had a wide impact, albeit sometimes
in oversimplified forms.' In France, for some years, he was a signal force. But
his methods-broad cultural surveys coupled with close qualitative analyses-have
been less followed.' Perhaps more than anything, it is his notion of the links
between class and cultural taste systems that continues to resonate. And this has
linked quite well with the tradition of cultural studies considerably led by Stuart
Hall's encoding/decoding model. From the 1980s, a substantial body ofwork and
ideas emerged, especiallyfrom the United Kingdom. Typically oppositional, its primary
address was to the uneasy lines connecting mass media and popular culture
and knowledge. When it moved abroad, and especially to the United States, its focus
shifted. Fan studies took and celebrated the notion ofthe "active audience," making
ofthis a substantial specialist field-although one that to outsiders seems often
inflated and to be making exaggerated political claims. But perhaps just as important
has been cultural studies' "textualism." The powerful refocusing on culture as
"textual" (semiotically rich and charged, a major medium through which contemporary
political life is formed and conveyed) has nagged at the edges of audience
research, telling it what to look for and what it must find.
All these traditions have mainly looked at what we might call "mainstream''
audiences for objects like television.' Outside such spheres, the picture is patchy.
Theatre researchers, for instance, briefly turned to their audiences, but an international
research association formed for this purpose was short-lived.4 Instead, the
main strengths here have been in the historical study ofaudiences-yet this is something
only now being attempted in fields such as film.' In the literary field, there
has been a strong growth ofhistorical studies in reading practices.' Methodologically,
these have involved a combination of interpretive work and archival mining. But
there has been little contemporary work, except where, locally, as in Scandinavia,
groups ofresearchers come together. Art audiences are hardly touched, other than
through Bourdieu's work and occasional rich historical accounts (Michael Baxandall,
for instance'). Museum studies has grown its own professionally driven traditions.
The study of music audiences is a partial exception, with the added bonus that
researches in this field both draw fruitfully on Bourdieu's conceptualisations and
attend to the social processes ofmusic listening.' In parallel fields, the study ofsports
fans has become a substantial subset ofan essentially sociological approach. In short,
a good deal going on, but with little by way of shared theories, questions, or
methods.
216 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
It is important to note, however, that the term audience has become increasingly
questioned. Not an innocent term, it seems to picture people as recipient end
points for cultural processes.' A number ofdevelopments have led to challenges to
this. In roundabout ways,Jurgen Habermas' influence led to an interest in audiences
as publics--people using media and cultural forms as the bases for their involvement
or noninvolvement in democratic domains.10
This has found resonances in studies
of children, and in the ways they may learn to be citizens." In quite another field,
the emergence of the various forms of digital media (games, the web, mobile
phones, and so on) has pushed notions of"interactivity'' to the fore-again, directly
challenging the implicit metaphors within the term audience. In an almost reverse
direction, fields such as tourism studies have seized (albeit with intense debates
around the work of people such as John Urry") upon the idea of people "gazing"
upon Other Cultures, and erected wholesale models of a new international
politicaVcultural economy. This has been much influenced by the work ofMichel
Foucault on the power-knowledge nexus. Meanwhile, quite outside our fields, others
have been quietly borrowing some ideas from us, and turning them to unexpected
uses. The field ofconsumer research, for instance, has been transforming itsel£13
The idea ofthe "consumer" is getting a history and a (theoretical and methodological)
makeover. Given all these, it is not surprising that when a journal for our field
began to be debated in the late 1990s, its title was debated hard-those involved
eventually settled on Participations as a relatively neutral, but indicative, term.14
A summation ofwhere we are is therefore hard. A surprising amount ofwork
is going on, in many countries and within different research paradigms. In some
countries the impulses to and backgrounds ofresearch are primarily sociological (and
the influence ofJesus Martin-Barbero in Latin America is one signal example ofa
"local" force); in some the drivers are more culturaVhumanistic. But outside mass
communications (with its continuing stilted dedication to variable-manipulating laboratory
studies") and uses and gratifications (with its needs-oriented questionnaires),
there are few agreements on questions, concepts, or methods. And in different
regions of the world, and indeed in different language communities, the main
working models and exemplars for studying reception processes just do vary greatly-far
too much to make any substantial international collaboration easy.
A common thread in much "new audience research': is a recognition that audience
engagements are deeply interwoven with wider cultural memberships. This is
a major achievement in itself. It challenges the decontextualised "individual" ofmass
communication theory, and puts audiences back into society and history. But in so
doing, it lands us in the heart ofother debates. Ifwatching films is necessarily part
of "culture," what is the relationship between culture, work, and politics? How
does the business ofentertainment relate to its pleasures? Might not the very separation
ofculture as "leisure" (this is "just for fun,""escapism," and so on) itselfmark
an ideological process? When corporations make films, maybe they also make ideologies.
All such questions-and there are many ofthem-challenge the sufficienFOURTEEN.
OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS 1 217
cy of audience research to tell us what we might need to know about the significance
of a film such as The Lordofthe Rings.
Another strain ofargument takes up the complexities raised by that idea of"cultural
memberships." Cultural studies early on challenged the notion of unified
"cultures," with agreed tastes and scales ofvalues. To this was soon added a questioning
ofthe idea ofsingular "selves" who respond as one kind ofperson and from
one position. Real people think and respond at different times by age, sex, ethnicity,
class, politics, family, and many other memberships. But global population
shifts (and the associated idea of "hybrid" nationalities) and the rise in global
knowledge systems make who "we" are ever more complex.This had strong implications
for cross-cultural research. The danger would be that we might take someone
responding from, say, Denmark, to be in some simple sense responding as
"Danish." It made it vital that we think about how to draw out people's sense ofthe
communities (real, virtual, imagined, wished for) they belonged to, whose values and
ways ofresponding they shared.
In this messy, fragmented, but exciting set ofcontexts, we formed and attempted
our world project.
OUR PROJECT'S PARTICULAR REQUIREMENTS
As this book makes clear, our project had three, interlinked stages: gathering and
analysing prefigurative materials, recruiting and analysing responses to a questionnaire,
then selecting individuals for detailed interviews-and analysing those. Each
ofthese stages makes its own tough methodological demands. The challenge multiplies
inasmuch as we wanted to link them. Here, we focus in on some ofour most
important decisions.
But ahead ofany ofthese detailed discussions, we must remember that the very
idea ofstudying"the audience" has been a topic ofdebate, because ofarguments that
the "thing" being studied may only come into existence through the act ofresearching
it. "Audiences" may only exist because researchers constitute them. This is a problem
that a number ofresearchers have addressed. Kim Schrnder and colleagues, for
instance, write, "All audience research is intrusive. We cannot study audiences
empirically without at the same time interfering with the very phenomenon we wish
to study--the everyday practices through which people use and make sense of the
media-or interrupting people's lives for the duration ofthe research encounter.""
But while this is an inevitable feature of audience research (as of course of many
other kinds of social research), it neither invalidates the idea nor undermines the
importance ofasking, How can we make sure that we do the research as well as is
possible? It does ofcourse mean that among our considerations has to be an assessment
of the ways in which our very processes of generating evidence may have
shaped what we gathered. More specifically, there is the difficult question ofthe ways
in which the implements (questionnaires, interviews) might privilege certain under-
218 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
standings and might predetermine the kinds ofanswers we could come to. The only
solution we see to this is simply a regular dose of honest self-examination.
Otherwise, such concerns simply freeze research.
It may help to divide this discussion into two sections: one addressing the gathering
and organising our research materials, the other dealing with processes of ..
analysis. Our goal was to gather very large bodies ofdata and materials in forms that
could thus allow us to pose questions, and to look for patterns, separations, connections,
or simply puzzling features.
An example may clarify what we mean here. Our research was addressed to the
functions offilm fantasy in the lives ofdifferent kinds ofaudiences. Ofcourse, the
concept of"fantasy'' has been widely discussed for a long time. It is not just an academic
concept; it is also, ifyou will, apublic concept. That is to say, it is used by cultural
commentators to pass judgement on people's tastes and preferencesfrequently,
to find them wanting. In 2005, the British Guardian newspaper featured
author Natasha Walter commenting on the popularity ofTolkien, and the Harry
Potter novels and films. Walters warns against "patronising" these audiences, and
quotes others calling fantasy "infantile" and "regressive." Yet she then herself proceeds
to describe them as "providing comfort," as filling "god-shaped holes," and as
"making no demands on us."" Many ofour audiences would simply disagree strongly
with these judgements about them. But it is not only cultural critics who make
these judgements-they are very frequently embedded within academic discussions
as well. Audiences get categorised and judged in these processes. Our research questions
could not ignore these. Those very debates about "fantasy" might influence
people's expectations, their sense ofthe value ofthis film, and their sense ofselfwhen
they watched it.
The termfantasy marks out, ifyou like, a fought-over territory-and words are
weapons ofthe war to control it. This means that we would have to try to do three
difficult things at the same time:
1. We had to gather large bodies ofthose "debating" materials-press, magazine,
television, radio, Internet-to see wh~t sorts ofviews ofthe film were
being circulated in different places and spaces. But we could not thereby
assume they had an influence, or what that influence might be.
2. We had to gather large samples ofaudiences' talk about the films and the
books, so that we could hear in their own words what they meant to them.
This meant both having very large numbers ofpeople responding, and having
them tell us a lot about their responses. This volume of materials was
itselfgoing to be a real challenge.
3. But we could not solve that challenge by imposing our own definitions on
them in advance. Ifwe did, we might well be imposing just another version
ofthose public categories. Nor could we predetermine some "sample"
of those people we needed to hear from, and thus limit the amount we
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I219
gathered. Instead, we had to recruit as widely as we could, and find ways
to let the meanings and patterns emerge.
These were the general requirements that drove a great number ofour methodological
decisions. More than anything, it drove our decision to combine quantitative
with qualitative approaches.
CROSSING THE QUALIQUANT
There is a wide range ofwriting about the issues involved in trying to combine quantitative
and qualitative modes ofinvestigation. Two tendencies stand out from this
literature. First, there is more writing about the likely virtues of the combination
than actual working examples of the practice; second, those researchers who have
attempted it have on a number ofoccasions seen the two stages as serialrather than
integral. They do some ofeach and hope that the results will be mutually informing."
It may help for a moment to think ofthis as like a river, the Qyaliquant, up which
we are trying to take a body ofcargo. Research is hard work, so it is definitely against
the current. Our cargo has to be towed from the banks. But the residents of each
side-the Qyalis and the Qyanters-are pretty suspicious ofeach other. They live
different lives, speak different languages. They have very different beliefs about the
right way to tow a boat effectively. Therefore, in the main, it is just easier to work
from one bank at a time-even ifit means our boat tends to drift sideways. Ifonly
they could be got to work together, large volumes ofcargo could be handled much
more easily!
We had no choice but to try to build a bridge, and get the two parties talking
to each other. This was most particularly true because, with our central implement,
the questionnaire, we planned to collect thousands of responses. Without a solution,
these would be useless. The questionnaire's design was a major preoccupation.
There are many good books on questionnaire design, offering helpful advice and
examples on a wide range of topics such as question order, problems ofambiguity,
the kinds of language to use, differences between open and closed questions, and
overall length. But no questionnaire can be devised simply by reference to these sorts
of cautionary rules. Rather, these lists of features are best seen as quality checks,
brought into the equation near the end of the design process. Our design process
was the result of an interplay between three overarching challenges:
1. What did we want tofind out? We could not directly ask people our Big
Qyestions. We had to find ways to translate them into smaller ones that
would be meaningful to anyone answering us. For example, since we were
centrally interested in investigating the ways different audiences related to
fantasy, a lot of our thinking went into how we could get audiences talking
about the idea of"fantasy'' without presuming its meaning. And remem-
220 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
ber that this had to comprehensible, in translation, to people from
Guatemala to Germany, Los Angeles to Laos.
2. What were wegoingto do with the answers?Perhaps the hardest message to
convey to students of research methods is that at the beginning of any
research project, the most important questions they need to address is
what they will do at the end. It is no use gathering materials or data in
forms, in quantities, and ofkinds that you cannot use. The kinds ofanalysis
you plan to do have to drive the design. For example, we wanted to
explore how group memberships might influence people's responses to
the film. So we needed to get people to give us information about themselves.
That is quite easy with sex and age-but what about occupation?
Designing a way to get usable information about people's occupations
anywhere in the world (Mumbai to Mexico, or London to Lagos) is not
easy-because the worlds ofwork are so differently constituted. Our solution
was bold but effective, as we hope to show.
3. Why would anyone complete our questionnaire? We live in a world where
most people know about questionnaires. Governments require us to complete
some. Commercial bodies often try to get them done. Others are done
for fun-magazines inviting us to rate ourselves, for instance. We frequently
see them (and ourselves, thereby) discussed and pontificated upon.
Why should they do ours? The issue ofhow our questionnaire should look,
read, and be publicised, preoccupied us. We needed it to become, ideally,
part ofthe experience ofwatching and talking about the film. It had to be
fan tofill in. We could reasonably hope to capture people who were enthusiastic
about the film-even perhaps those whose enthusiasm took the form
of anger at the film-but what about those whose main reaction was that
the film was "Alright--for a night out"?
It was out ofimaginative juggling between these three that our questionnaire
emerged. As we outlined in the introduction, the key move was the coupling of
quantitative and qualitative questions. We asked people to allocate themselves on
several multiple-choice lists (enjoyment, importance, kind of story), and then
immediately to explain their answers in their own words. So we could potentially
explore not just how many said they really enjoyed the film, but also what kinds of
people most enjoyed the film, and how their ways ofstating their enjoyment related
to that ofpeople who did not enjoy it so much. We could explore their relations
with the books, and how (through, for instance, their expressions of disappointments)
their relations with the books overlapped with or were different from those
ofother groups. And ofcourse there is no reason to suppose that only one kind of
person enjoyed the film. So, potentially, we could buildportraits ofthe viewing strategies
and responses ofdifferent groups. All these possibilities were consciously built
into our research design.
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I221
But as we've said, a good design often yields more than is originally thought
of. For example, one idea not originally planned, but which proved productive, was
to explore the relations between responses to questions about favourite characters
and most memorable moments or aspects. This allowed us to extract data relevant
to debates about "identification." Combined with the reasons for choosing different
characters, it allowed a detailed study ofdifferent relations with the film."This
was simply not planned for.
Take the debate over the question about occupation. The U.K. team proposed
that we should not ask people to name their occupation-we believed that this
would result in an unmanageable list of answers. Instead we suggested producing
a short list ofkinds ofoccupation, and that we should embrace the notion that people
might partly choose their answer by how theyfelt about their work. A person
working in advertising, for instance, might see themself as creative, or as a professional,
or as an executive. A person working in farming might see themself as
either unskilled or skilled manual, or even as a service worker. Since we were interested
in attitudes to "fantasy," this could be valuable. After much debate, this tack
was agreed upon-although it does run counter to more standard sociological
researches. Early signs are that this has paid off-a number of distinctive groups
emerged from our analysis, and are being explored.20
But of course a decision the
other way could well have produced other, equally interesting findings. This is
once again a case ofmethodology being less about right or wrong, more about decisions
with consequences.
We tell these stories to show that committing ourselves to a O!ialiquant
approach did not solve all our problems-it simply moved and changed them.
OUR SAMPLING STRATEGY
Sampling is a key issue in social research designs, and was one we had to face. The
advantages ofsampling are well known: low costs, economy of time, and a better
organisation of research.
There are two main types ofsampling methods: probability (random) sampling
and nonprobability sampling, respectively typical of(but not exclusive to) quantitative
and qualitative research. In probability sampling, definitively codified in the
1930s by the Polish statistician Jerzy Neyman," all units of the target population
have an equal, calculable, non-zero probability of being included in the sample.22
Many researchers believe that probabilistic samples are better, because they are representative
ofreality. In brief, they maintain, what we can say about the sample can
be extended to the reality sampled (by statistical inference). Another advantage is
that we can calculate the sampling error, which is a crucial datum in order to assess
the validity ofa sample.The main problem, with this kind ofsample, is that we need
the complete list ofthe target population to extract it, and very often this is impossible
to obtain. This is no small issue. We can't say whether a sample is representa-
222 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
tive or not, because we generally sample precisely in order to find out something
about a reality we don't yet know. This is called the samplingparadox, and it applied
with great force to audiences for LotR. Nonprobability samples are generally"purposive"
or "theory-driven."" This means that they are gathered following a criterion
that the researcher believes to be satisfying, in order to achieve typological representativeness.
Being purposive, these kinds of samples are rather heterogeneous.
Miles and Huberman, for example, listed sixteen different qualitative sampling
strategies." The difficulty with nonprobability samples it that we have only loose
criteria for assessing their validity.
The strategy chosen for the LotR project involved a new mix of qualiquantitative
solutions, in order to be consistent with the general "philosophy" ofthe
project, which aimed at interweaving different methods and techniques. This hybrid
direction is gradually getting a footing in the social researchers community, as the
success of mixed strategies as respondent-driven sampling (RDS) clearly shows."
We could not possibly extract a probability sample, simply because we couldn't know
the complete film audience. In fact, we weren't searching for statistical representativeness;
rather, we were more interested in typologi,calrepresentativeness. That is, we
needed as many types of respondent as possible and as manyfarms of argumentation
as possible. Does everyone who sees a film equally count as "the audience"? For
some purposes, yes-but not ifyou want to explore influence and meaning. Someone
who falls asleep, or leaves halfway through-or perhaps rejects and forgets the
whole experience the moment they leave the cinema-may not be an "audience" in
the same sense as someone who returns again and again to it. We needed a research
design that would allow us to build a picture of as many kinds ofviewers as possible.
In a case like this, the best choice is a "qualitative," nonprobability sampling.
The best way to reach quickly the huge target population needed for our
research, cheaply and manageably, was to use Internet sampling.
Internet sampling is a procedure that is administered, partly or fully, through the Internet.
This entails procedures which enable the researcher to bring questionnaires to the attention
ofprospective respondents, by either directly forwarding them the questionnaire, or informing
them ofthe availability ofthe survey and asking them to participate. This is facilitated
through email or web pages.26
Ofcourse, Internet sampling still has problems. For example, the number ofinternet
users is significantly lower among older people. For this reason we supported the
web questionnaire with a paper version ofthe questionnaire administered to audiences
at cinemas.
Ultimately, of our 24,739 respondents, 22,486 completed the questionnaire
online, with the remaining 2,253 completing the paper version. Only some countries
were in a position to use the paper questionnaire (with Italy having the highest
proportion, at 29 percent ofthe total). A comparison ofthe two sources did reveal
some clear differences. Internet completers were younger, with higher representaFOURTEEN.
OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I223
tion ofstudents and professionals. They had higher levels ofknowledge ofTolkien's
books, and were more committed to the films. So, having the two sources could alert
us to the biases in our main sample.
We can't therefore say that our sample and its subsamples are representative of
some broader population, because we chose the nonprobability alternative. But we
believe we can be rather confident, considering our success in gathering almost
25,000 responses, that we achieved a very good typologicalrepresentativeness-that
is, we have sufficient members ofall our main categories to be able to describe with
confidence their patterned similarities and differences.
MAKING SOME KEY CONCEPTS RESEARCHABLE
This project was concerned with some tricky concepts. We touched on this earlier
in relation to the concept of"fantasy." Another difficult concept for us was "pleasure."
They are difficult for several reasons. First, both ofthem, at one level, seem
very obvious. Richard Dyer has explored equivalent problems with the concept of
"entertainment," showing how the term is often used to block discussion and investigation-it
is too obvious to be worth pursuing." In the same way, people will say
"it's only fantasy" or "I just enjoy it," as ifthat ends the discussion. But both "fantasy"
and "pleasure" have been the topic ofheavy theorisation. Fantasy is already a
term with many meanings. It can mean generally the human capacity to imagine
wildly, without many formal constraints-to invent, to daydream, to construct
amazing scenarios. It can mean a genre ofliterature, which has in the last forty years
become a publishing phenomenon. It can, for some people, be a term within a formidable
array of other concepts, which constitute the broad psychoanalytic tradition-here
"fantasy" supposedly arises from repressed desires, frequently rooted in
childhood experience. But in addition to these, some more specialised understandings
have been developed, as in the strong tradition ofwork that views fantasies as
culturally loaded vehicles through which we live our membership of our societies,
and conceive our relations to Others.The problem is not simply that these approaches
do not tidily coincide, or that evidence for one or another is more or less persuasive.
It is more that what counts as evidence on one approach simply would not be
acknowledged on another.
The cultural studies tradition is awash with writings about both fantasy and
pleasure, and with claims about their implications and consequences. In film studies,
perhaps no work has been individually more influential than Laura Mulvey's
essay on "visual pleasure."" Mulvey claimed to identify the pleasures that men and
women must respectively feel, in light of the textual organisation of mainstream
Hollywood films. Hers is among many others that arrive at very negative accounts
ofthe cultural meanings and implications ofpopular culture, through theoretically
based assertions about the kinds ofpleasure films afford and the apparent costs
to selfofsuch enjoyments. But at another extreme, other scholars and theoreticians
224 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
have been charged with simplycelebratingwhatever"the people" enjoy. The accusation
of"populism," levelled by among othersJim McGuigan,29
has once again more
to do with the supposed consequences of pleasures than with the nature of those
pleasures. .
The level of theorisation has not been matched by the quantity of researches
into actualpleasures-who has them, what they feel like, what they do to get them,
and what they do with them once they have them.30
But in the last twenty years, a
small number of studies-often quite exploratory-have begun to unpack these
complexities. !en Ang, in her study ofDallas viewers, begins to unpick the complex
components ofpeople's pleasures and dislikes." She shows, for mstance, '.hat pleasure
can be perverse, deriving from finding the programme poor and feeling superior
to it and its "ordinary audiertces." Martin Barker and Kate Brooks attempt to
characterise the logic of different kinds of pleasures (what you have to be and do
to get them, what viewing conditions best promote them, and so on) in actionadventure
films."Thomas Austin has explored the character ofmen's responses to
a film such as Basic Instinct." More recently, Aphra Kerr and others have explored
audience pleasures in video games-and once again immediately point to unexpected
complexities." But for all these valuable pieces ofresearch, theories ofpleasure
and fantasy have largely marched on, regardless.
In this sense, we began with a commitment. This research was pitched and
designed within what is generally known as the cultural studies tradition. Ifnothing
else, this involves a belief that a cultural "text" like LotR cannot be signed off
as "just fantasy'' or 'just entertainment."The story itself, in book ~nd film forms, ~as
to be seen as a complex vehicle for both pleasures and meanmgs. Its narrative
organisation, its kinds of characters, the manner of its tellin?, its pa~t and present
reputation, and its social circulation-all these make any possible audience response
far more than a matter of"entertainment" or "effects." The film comes out of and
resonates in all kinds ofways with this point in history. Therefore, any enquiry into
audiences for LotR would have to enter into the complicated ways in which people
understand their part in all this, and the ways in which the film plays a role within
people's wider sense oftheir world. .
That meant getting people to talk to us about how the1r responses to the film
engaged with other aspects oftheir lives. And not just as individuals. As people talk
about things like films, they draw upon shared languages, and they address themselves
to others in groups-and this sociality is a core part ofpeople's responses. Such
communities can be very local (a lot of young people's language operates to share
understandings, to the exclusion ofadults), or very wide (shared international languages
in antiglobalisation campaigns). And they can be fought ov~r." The use of
words can be very positive (the history ofthe term cool as a summat10n ofa cultural
stance, including ways of using one's body, would be a case in point). They can
be negative (the history ofderogatory terms for women has been a substantial case
study in itself). They can change over time-the capture of the term gay and
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS , .
225
thence the reclaiming ofthe word queer by homosexual activists.are good examples{.
The study ofthese, 1t has been argued, enables researchers to bnng mto view many
ofthe practices through which people build and maintain their social lives, and the
ways people understand the world and each other. All this is part ofwhat has been
widely termed the "turn to language" in much recent social theory.
EXPLORING AUDIENCE CATEGORIES
These are indeed exciting times when it comes to the development ofways ofhandling
and analysing people's everyday talk. The "cultural turn'' or "linguistic turn,"
as it has sometimes been called, within social, historical, and literary theory generally
came out ofthe realisation that social processes could not be understood without
proper attention to the ways in which people understand the social (and indeed
physical) world they inhabit." Ways of understanding the world are developed
and communicated, oftentimes by powerful means. These are not simply rational
constructs, but involve elements ofimagination and fantasy, senses ofselfand others,
stories, pictures, hopes and fears. These are to be found not so much within
organised bodies of words and images such as books, speeches, laws, films, or
poems, but within people's ordinary talk.
There are a number ofvery different traditions for how to think about, and how
to deal in research with, words. At the back ofour project were two particular bodies
ofwork: discourse theory and vernacular theory.
The field ofdiscourse theory and analysis has mushroomed mightily in the last
twenty years, as researchers have developed theories and methods for examining language
in action and argued over its role in the production and maintenance offorms
ofpolitical power and domination. Every commentator on the field has noted the
variety of emergent conceptualisations and associated methodologies within this
field.37
A substantial array ofdetailed concepts and methods has been developed and
deployed, to enquire into everything from "excuses" used by smokers for not quitting,
police interrogation techniques,38
Bill Clinton's management of the Monica
Lewinsky affair,39
and the "banal"practices ofnewspapers in defining who "we" are
as a nation.40
But until recently, these approaches have not been much used in audience
research-perhaps for two reasons.41
Discourse analysis, in almost all its varieties,42
has tended to focus on very small samples, chosen by the analyst because she or he
sees it as particularly indicative. We could not limit ourselves to this, although it is
evident that each interview on its own could be a rich source. But also, discourse
analysis shares with wider approaches to texts and textual analysis and shares with
them a beliefthat language is a mode ofpower. So, typically, discourse analysts will
analyse "texts" such as films, and then deduce likely impacts on viewers. Audience
research has to start at the other end and ask, How do different audiences engage
with our film, and what pleasures and meanings do they gain from it? Ultimately,
226 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
it might even be possible to reconstruct different versions of"the film'-how the
various parts and facets ofit bind together to become a meaningful whole-via the
detailed accounts ofparticular audience groups.
From another direction, ethnographers have examined the ways in which local
cultures can be formed around shared modes oftalk." The early work ofthe "ethnoscientists"
has recently been revisited and redeveloped byThomas McLaughlin, who,
among other case studies, explores the ways in which informal communities around
fanzines debate and construct working accounts of the world and what they want
to achieve." This sort ofwork has been made relevant to film studies in a range of
ways. Rick Altman, emphasising the historicaldevelopment ofgenre ideas, explores
many cases where genre labels evolved over time, and at the behest ofvery particular
groups."
Just recently, a few researchers have begun to develop ways of redressing this
gap. Barker and colleagues, in their study ofthe U.K. Crash controversy, showed how
some audiences had sufficiently soaked up the local category"sex and violence" that
they had gone to see the film with front-loaded expectations as to what it must be."
Very recently, Klinger has shown how an expression such as "chick flick" can enable
people to think and plan their (repeated) encounters with films, readying themselves
to experience appropriate emotions.47
Our goal, then, was to take the best from discourse and vernacular theories and
develop ways ofapplying these to our very large datasets. This was not easy, and there
were hazards. Words do not come with flashing lights attached, to say"this is a key
term, with many implications."To an extent, you need people close·enough to a culture
to know that certain words are doing substantial cultural work. In the design
ofour core questionnaire, this constituted a problem particularly for our key question,
in which we asked people to say what kind efstory it was for them. But even
once identified, we needed to be careful about differences in uses and implications.
Below we give the example ofhow the U.K. team explored the complex meanings
ofthe term epic.
A further problem is knowing how to move from identifying ways of talking
to saying something about the kind efcommunity (its membership, their shared values,
ways ofoperating, and so on) to which those ways oftalking belong. Here, we
think, we reach the boundaries of our research and have been very cautious about
crossing it. One instance, to illustrate this. Analysis ofour database showed us that
there was a quite sharp separation between those who told us that among their key
sources for knowing about the film were the web and the Internet, and those for
whom this was not the case. Users of new media used much more emotional languages
for discussing the film than users of traditional media did. This is without
question an interesting finding, and certainly runs counter to the claims ofsome new
media theorists that interactivity signals the death of narrative enthrallment. But
because of the ways in which we had chosen to gather information, we cannot go
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I227
much further to say how people are feeling that they belong to web communities
That will require other kinds ofresearch. ·
. Aware that thi~ is an emerging area, we have devoted a lot of our time to trymg
out new analytic procedures that can take full advantage of our having a very
large and highly organised body ofresponses. Chapters 8 and 9 are attempts at such
a cross-cultural analysis ofresponses.
FINDING PATTERNS WITHIN THE DATA SET:
APPROACHES, PRACTICES, SOFTWARE
The main task ofanalysis is to find significant patterns or distinctive groupings within
a body ofmaterials or a dataset. There is a payoff among the size and complexity
ofthese, the difficulty ofthe task ofanalysis, and the potential value ofwhat can
be learnt. The larger and more complex the body of materials gathered (where, for
instance, it involves qualitative materials), the more that can be learnt but the
harder analysis becomes. For this reason, iffor no other, computers and research software
have become indispensable to contemporary social research. In this section,
we explain two rather different approaches to this used in this research.
A quali-quantitative research design needs a particular approach. In order that
the two aspects can relate to each other, it is necessary to adopt one (or more than
one) ofthe following solutions:
1. It may be possible to formulate questions in both multiple-choice and
open-ended forms, in order to verify similarities and differences, which was
one solution adopted in our project. The tricky issues are, first, not to irritate
your audience by appearing to ask the same thing twice; and, second,
to have thought in advance about how the quantitative and qualitative
answers are going to inform and interrogate each other.
2. Researchers can carry out a post-coding of qualitative responses, in order
to prepare them for subsequent statistical treatment-a standard option in
many researches, and one used in a number ofthe analyses in our project.
This becomes most effective if the overall research design produces the
means to choose limited samples for specific purposes. Generally, this
approach can be very effective, but it is very time-consuming.
3. Techniques have been developed to effect a form of automatic coding of
the responses to the open-ended questions, to explore the main topics
and isotopies" in the data as well as their axial orientation, with the possibility
then ofseeing how they are correlated with quantitative variables.
4. Finally, there are ways to search for some ideal types ofrespondent, using
quantitative variables and cluster analyses, which can then be further "read"
in the light of qualitative responses.
228 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
Each ofthese strategies has been used at some stage in the project, often by different
participant groups who come from different research backgrounds. We explain
here two broad strategies-each using computers and software in distinctive ways.
At the close of the project, the almost 25,000 questionnaire responses were
assembled into one database and made available to all research teams in one oftwo
formats: either Microsoft Access or the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences
(SPSS). These software systems operate differently, and invited different kinds of
analysis.
The U.K. team, among others, worked with Access. Access as a relational
database permits searches by individual field or by increasingly complex cross-field
searches. In principle, therefore, it makes possible two routes ofsearching. Either
a researcher can move from identifying patterns in multiple-choice responses to
locating and then analysing associated qualitative materials, in order to see how they
too are patterned. Or he or she may progress from identifying interesting tendencies
in the qualitative responses to a consideration ofwhat, ifany, associated quantitative
patterns emerge. The weakness ofAccess is that it will not perform statistical
operations.
An example to show how this worked. Field 5 contained responses to our
modality question: "What kind of a story is Lordefthe Rings for you?" People had
been asked to nominate up to three from our list oftwelve, or to nominate their own.
We began with simple counts-how many people had chosen each? We then
looked at combinations-which of the twelve were most and least frequently
paired? From these searches alone, we were able to develop a very informative map
ofthe semantic connections and oppositions in people's responses.
We were able, then, to begin to link each modality choice with those in other
fields. Ifacross the world the most common choice was "Epic," was this true in all
main countries?49
Itwasn't. We were also interested in the relations between modality
and enjoyment and importance. Here, we made a major discovery; while "Epic"
was the most common choice among world respondents, another choice-''Spiritual
journey"-was more strongly chosen by those reporting the highest levels on enjoyment
and importance.The meanings ofthese modality terms, remember, could not
be assumed. Therefore we began a series ofcomplex semantic investigations, from
two quite distinct directions. First, we sorted all responses from people" who had
not only chosen "Epic" from our list but had spontaneously used the term in earlier
answers. We examined the uses ofthe word, to see what kinds ofjudgement on
the film they suggested or implied. Eleven meanings emerged. We then scaled these
(on three levels) for the extent to which they appeared to celebrate, simply describe,
or criticise the film. Finally, we looked at who had made these attributions, and
found that the celebratory uses were most likely to be used by those also nominating
"Spiritual journey." Second, we isolated the two sets of responses-people
nominating "Epic" but nOt "Spiritual journey," and vice versa-randomised them
in Access, and sampled one hundred for their responses to our first free-text quesFOURTEEN.
OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I229
tion: "What did you think ofthe film?" A coding system was developed, to the point
where all components ofthe answers were covered, and portraits ofthe two sets elaborated.
There were, ofcourse, some overlaps, but we found that the "Spiritualjourney"
choices showed much higher levels ofemotionality, less interest in the cinematic
aspects of the film, and a much greater tendency to discuss the moral meanings and
implications of the story. . . .
This was not the end of our explorat10n even of field 5. But we hope 1t illustrates
the ways in which Access allowed the U.K. team to delve deep into our data
and their meanings. It was painstaking and at times very slow.
Several teams-the Italian, German, and Dutch especially-worked with
SPSS. Data analysis here can be carried out with respect to three main objects: (1)
variables, (2) cases, and (3) words.
The analysis of variables typically characterises quantitative research, with
three main kinds ofanalysis. Monovariate analysis is based on one variable, and its
aim is descriptive (how is reality?). Bivariate analysis is b.ased on two varia?les and
its aim is explicative (why is reality thus?). In our project, all the questionnaire
responses were subjected to monovariate and to bivariate analysis (mainly crosstabulations
of responses to pairs of answers). These in themselves provided an
array ofbroad patterns, from which the various national teams then developed their
further preferred methods of analysis. Multivariate analysis is based on more than
two variables. It is less common, generally, and was not widely used by us because
of the particular nature of.our sample, which would not support some inferential
techniques typical of multivariate techniques.
The techniques for the analysis of cases are relatively few. The most important
is cluster analysis. Cluster analysis is actually a "family'' of techniques (hierarchical,
partitioning, local density, and neural)." It is particularly useful when the resear~er
aims at building a typology of objects-that is, when she or he wants to classify
them. In our research it was used to catalogue the types of audience. The purpose
of cluster analysis is to detect groups of respondents who show similarity to each
other when compared to respondents who belong to other clusters. In addition to
identifying the clusters, of course, we have to determine how the clusters are different--that
is, to determine the specific variables or dimensions that vary. Cluster
analysis yields very robust results, and does not require a probability sample, because
it classifies objects in a typology, irrespective oftheir number.
Using this approach, the Italian team detected four ideal types ofspectators: the
enthusiasticfan, the disappointedJan, the critic reader, and the mass spectator.
52
These
types, interestingly very similar to the ones emerging from the German research,
came from interpreting the results shown in graph 1,which indicates, for each cluster,
the means (shown on the y-axis) ofthe variables considered .in the analysis (xaxis).
These were: global evaluation, importance of the film, having seen the other
two films, and having read the book. We can see, for instance, that cluster 3 (the
path outlined by the graph's little rhombus) is characterised by high values of the
230 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
Figure 14.1 :Ideal Types of Spectators
"
',,
\
\
\
.. \
\
\
\
,,
\
\
\
\
\
'
....,_ C"ster1
·<>· C"Sl•r2
.,... C*Jstor3
oo'---~---------~-~-,/; ciustor4
Think of film Importance Fellowship Towers Book
means with respect to every variable: hence the name enthusiasticfan. Following the
same approach, we could reconstruct the other types ofaudience. The "name" ofthe
cluster, ofcourse, is not given by the computer. This is a task for the researcher, who,
reading carefully a graph such as this, interprets and labels the clusters.
The statistical picture, then, was rather clear, but we wanted to go beyond this
picture, having the big opportunity to look at the responses to the open-ended questions.
We wanted the most "representative" cases ofeach group, but howcould we
find them? Fortunately, the output ofa cluster analysis can assist in answering this
kind ofquestion. Each cluster, in fact, has a statistical centre, called the "centroid."
Calculating the distance ofeach case from the centroid (SPSS, Statistica,.and SAS
does this job very easily), we could locate the cases closer to a certain ideal type. This
allowed us to understand the meaning ofthe groups emerging from the data, transcending
the raw statistical figures. From this, the Italian researchers realised that
the four clusters coming out ofthe analysis could be reduced to three, because the
qualitative responses ofcluster 1 (the disappointed fan) and cluster 2 (the critic reader)
were almost identical (some expressions were in fact identical). The research
could benefit from the fact that there was a difference between the responses to the
open questions and to the closed questions. In short, people expressed different (and
paradoxically less detailed!) thoughts through words. This is a clear example of a
methodological "loop"-that is, a form of triangulation within the same research
design, as explained below, in which the findings from both the qualitative and quantitative
approaches are mutually informing, and shows that triangulation is achievable
even at a cheap price.
Unlike cases and variables, words can also be analysed apart from the matrix.
In our research, words could be found in: (1) open-ended questionnaire responses,
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I231
(2) transcripts from interviews and focus groups, and (3) public texts of various
natures (for instance, press materials).
To consider words as data, we have to face numerous problems, the most
important of which is that their meaning is no: the same for everyone. ~his i~ a
problem that, of course, in a world research project be.come'. hu?e. It ?egms with
the translation ofour tool for gathering data (the quest10nnaire) mto different languages,
and with the disambiguation of certain key concepts. That alone re~ui:ed
arriving at shared definitions among the different research teams at the begi~nmg
ofthe research. It further required us to find virtual synonyms for key terms m the
questions (for example, myth and quest). Having solved these problems and gathered
responses, people's answers need to be analysed.
WORDS IN OPEN-ENDED QUESTIONS
Open-ended responses have to be post-coded for two main reasons: to cut do"'." and
summarise the complexity ofwords and speeches, and to allow further statistical
treatment. Traditional post-coding procedures involve the development ofcategories
and the subsequent assignment ofwords and speeches to a value label corresponding
to a given category. This is a hard and time-consuming task, but generally it
guarantees a good reliability.
In recent years, following the French school of Analyse des donnees, many
researchers have turned to Lexical Correspondence Analysis (LCA), an evolution
offactor analysis for qualitative data.53
The main idea of this new approach is that
words alone (the focus of classic content analysis) have no meaning. They make
sense only in association and/or in opposition with other words or groups ofwords,
and as typical of certain kind of people. LCA is not interested in simil';'ities, but
instead in differences. Even words with a low occurrence, then, could be sigmficant,
providing that they are typical of certain people or group ofpeople. LCA h~s two
main goals: (1) to find regularities in the data and (2) to find only those few dimensions
ofmeaning that explain these regularities, employing factorial techniques. To
accomplish this, data are organised in a word-by-text matrix: the words are placed
in rows, while the answers (that is, the texts) are placed in columns, as in table 14.1.
The number in each cell indicates how many times a certain word has been said by
a given case.
Table 14.1 :Lexical Correspondence Analysis
Words Case l's Answer Case 2's Answer Case 3's Answer
DVD 0 2 1
Fantastic 5 0 1
Magic 4 1 0
PeterJackson 0 3 2
232 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
Given such tables, a computer is able to run the LCA algorithms." The procedure
is fast (SPAD and T-Lab are the main programs") and yields a sort of autocoding
ofopen-ended questions.The main output ofLCA, in fact, is a factorial space (basically
a Cartesian coordinate system) that shows the semantic orientation ofsignificant
words on opposite axes, thus contributing to their disambiguation. Words and
meaningful groups ofwords (that is, isotopies) are considered significant ifthey are
distant from the origin ofthe factorial space. "Understanding a factorial axis means
finding what is similar, firstly all that is on the right ofthe origin (barycentre), and
secondly all that is on the left of it, and then expressing concisely and exactly the
opposition between the two extremes."" Each axis allows the researcher to reconstruct
an ideal syntagm-that is, a theoretical model ofa latent proposition in the
'corpus.
LCA was used by both the Dutch and the Italian research teams. The Italian
responses, for instance, are characterised by two different semantic axes, interpreted
reading the words located on the left and on the right (for the x-axis) and at the
top and the bottom (for the y-axis) of the factorial space. These axes are: (1) boring
vs. amusing (with respect to the film) (x-axis) and (2) "aesthetic"book adaptation
vs. ''technical"book adaptation (y-axis)." As an example, the group ofwords (or "isotopy")
that permitted us to interpret the "boring" semiaxis were: "abnormal," "deadly
dull," "horrible," "long," and so forth. These words, which characterise the
"boring" isotopy, were located at the extreme left (negative x-semiaxis) of the factorial
space.
WORDS IN INTERVIEWS AND FOCUS GROUPS
The analysis ofthe words contained in interviews and focus groups is different, and
can take three main directions: quantitative, qualitative, and computer-assisted
(typically quali-quantitative). In the first case, a post-coding is required; then the
data are tabulated and/or cross-tabulated, and finally the researcher interprets the
results. There are two drawbacks in this approach: firstly, as above, post-coding is
onerous; secondly, a lot ofinteresting data get lost. The main advantage is that the
researcher has the possibilityofemploying some statistical techniques. Nevertheless,
considering the small size of the samples generally utilised in researches based on
interviews and focus groups, the statistical option is often an avoidable luxury,
unless both the qualitative and quantitative approaches are used in a "loop" strategy,
as happened in our research.
The second direction is often called an ethnographic or narrative approach.The
analyst first tries to identify the main topics within the transcriptions. Then he or
she chooses the quotations he or she thinks are more significant (considering also
the context in which they are situated) or the chunks of data, for each theme, that
show some commonalities. Some sort ofcoding procedure could be adopted at this
point. The researcher could also build a classification and/or a typology. Finally, he
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS'!
or she tries to interpret the findings. However, this is a general scheme." For .,:~al:fi~~I
pie, within Glaser and Strauss' grounded theory the analysis should be done <1uririiJt}:;
data collection, until a "theoretical saturation'' has been achieved.
In the case ofqualitative analysis, in fact, many different practices (for m•itaiicei)"
fixed, iterative, and subjectivist)," paradigms (even within qualitative SO<OIO.log'\(
itself: constructivism, ethnomethodology, interactionism, interpretivism
stu?ies, po~tmodern sodology, and so forth), and also disciplines can be '.doptedici
This plurality of paradigms and methods, far from being a drawback, contrib t ·
instead to enrich the analysis. This is not accepted by some orthodox methodule~
. "b .. h h h
00
g1sts, . ut 1t 1~ t e app:oac t .at from th~ beginning characterised our project.
Acceptmg the idea oftnangulat10n (or the idea ofthe loop, which is our more specific
interpretation oftriangulation), we implicitly accept, and actually encourage
the cohabitation of different paradigms. '
WORDS IN THE PRESS
Traditionally, press materials on cinema, like the critical reception ofa film, are studied
qualitatively. This approach stems from a combination ofa film studies and cultural
studies perspective on cinema. The film studies approach focuses on the
activity ofinterpretation, and is concerned with which meanings inherent to the film
are communicated in criticism. Robin Wood, David Bordwell, and Rick Altman
have studied how ideology, narrative, and genre are treated in film criticism." The
c".1'."~al studies approach is more concerned with how interpretations are createdby
cr1t1C1sm.Janet Staiger, Barbara Klinger, and Ernest Mathijs have emphasised how
i?eology, style, and rhetorics are evo~ed by critics.62
But qualitative studies ofrecept10n
have never managed to convmcmgly prove that their observations are also representative
for an entire reception. Staiger's discussion ofgender and sexuality in the
critical reception ofThe Silence ofthe Lambs (Demme, 1991), for instance, may well
refer to a very marginal discourse, one that hardly touches the film's mainstream
reception. Studying the press materials circulating around the release ofRotKthus
required an integrated approach, combining the attention to detail ofa qualitative
analysis with the representativeness ofa quantitative one. To that aim we employed
an advanced form ofcontent analysis.
Content analysis is basically a technique for quantifying the qualitative. Its main
applications and better results have always been in the field of mass communications
and political speeches since the 1950s, when Harold Lasswell and Bernard
Berelson first introduced the method. The key question that content analysis tries
to answer is well known: Who says what to whom and with what effect?
Nevertheless, it is not clear yet whether content analysis can deal with the latent
content of a text or only with its manifest content, as Berelson's classic definition
claims.63
Of course, the manifest-latent distinction is not neutral, because it is
strongly linked with the tricky issue of"hidden persuasion."The success ofBerelson's
234 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
definition made content analysis compatible with the functional approach to massmedia
research, while this very fact made it suspect to most critical currents."This
must be kept in mind when using content analysis. Increasingly, researchers have
sought to separate content analysis as a theory (distinguishing manifest from latent
contents, and implying cumulative effects) from its usefulness as a family oftech~
niques.65 Since the 1960s, interest has grown in the possibilities oftranscending its
reductionist tendencies, by developing forms ofqualitative content analysis that can
discern patterns and relationships within materials.
In this research, content analysis was utilised, for example, to see how the
press followed the launch ofthe RotK UsingT-Lab, the Italian team carried out a
study of the Italian press (newspapers and magazines), in order to know on which
topics it focused its attention. Five topics emerged from the analysis: the premiere
of the film, the night of the Academy Awards, the adaptation of the book,
Hollywood and the showbiz, Tolkien's world. The topics were detected simply by
building some baskets of keywords and then counting the frequency of each basket
in the corpus, in order to evaluate their weights. For example, the "premiere of
the film'' topic was characterised by the following words (next to the word is shown
the number of phrases in which it occurs): Italy (26), day (25),january (24), cinema
(20), to release (17),premiere (16), town (15), marathon (ll), Bologna (10), to screen
(8), Thursday (8),place (7), wait (6), ticket (6).
Using the co-occurrence tool provided byT-Lab, we could investigate· also some
significant relationships between words. This showed, for instance, the first fifteen
strongest associations with the phrase Peterjackson used in the Italian press (the corpus
considered consist ofthirty-nine articles, published both in magazines and newspapers),
based on the cosine coefficient.66
Many associations are quite predictable. But
one ofthe most interesting is between PeterJackson andfantasy. This means that,
when an Italian journalist wrote about PeterJackson, it was highly probable that she
or he used also the wordfantasy in close proximity. ~
But proximity is not everything. The U.K. team wanted to know how, when,
and by whom terms and remarks, references and words, were introduced into the
discourses surrounding the release ofRotK Therefore we developed an advanced
coding method for the content analysis ofpress materials that would also identify
the time and place of the public presence of the words concerned. The method is
derived from Karl Erik Rosengren's study ofthe Swedish literary frame ofreference,
Marcus Hudec and Brigitte Lederer's study oftheatre reviews, and Wesley Shrum's
analysis ofperforming arts reviews.67
At its base lies the "mention": a term or word
within the print message that contains meaning, in the form ofits references, allusions,
opinions, indications, or implications. According to Rosengren,
A mention may be regarded as an expression ofan association made by the reviewer, and ...
can be used as an indicator oftopicality.... All the mentions made in all reviews ofthe-press
in a region during a given time period (or in a representative sample thereof) may be
regarded as an expression ofthe lexicon ... available to the reviewers and constituting acentral
element of [their] frame ofreference.68
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTI ., .. ·.·.;·:·'·····;·····
ONS• •235•
,',' -",'/
This method was employed most rigorously by the teams from Belgium, Germany,
and the United Kingdom (which had the largest set of pre- and postrelease press
materials; see table 14.2).
Combining content analysis with a strong focus on source and timing allowed
for the analysis of topical references and for detection of when certain remarks,
phrases, and words entered into the discourses accompanying the release ofthe film.
(See chapter 4 for some ofthe results ofthis.)
Table 14.2: Prefigurative Items
(United Kingdom Only, October 1-December 31, 2003)
Marketing
Merchandise (info/samples)
National newspapers
National magazines
National radio
National TV (freeview)
Internet
TOTAL ITEMS
193
147
946
542
22
64
647
2,512
OTHER APPROACHES WITHIN THE PROJECT
Besides these two broad approaches, a number ofteams and individuals within the
project worked in other ways with its assembled materials, and we see it as one of
236 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
the project's major strengths that this was possible. Each ofthese further approaches
drew upon particular traditions to examine in detail some particular aspect or
component. Here we discuss just one ofthese: the political economy approach.
In order to paint a picture of the global conglomerate(s) involved in the production,
distribution, and marketing of the prefiguration materials, researchers
within the American team drew upon political economy traditions. This allowed for
the classifications and descriptions of merchandising and its range and functions.
There are strong traditions ofcritical enquiry into these sorts ofmaterials, their economic
and strategic importance to studio finances, and the ways in which films
themselves may be shaped by the pressures to produce these ancillary materials..
According to Janet Wasko, who headed this effort in our project, a political economy
approach to film is, in essence, an institutional approach-it sees the actors in
the communication process as agents oforganisations, put in the public domain first
and foremost to serve the interests ofthose organisations with the accumulation of
"wealth" or the allocation ofresources." So it is that the first interest ofa Hollywood
studio like Warner Bros., or even a smaller subsidiary like New Line Cinema, is in
maximising its own profits, either purely financially or in indirect ways (through creating
a reputation, a market share, or a portfolio, for instance). RotKoffered an excellent
case study for this approach.
Within our project, Wasko and other teams (for instance, the Belgian team of
Daniel Biltereyst and Philippe Meers, but also the French team of Divina FrauMeigs)
have widened the scope of research beyond material goods to include less
tangible goals and ways in which the institutions in charge ofproducing and releasing
RotKused diverse means and agents to guard their interests and maximise their
profits. The key concepts that were put at the centre of the political economical
approach in our project were:
1. the ties between existing popularity (an existing fan base) and maximising
profit (this meant collecting materials evidencing how New Line
approached LotR fans);
2. property/copyright (tracing the ownership);
3. the merchandise (collecting evidence ofall rights, tie-ins, and revenues from
sellable products related to the films); these were divided into: books, typical
merchandise (toys, T-shirts, action figures), high-end merchandise
(collectibles ofhigher value, such as jewelry, furniture, and so on), games,
merchandise promos, and events (including the sites were these were
announced); and
4. promotion and publicity (evidence of straightforward publicity for the
release of the films).
This categorisation not only enabled a thorough view ofthe ranges and density of
publicity efforts, but also contributed to a better understanding oftechniques used
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I237
to create interest, such as media hyping, blanket coverage piggybacking s ·
f
. . . ' , ynerg1es
o ownership and mterest, and the conflat10n between supposedly independent _
. (l"k h f: . . . . agencies 1 et e press, ans, or reVIewers) and the mst1tut10ns promoting the films.
THE IDEA OF "TRIANGULATION"
From its inception, as we've explained, this was an ·ambitious project. But we wanted
to conduct it in ways that could give some measure efassurance in our resulta t
~!aims.T~stw~;thi_ness ofoutcom~~ matt_ered to us-we didn't want to offer "ju:t
mterpretat10ns. Given these amb1t10ns, 1t should not surprise that we were led
towards the idea of"triangulation." "Triangulation" proposes that findings can be
more trusted if they are arrived at and supported by more than one method, and
based upon more than one body of materials. Mutually supporting outcomes are
stronger, on this argument, than the singly supported. The idea of"triangulation"
emerged and developed in the United States in the 1960s.70
It came at a time when
"old certainties" were being shaken. This was the period when qualitative research
began to come into its own, with the rise ofGroundedTheory. It was also the period
in which qualitative researchers sought to assure themselves and others that their
results could be trusted as much as the old-guard quantitative researchers, with their
triad of"validity, reliability, generalisability."
Major work was done on the concept of"triangulation" in the 1970s by Norman
J?enzin." Den~in importantly distinguished four kinds oftriangulation: data, investigator?
t?eoret'.cal, and methodological. But from other people's developments of
these, 1t 1s possible to see that a number of rather separate issues are being-perhaps
unhelpfully-contained under one term.72
The central problem with "triangulation''was soon perceived, and argued most
forcefully by one of Denzin's own colleagues, Yvonna Lincoln.73 This was that
research does not simply reflect the world it investigates; it constructs the materials
different!?' acc?rding to its methods and assumptions. Therefore, the more precise
and genumely mdependent each ofthe contributory components, the less they will
be able to support each other, because they will be formulated in incommensurable
ways. ~o, imagine two researches into how audiences might "identify'' with characters
m a film, one using quantitative, the other using qualitative, methods. The
quantitative analysis will typically theorise the implications of"identification'' (for
example, how can we measure the differences between high and low "identifiers"?)
and operationalise these into questions. Responses to these will then be the evidence
for or against the preconstituted idea of"identification."The qualitative research will
typically stage situations oftalk, in which people will be asked to say how they feel
about the characters, and any use ofthe term identification (or near-synonyms) will
be analysed. The analyst will then construct an account from this evidence. The
problem is that in the first case the term identification has become a specialist concept,
while the second seeks to gather vernacular concepts. The two do not mean
238 IBARKER, MATHUS, AND TROBIA
the same thing, and cannot assist each other.74
The price is, thus, that the better in
their own terms the individualresearches, the less easily they can be measuredagainst each
other. Only "loose" researches can be mutually supporting, if they are constructed
independently of each other.
We tried something different. We endeavoured to incorporate means oftriangulation
within our research design, so that the form in which quantitative results
were generated immediately pointed towards the qualitative stages of our investigations.
Our codings and analyses of the prefigurative materials were designed to
be tested by the second and third stages. Each part was designed to generate preliminary
propositions for the next to take further. Upon consideration, we chose to
give this a new name: the methodological loop. This "loop" derives from a complex
way ofconceiving the classic "circuit ofculture-that is, the ways in which the production,
distribution, and reception ofcultural forms and meanings are interwoven."
Following are two rather different illustrations ofhow we believe that this has benefited
our research. The first relates to the connections between our analysis ofprefigurative
materials and the ways in which our respondents drew upon these. In
analysing audience responses, as already discussed, we had found that "Epic" was
the most commonly chosen modality term, both across the world and within the
United Kingdom. Our coding of media coverage allowed us, then, to ask which
media source in the United Kingdom most used and emphasised this term. This
turned out to be, unequivocally, the right-wing Daily Mail, which indeed issued a
special edition to celebrate the film. That provokes interesting questions about the
influence of this widely read newspaper. And certainly we could point to definite
instances ofits influence (quotations found only in its pages turned up in interview
responses, for instance). However, we were also able to conduct a qualitative examination
ofthe range ofmeanings ofepic used within the Mail and among audiences.
This revealed significant differences. Whilst the Mail presented an'account ofthe
film as about an embattledsociety, among audiences a different emphasis on hope indicated
a rather different direction. This required looping back and forth between the
two bodies of materials in order to disclose their relations.
The second was quite different. In our investigation ofbook-film relations, we
realised early that people who were highly committed to the books could still
greatly enjoy the films, whilst recognising many kinds of deviation from the original.
We therefore turned our attention to the ways in which New Line Cinema
sought to explain andjustifj its handling of the books. A prime resource for this
turned out to be the extended DVDs of the films. Our analysis of these threw up
a paradox. Our audiences clearly demonstrated in very many cases that they were
waiting until they had the final extended edition before finalising their judgements
on the films. We therefore examined that by comparison with the previous twoand
found (as shown in chapter 5) that this offered a new justification of the
changes. We could best make sense of this if we conceived New Line Cinema as
working with a distinct model of audience behaviours-a "figure" of the audiFOURTEEN.
OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS I239
ence-within. which the DVDs provide the point efsedimentation of people's
responses. This was therefore not simply a loop in our methods-moving back and
forth be~:en different parts ofour research material-but a discovery of a strategic
recognition in theproducers ofthe same kind.
In both cases, we believe something very complicated is involved and more than
s~mply a met~od. I_t invol.ved a way ofconceiving the relations betw:en the production,
marketing, circulat10n, and reception ofthe film in which theproducers themselves
held and worked with conceptions ofthese kinds.
CLOSING REMARKS
!n very many ways, including in. its methodologies, the LotR project was an exper~ment.
We took ch~nces, a~d tri:d things to see what happened-both in gathering
data and materials and in their analysis. To a considerable extent, we wanted to
~nd o.ut how far we could go, and to see what could be learnt ifwe asked new quest10ns
in new ways. It might have gone horribly wrong-but it didn't. We have tried
to indicate clearly where we are sure ofour findings and where we have to be much
mor: tentative. We know that we have walked tightropes in some of our methodological
~oves'.b.ut again we have tried to declare and show these so that they can
be examined critically. Methodology, to us, is a two-way path. It is vitally important
that all processes and claims should stand up to critical scrutiny, and that
m~ans that there have to be many kinds ofshared checks on validity and trustworthiness.
But meth.odology .is also abo~t enabling-developing and sharing new
means offormulati~~ quest10.ns, gathering data and materials, and analysing them.
A big an.cl ambit10us pro!ect, then, designed from the start, through its methods
ofgathering, to allow a wide r.ange oftheoretical and methodological approaches
to work on its data and materials. In this book you will have found a core set of
our fi~dings, but these will be only a small proportion ofwhat has already emerged,
and will continue.to emerge, from this project. Henceforth the judgements on the
quality ofthe achievements will not be ours, and that is as it should be.
APPENDIX
The World Data Set
The following tables present the raw data from the project's world questionnaire.
Any researchers interested in exploring the dataset for themselves may do so by
approaching the UK Economic and Social Data Services.
What did you think ofthe film?
Extremely enjoyable
Very enjoyable
Reasonably enjoyable
Hardly enjoyable
Not enjoyable at all
No answer
17,449
5,148
1,578
262
201
109
How important was itto see the film?
Extremely important
Very important
Reasonably important
Hardly important
Not important at all
No answer
14,732
5,987
3,043
639
284
62
70.8%
20.9%
6.4%
1.1%
0.8%
59.7%
24.2%
12.3%
2.6%
1.2%
242 IAPPENDIX
What kind ofstory is The Lordofthe Ringsfor you?
Please choose up to three.
Allegory 2,586 3.8%
Epic 13,044 19.2%
Fairytale 2,808 4.1%
Fantasy 9,885 14.5%
Game-world 531 0.7%
Good vs evil 10,734 15.8%
Myth/legend 8,897 13.1%
~est 8,288 12.2%
SFXfilm 5,572 8.2%
Spiritual journey 1,877 2.8%
Threatened homeland 1,688 2.5%
War story 2,174 3.2%
What was the main source ofyour expectations?
The books
The director
One ofthe starS
The first two parts of the film
A game associated with the film
Nothing in particular
Other answers
Sex
Male
Female
Age
Under 16
16-25
26-35
36-45
46-55
56-65
Over 65
13,343
326
434
7,334
150
803
2,357
12,174
12,108
2,486
11,722
5,938
2,563
1,305
364
103
59.6%
1.5%
1.9%
32.8%
0.6%
3.6%
(50.1%)
(49.9%)
10.2%
47.9%
24.3%
10.4%
5.3%
1.5%
0.4%
How often have you seen Fellowship ofthe Ring?
Once
More than once
Not at all
3,321
20,948
219
How often have you seen Two Towers?
Once
More than once
Not at all
3,851
19,882
341
APPENDIX I243
How many times have you read the books of The Lordofthe Rings?
Read all three books once 5,195 21.2%
Read all three more than once 11,614 47.4%
Read some ofthe books 1,625 6.6%
Still reading for the first time 1,603 6.5%
Haven't read them at all 4,469 18.2%
Where do you live? (top twenty response levels)
United States 4,744
Netherlands 3,275
United Kingdom 3,057
Denmark 1,677
Spain 1,584
Belgium 1,378
Germany 1,161
China 1,087
Slovenia 966
France 649
Australia 551
Greece 500
Canada 485
Italy 483
Turkey 334
Norway 296
Chile 224
Colombia 194
New Zealand 156
Sweden 148
Other countries 1,790
Notes
INTRODUCTION. RESEARCHING THE LORD OF THE RINGS:
AUDIENCES AND CONTEXTS
1. Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction:A Social Critique ofjudgementofTaste (London: Routledge, 1986),
32, 271-272.
2. Janet Staiger, Interpreting Films: Studies in theHistoricalReception ofAmerican Cinema (Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992).
3. Thomas Austin, Hollywood, Hype andAudiences: Selling and Watching PopularFilm in the 1990s
(Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002), 1.
4. Kim Schr0der, Kirsten Drotner, Stephen Kline, and Catherine Murray, ResearchingAudiences
(London: Arnold, 2003);Janet Staiger, Media Reception Studies (NewYork: New York University
Press, 2005), 17-94; Robert Holub, Reception Theory: A Critical Introduction (New York:
Methuen, 1984); Arild Fetveit, "Anti-Essentialism and Reception Studies," International}ournal
ifCultural Studies 4, no. 2 (2001): 173-199.
5. See Laura Mulvey, "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema," Screen 16, no. 3 (1975); republished
in Tony Bennett, S. Boyd-Bowman, C. Mercer, and Joan Woollacott, eds., Popular Television and
Film (London: BFI, 1981), 206-215; David Bordwell, Making Meaning: Inference andRhetoric
in the Interpretation ofCinema (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989).
6. Recent overviews of such interest are to be found in the work of Henry Jenkins, Matt Hills,
Martin Barker, and Ernest Mathijs, but some discussions ofthese concerns go back way further.
See HenryJenkins, "ReceptionTheory and Audience Research: The Mystery ofthe Vampire's
Kiss," in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams, eds., Reinventing Film Studies (London:
Arnold, 2000), 165-182; Matt Hills, Fan Cultures (London: Routledge, 2002); Robert Wyatt
and David Badger, "What Newspaper Critics Value in Film and Film Criticism," in Bruce
A •• ~ ...:- _.J r1_ --- ___ , .,__ ' ,.. • ··- •••
.i;;
246 J NOTES
Publishing Corporation, 1985), 54-72; Greg Taylor, Artists in the Audience: Cult, Camp and
American Film Cn"ticism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999); Ernest Mathijs,"Bad
Reputations: The Reception ofTrash Cinema," Screen 46, no. 4 (2005): 451-472; Bruce Austin,
"Portrait of a Cult Film Audience,"journal ofCommunication 31(1980):43-54; Bruce Austin,
"Critics' and Consumers' Evaluation of Motion Pictures: A Longitudinal Test of the Taste
Culture and Elite Hypotheses," journal ofPopular Film 10, no. 4 (1983): 156-167; Barbara
Wilinsky, Sure Seaters: The Emergence ofArt House Cinema (Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota
Press, 2000); Martin Barker,Jane Arthurs, and Ramaswami Harindranath, The Crash Controversy:
Censorship Campaigns and Film Reception (London: Wallflower Press, 2001); Annette Hill,
Shocking Entertainment: Responses to Violent Movies (Luton: University of Luton Press, 1997).
7. Such an integrated approach is advocated by Barbara Klinger, "Film History Terminable and
Interminable: Recovering the Past in Reception Studies," Screen 38, no. 2 (1997): 107-128.
8. For a bibliography ofdifferent prints and editions ofTolkien's writings, including translations,
see Wayne Hammond, ed., with Douglas A. Anderson,]R.R. Tolkien:A Descriptive Biblz'ography
(Winchester: St. Paul's Bibliographies, 1993).
9. Neil Isaacs and Rose Zimbardo, eds., Tolkien and the Critics (Notre Dame, IN: University of
Notre Dame Press, 1968); also see Neil Isaacs and Rose Zimbardo, eds., Understanding the Lord
ofthe Rings: The Best ofTolkien Criticism (London: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005); Richard
C. West, Tolkien Criticism: An Annotated Check List (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press,
1981).
10. For a selection ofwork along these lines over the years (with some emphasis on early examples),
see Lin Carter, Tolkien:A Look behindthe Lordofthe Rings (New York: Ballantine Books, 1969);
Gunnar Urang, Shadows ofHeaven: Religion and Fantasy in the Writings ofC.S. Lewis, Charles
Williams, and]R.R. Tolkien (London: United Church Press, 1971); Lee D. Rossi, The Politics
ofFantasy: C.S. Lewis and]R.R. Tolkien (Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Press, 1971); Randel Helms,
Tolkien's Worlds (London: Thames and Hudson, 1974); Tom Shippey, The Roadto Middle Earth
(London: Grafton, 1982); David Harvey, The Song ofMiddle Earth (London: Allen and Unwin,
1985); Marli Schi.itze, Neue Wege nach Narnia und Mittelerde: Handlungskonstituenten in der
Fantasy-Literatur von C.S. Lewis and]R.R. Tolkien (Berlin: Lang, 1986);Jane Chance, The Lord
ofthe Rinf}f: The Mythology efPower(Lexington: University ofKentucky Press, 1992-ZOOl);Jared
Lobdell, ed., A Tolkien Compass (New York: Open Court, 2002); Wayne G. Hammond and
Christina Scull, The Lord ofthe Rings:A Reader's Companion (London: HarperCollins, 2005).
11. In a defence against indignations, Terry Pratchett sums up some criticisms of The Lord ofthe
Rings as a "cult classic" that is "inexplicably popular but unworthy." See Terry Pratchett, "Cult
Classic,"in Karen Haber, ed., Meditations on Middle-Earth (London: Simon and Schuster, 2001),
75.
12. Isaacs and Zimbardo, Tolkien andthe Critics, 1.
13. David Glover, "Utopia and Fantasy in the L_ate 1960s: Burroughs, Moorcock, Tolkien," in
Chris Pawling, ed., PopularFiction andSocial Change (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1984): 185-211;
Brian Rosebury, Tolkien: A Cultural Phenomenon (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003);
Anne C. Petty, One Ring to Bind Them All: Tolkien's Mythology (Tuscaloosa: University of
Alabama Press, 2002); Gregory Bassham and Eric Bronsson, eds., The-Lord ofthe Rings and
Philosophy: One Book to Rule Them All (New York: Open Court, 2003); Peter Kreeft, The
Philosop!JyofTolkien: The Worldview behindthe Lordofthe Rings (New York: Ignatius Press, 2005);
Mark Eddy Smith, Tolkien's Ordinary Virtues: Discovering the Spiritual Themes ofthe Lord ofthe
Rings (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2002); Ean Begg, Lordofthe Rings andthe Signs
ofthe Times (London: Guild of Pastoral Psychology, 1975); Patrick Curry, Defending MiddleEarth:
Tolkien-Myth and Modernity (Great Barrington, MA: Floris Books, 1997); Hal
Colebatch, Return ofthe Heroes: The Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Contemporary Culture
(Canberra: Australian Institute for Public Policy, 1990).
I
•
NOTES I247
14. For a bibliography of these fan criticisms, see http:l/www.uni-klu.ac.atl~jkoeberl/Courses/
Tolkien/biblio.pdf(accessed May 15, 2006).
15. Probably the earliest studies from this perspective are John S. Ryan, Tolkien, Cult or Cultu~e?
(Armidale, New South Wales: University Press of New England, 1969); and Bruce A. Beatie,
"The Tolkien Phenomenon: 1954-1968,"Journal ifPopular Culture 3, no. 4 (1970): 689-703.
Others include Nigel Walmsley, "Tolkien and the '60s," in Robert Giddings, ed., J R. R.
Tolkien, This Far Land(London and Totawa, NJ: Barnes &Noble Books, 1984): 73-85; Martin
Barker, "On Being a 1960s Tolkien Reader," in Ernest Mathijs and Murray Pomerance, eds.,
From Hobbits to Hollywood· Essays on PeterJackson's The Lord ofthe Rings (New York: Rodopi,
2006), 81-100;Tracie S. Speake, "The Power ofthe Ring:J RRTolkien and American Popular
Culture," The Sextant 1(Summer2003): 71-86.
16. Rosebury, 1-3.
17. The sheer quantity of its producers' archived materials, deposited with the New Zealand Film
Archive, attests to this and is a resource still awaiting research.
18. See Vivian Sobchack: "Most Hollywood historical epics not only repeat the narrative within the
film through a doubling narration but also repeat that narrative outside of the film-within its
cinematic discourse." "'Surge and Splendour': A Phenomenology of the Hollywood Historical
Epic," in Barry Keith Grant, ed., Film Genre Reader II (Austin: University of Texas Press,
1995), 280-307, this quotation 293.
19. Talk given to the Department of Screen and Media, University ofWaikato, Hamilton, New
Zealand, May 9, 2002. Botes has produced his own three-DVD documentary version, which
New Line would not allow him to issue but which the company itselfedited down into yet another
LotR boxed set for issue in August 2006. The trilogy's texts are recycling still further with probable
Blu-Ray and HD DVD issues. See "Short Ends," Onfilm 2 (2006): 13. After global success,
the exhibition ofproperties from the project has returned to the nation's museum,Te Papa, and
has attracted remarkable numbers again.
20. Richard A. Petersen and Narasimhan Anand, "The Production ofCultural Perspective,"Annual
Review efSodology30 (2004): 311.
21. Michael Dorland, "Policy Rhetorics ofan Imaginary Cinema," in Albert Moran, ed., Film Policy
(London: Routledge, 1996), 125.
22. David Hesmondhalgh, The Cultural Industries (London: Sage, 2002), 50.
23. G. Campbell, "Planet Middle Earth," New Zealand Listener (December 15, 2001), 18-24.
24. See Sandy George, "Gunning for a Bigger Stage," Screen International(November 12, 2004). See
also the Year2005 Production Report from the U.S. Center for Entertainment Industry Data and
Research, which cites a 531 percent increase in film production in Australasia from 1998 to 2005,
available at http://www.ceidr.org/2005CEIDRReport.pdf(accessed August 4, 2006).
25.
26.
27.
28.
See P.J. Huffstutter, "NotJust aTolkien Amount: 'The Lord ofthe Rings' MovieTrilogy Boosts
Tourism and Brings Other Benefits to New Zealand; Locals Call It the 'Frodo Economy,"' available
at http://www.newsday.com/entertainment/news (accessed September 16, 2005).
Geoff Lealand and Helen Martin, "Aotearea/New Zealand," Australian Screen Education 39
(2004): 15.
Bertha Chin and Jonathan Gray, "'One Ring to Rule Them All': Pre-viewers and Pre-Texts of
the Lordofthe Rings Films,"lntensities:JournalofCult Media 2 (2001) (accessed May 11, 2006).
Rumour in fact has it that the trilogy may have made back its entire negative costs from licensing
agreements before even the first ftlm was released. "No quaint cottage industry anymore, marketing
Middle-earth has assumed a world-girdling corporate form, a behemoth encompassing
publishers, merchandisers, law firms, webmasters, not to mention countless hordes ofopportunistic
hangers-on. For sheer commerciality, Rings has arguably become the most profitable fictional
work of all time.... New Line Cinema's 300-plus international licensing agreements alone
recouped the movie trilogy's $300 million price tag months before the first film even hit the mul-
248 J NOTES
tiplex." Ethan Gilsdorf, "Lord of the Gold Ring," Boston Globe (November 16, 2003). Couple
that with the New Zealand tax advantages, and we have another ofHollywood's famous auditing
miracles.
29. See, for instance, the official insider's guide to the films, the location guidebook, and stories from
actors: Brian Sibley, The Lord ofthe Ring.r: The Fellowship ofthe Ring Insider's Guide (Boston:
Houghton Miillin, 2001); Andy Serkis and Gary Russell, Gollum: How We Made MO'Vie Magic
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003); Ian Brodie, The Lord ofthe Rings Location Guidebook
(London: Harper Collins, 2003); Sean Astin and Joe Layden, There and BackAgain, an Actor's
Tale:A Behind the Scenes Look at The Lordofthe Rings (London: Virgin Books, 2005).
30. See Warren Buckland and Chris Long, "Following the Money: The Lordefthe Rings and the
Culture ofBox Office Figures," andJanet Wasko and Govind Shanadi, "MoreThanJust Rings:
Merchandise for Them All," in Ernest Mathijs, ed., The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture in
Global Context (London: Wallflower Press, 2006).
31. See, for instance, Jane Chance, "I~. There a Text in This Hobbit? Peter Jackson's Fellowship of
the Ring," Literature/Film Quarterly 30, no. 2 (2002): 79-85;Jim Smith and J. Clive Matthews,
The 'Lordofthe Rings:· The Films, the Books, the Radio Series (London: Virgin Books, 2004);Janet
Brennan Croft, ed., Tolkien on Film: Essays on PeterJackson's The Lord ofthe Rings (London:
Mythopoeic Press, 2005); Lynnette R. Porter, Unsung Heroes o/'TheLordoftheRings:·From Page
to Screen (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2005); Robert Eaglestone, Reading The Lord ofthe
Rings:New Writings on To!kien's Trilogy (London: Continuum, 2005). More recent developments
in adaptation research have shifted to exploring the variety ofideological meanings that different
adaptations achieve, along with a broader attention to the role of intertextual referencing
within them. For good illustrations of both, see Robert Stam and Alessandra Raengo, eds.,
Literature andFilm (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004).
32. Barry Keith Grant, A CulturalAssault: The New Zealand Films ofPeterJackson (Nottingham:
Kakapo Books, 1999); Ron Magid, "Imagining Middle Earth," American Cinematdgrapher 82,
no. 12 (December 2001): 60-69; Iain Lawson, Keith Marshall, and Daniel O'Brien. The World
ofthe Rings (Richmond, Surrey: Reynolds and Hearn, 2002); Harmony Wu, "Trading in Horror,
Cult and Matricide: Peter Jackson's Phenomenal Bad Taste and New Zealand Fantasies of
Inter/National Cinematic Success," in MarkJancovich,Antonio Lazaro-Reboll,Julian Stringer,
and Andrew Willis, eds., Defining Cult Movies: The Cultural Politics ofOppositional Taste
(Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003), 84-108; Ian Pryor, PeterJackson: From Prince
ofSplatter to Lord ofthe Rings (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2004); Greg Wright, PeterJackson
in Perspective: The Power behind Cinema's The Lord ofthe Rings:A Look at Hollywood's Take on
Tolkien's Epic Tale (Los Angeles, CA: Hollywood Jesus Books, 2004); Alec Worley, Empires of
the Imagination:A CriticalSurvey ofFantasy Cinema.from Georges Mth'Cs to The Lordofthe Rings
(New York: McFarland & Company, 2005).
33. Michael N. Stanton, Hobbits, Elves and Wizards (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2002); Hal G.
P. Colebatch, Return oftheHeroes: The Lordofthe Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter andSocial Conflict
(Perth: Cyber Editions Corporation, 2003); Russell W. Dalton, Faith journey through Fantasy
Lands:A Christian Dialogue with Harry Potter, Star Wars andTheLordofthe Rings (Minneapolis,
MN: Augsburg Fortress, 2004); Anna Dawson, Studying The Lordofthe Rings (London: Auteur
Publishing, 2006).
34. See the chapters by Douglas Kellner, Sean Cubitt, Ken Gelder (on the cultural significance of
The Lordofthe Rings' themes), and Ian Conrich and Jennifer Brayton (on merchandising and
fandoms) in Mathijs and Pomerance. Also see the chapters byJenny Lawn and Bronwyn Beatty
and Davinia Thornley (on the New Zealand reception), and Matt Hills, Kirsten Pullen, and
Judith -Rosenbaum (on fandoms) in Mathijs, The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture. Also see
Elana Shefrin, "Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Participatory Fandom: Mapping New
Congruencies between the Internet and Media Entertainment Culture," Critical Studies in
~~
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J
NOTES I249
Media Coinmunication 2, no. 3 (2004): 261-281; Suman Basuroy, Subimal Chatterjee, and s.
Abraham Ravid, "How Critical Are Critical Reviews? The Box Office Effects ofFilm Critics,
Star Power, and Budgets,"Journal ofMarketing 67, no. 4 (2003): 103-117.
35. See the chapters by Erik Hedling ("FramingTolkien: Trailers, High Concept, and the Ring"),
Jonathan Gray ("Bonus Material: The DVD Layering ofThe Lordofthe Rings"),Jon Dovey and
Helen Kennedy ("Playing the Ring: Intermediality and Ludie Narratives in the Lordofthe Rings
Games"), K. ]. Donnelly ("Musical Middle-Earth"), and I. Q Hunter ("Tolkien Dirty') in
Mathijs, The Lordofthe Rings: Popular Culture.
36. A substantial account ofthis can be found in Kate Egan andMartin Barker, "Rings around the
World: Notes on the Challenges, Problems and Possibilities ofInternational Audience Projects,"
Participations: Onlinejournal ofAudience & Reception Studies 3, no. 2 (2006).
37. This project simplywould not have been possible without the funding from the U.K. Economic
and Social Research Council. We also acknowledge the additional funding from the University
ofWales, Aberystwyth, which allowed us to extend the project by five months, enabling a much
fuller achievement. Colleagues in some other countries also received funding to support their
work, and acknowledgements ofthese are to be found in specific chapters. A full list ofparticipants
and contributors is given in the acknowledgements. We also want to extend our special
thanks to Janet Jones, now of the University of the West of England, Bristol, who was originally
part of the U.K. team, but who had to withdraw for health reasons. Her early contribution
was enormously valuable.
38. The countries were Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, France,
Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Russia, Slovenia, Spain,
Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
39. See Ariel Dorfman and Armand Mattelart, How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in
the Disney Comic (New York: International General, 1973); Harold A. Innis, Empire and
Communications (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1950). For an excellent introduction to
both stances, see Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright, Practices ofLooking: An Introduction to
Visual Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001).
40. Sonia Livingstone, "On the Challenges of Cross-national Comparative Media Research,"
EuropeanJournalofCommunication 18, no. 4 (2003): 477-500; Annabelle Sreberny, "The Global
and the Local in International Communications,"inJames Curran and Michael Gurevitch, eds.,
Mass Media and Society (London: Arnold,2000), 93-119.
41.
42.
43.
Tamar Liebes and Elihu Katz, The Export ofMeaning: Cross Cultural Readi'ngs ofDallas
(Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993); Ernest Mathijs andJanetJones, eds., BigBrotherInternational·
Critics, Formats andPublics (London: Wallflower Press, 2004);Janet Wasko, Mark Phillips, and
Eileen R Meehan, eds., Dazzled by Disney? The Global Disney Audiences Project (Leicester:
Leicester University Press, 2001).
See Joshua David Bellin, Framing Monsters: Fantasy Film and SocialAlienation (Carbondale:
Southern Illinois University Press, 2005); Richard Dyer, Only Entertainment (London:
Routledge, 2002); Andrew Gordon, "Science-Fiction and Fantasy Film Criticism: The Case of
Lucas and Spielberg,"journal ofthe Fantastic in theArts 2, no. 2 (1989): 81-94;James Donald,
Fantasy and the Cinema (London: British Film Institute, 1989); Dorfman and Mattelart.
Among the best studies ofthis kind that we know, we would mention Maire Messenger Davies,
Fake, Fact, and Fantasy: Children's Interpretations ofTelevision Reality (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum,
1997); Maya Gotz et al., Media andthe Make-Believe Worlds ofChildren: When Harry PotterMeets
Poktmon in Disneyland (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2005).
44. See Mathijs, "Bad Reputations";Janet Staiger,"Hitchcock in Texas: Intertextuality in the Face
of Blood and Gore," in her Perverse Spectators: The Practices ofFilm Reception (New York: New
York University Press, 2000), 179-187; Cynthia Erb, Tracking King Kong: A HollywoodIcon in
World Culture (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1998).
250 INOTES
45. Justin Lewis has commented on this summary dismissal, pointing out that, aside from the problematic
work we talk of here, there is a more valuable tradition of work arising from the
American mass communications tradition exemplified by people such as Andrea Press. And
Andy Ruddock (UnderstandingAudiences [London: Sage, 2001]), among others, has argued for
abiding benefits ofthe uses and gratifications approach. We are happy to acknowledge these other
strands, but maintain our view that the dominant position is as we have described it. A look at
the pattern of research presentations at any year's International Communication Association
Conference, we think, will indicate its continuing force.
46. A very recent example. In a book summarising the current "state of the art," one essay by
Rhodes and Hamilton discusses the Third Person effect. This well-attested phenomenon
records that very many people believe that they are not influenced by, for instance, violence on
television, but are worried about their impact on others. David Buckingham (Public Secrets:
'EastEnders'andItsAudience (London: British Film Institute, 1987), for instance~ has noted this,
and argued that parents-who know their own from close proximity-may worry about their
children beingfri'ghtened, but do not believe that they are made violent. In mass communications/media
psychology, however, this translates into a conviction that we as researchers know better
than the parents can, and that our job is to "educate" them to believe that they are harmed,
even ifthey deny it (see Nancy Rhodes andJames C. Hamilton,"Attribution and Entertainment:
It's Not Whodunit but Why," in Jennings Bryant and Peter Vorderer, eds., The Psychology of
Entertainment [Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2006], esp.121).
47. For discussion and debate on these issues, see Communication Review 9, no. 2 (2006).
48. Sonia Livingstone and Moira Bovill, eds., Children and Their Changing Media Environment: A
European Comparative Study (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2001).
49. Barker et al.; Martin Barker, "Loving and Hating Straw Dogs: The Meanings of Audience
Responses to a Controversial Film," Participations: Online journal ofAudience & Rtception
Studies 2, no. 2 (2005), and 3, no.1 (2006); Martin Barker and Ernest Mathijs, "UnderStanding
Vernacular Experiences ofFilm in an Academic Environment,"Art, Design and Communication
in Higher Education 4, no. 1(2005):49-71.
50. One particularly apt example is J. P. Telotte, "The Blair Witch Project Project: Film and the
Internet," Film Quarterly 54, no. 3 (2001): 32-39.
51. See Fernand Braudel, On History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982); Klinger.
52. See Jean Baudrillard, For a Critique ofthePoliticalEconomy ofthe Sign (St. Louis, MO: Telos Press,
1973). For' a critical assessment, see Douglas Kellner, "Boundaries and Borderlines: Reflections
on Jean Baudrillard and Critical Theory," in Illuminations, the Critical Theory Website, available
at http://www.uta.edu/huma/illuminations/ke112.htm.
53. Martin Barker, "News, Reviews, Clues, Interviews, and Other Ancillary Materials: A Critique
and Research Proposal," Scope, an OnlineJournal ofFilm· Studies (February 2004), available at
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/film/scopearchive/articles/news-reviews.htm (accessed May
2006).
54. Even this research project will have added to the "noise" around the film. Several media reported
on the project, and its existence made "newsworthy" "talk" in itse1£ Most reports were positive
or neutral; some were hostile. We are still proud to have been called names by the English
tabloid paper the Sun (there is honestly no better route to credibility than that). An error in currency
conversion led one American newspaper (USA Today) to believe we were going to pay our
research assistant an exorbitant salary, which generated even more talk, and hundreds of applications
for the post (much to the desperation ofour personnel office). See "Fraud ofthe Rings,"
Sun (December 20, 2003); Martin Wainwright, "Worldwide Qyest for the Magic of Middle
Earth," Guardian (December 20, 2003).
55. For an exploration and application of this, see Mathijs, "Bad Reputations"; Ernest Mathijs,
"Reviews, Previews, and Premieres: The Critical Reception ofThe Lordofthe Rings in the United
NOTES I251
Kingdom," in Mathijs, The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture.
56. See Rick Altman, Film/Genre (London: British Film Institute, 1999); Bordwell; Kendall
Walton, "How Remote Are Fictional Worlds from the Real World?",journal ofAesthetics and
Art Criticism 37, no. 1 (1978): 11-23; Kendall Walton, Mimesis as Make-Believe (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1995); "Fearing Fictions,"JournalofPhilosophy75, no.1 (1978):
5-27; David Lewis, "Possible Worlds," in Michael M. Loux, ed., The Possible and the Actual:
Readings in the Metaphysics ofModality (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979), 182-189;
Nicholas Rescher,ATheory ofPossibility (Oxford: Blackwell, 1975). For an examination ofhow
Lewis and Rescher can be applied to film analysis, see Thomas Elsaesser and Warren Buckland,
Studying ContemporaryAmerican Film:A Guide to MovieAnalysis (London: Arnold, 2002), 212.
57. See, for instance, Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen, Multimodal Discourse: The Modes and
Media ofContemporary Communication (London: Arnold, 2001).
58. The four bOoks that arose from two London conferences on Hollywood and its audiences all
contain materials ofrelevance here: Melvyn Stokes and Richard Maltby, eds., American Movie
Audiences: From the Turn ofthe Century to the Early Sound Era (London: British Film Institute,
1999), Identifying Hollywood's Audiences: Cultural Identity and the Movies (1999), Hollywood
Spectatorship: Changing Perceptions of Cinema Audiences (2001), Hollywood Abroad: Audiences
and Cultural Exchange (2004). In addition, it is worth considering among other things Tom
Stempel,AmericanAudiences on Movies andMoviegoing {Lexington: University Press ofKentucky
2001);].effrey Richards·and Dorothy Sheridan, eds., Mass-Observation at the Movies (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1987). Vivian Sobchack opened up a relevant theoretical line of
enquiry in her The Address ofthe Eye: A Phenomenology ofFilm Experience (Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1992).
59. This is the outcome of a great deal of research on fans, for instance. See in particular Henry
Jenkins, Textual Poachers (London: Routledge, 1992). See also, in connection with film audiences,
Barker and Brooks, KnowingAudiences:judge Dredd, Its Friends, Fans andFoes (Luton: University
of Luton Press, 1998).
60. An essay exploring some of these problems is forthcoming-see Martin Barker, "Discourse
Analysis and the Problem ofResearching'Impossible Objects,"' in Mike Pickering, ed., Cultural
Studies Methods (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2008).
61. We are still analysing this aspect ofthe research. One striking finding already to have emerged
is that there is a surprising, highly structured difference between those whose answers indicate
use ofdigital sources (the Internet and World Wide Web) versus those using only conventional
(press, television, and so on). The former show a more emotionally committed response with a
stronger sense ofbelonging to a community.
62. The details of that project were published in Barker, Arthurs, and Harindranath.
63. Chinese, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Norwegian, Russian,
Slovenian, Spanish,Turkish, and Welsh.
64. A minimal amount ofdata cleaning was necessary. In a small number ofcases, double-clicking
the "submit" button caused· two. entries in the database. We found just one simply abusive
response, and deleted it as pointless.
65. We will not list all conference papers members ofthe teams made in relation to the project, but
we would like to highlight a few occasions where different teams of the project made presentations:
Lothar Mikos, Susanne Eichner, Elizabeth Frommer, and Michael Wedel of the
Hochschule fur Film und Fernsehen organised a conference/workshop on the methodology of
the project, in Potsdam (April 30-May 1, 2004); Martin Barker, Kate Egan, and Ernest Mathijs
organised the closing conference of the project in Gregynog, Aberystwyth (December 10-12,
2004); team presentations were made at the ESA Research Network for the Sociology of the
Arts conference (Rotterdam, November 3-5, 2004), the Society for Cinema and Media Studies
conference (London, March 30-April 1, 2005), and the International Communications
252 INOTES
Association conference (New York, May 26-30, 2005). Martin Barker also presented findings
from the project at the Tolkien Society annual conferences in 2004 and 2005. Details of the
papers and participants can be found at the websites ofthe respective organising societies.
Publications directly stemming from the project include: Martin Barker, "The Lordofthe Rings
and 'Identification': A Critical Encounter," EuropeanjournalofCommunicat£on 20, no. 3 (2005):
353-378; Daniel Biltereyst and Giselinde Kuipers, eds., Tijdschrift voor Communicatiewetenschap
en Mediacultuur 34, no. 1; Wasko and Shanadi; Daniel Biltereyst and Philippe Meers,
"Blockbusters and/as Event: Distributing and Launching The Lord ofthe Ring.I'; Mathijs,
"Reviews, Previews and Premieres"; Susanne Eichner, Lothar Mikos, and Michael Wedel,
"'Apocalypse Now in Middle-Earth': 'Genre' in the Critical Reception of The Lord ofthe Rings
in Germany"; Anne Jerslev, "Sacred Viewing: Emotional Responses to The Lordofthe Rings";
Mariano Longo, "Cooperation versus Violence: An Ethnographical Analysis of The Return of
the King Video Game"; Stan Jones, "Fixing a Heritage: Inscribing Middle Earth onto New
Zealand," in Mathijs, ed., The Lordofthe Rings: Popular Culture,· Martin Barker and Ernest
Mathijs, "Seeing the Promised Land from Afar: Perceptions ofNew Zealand by Overseas Lord
ofthe Rings Audiences," in Adam Lam and Nataliya Oryshchuk, eds., How We Became MiddleEarth:A
Collection ofEssays on The Lordofthe Rings {London: Walking Tree Publishers, 2007).
ONE. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: SELLING THE FRANCHISE
1. This chapter draws on material presented in Janet Wasko and Govind Shanadi, "More Than
Just Rings: Merchandise for Them All," in Mathijs, ed., The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture,
23-42.
2. New Line Entertainment, "About Us," available at http://www.newline.com/about/index.shtml
(accessed January 28, 2004).
3. Jonathan Bing and Cathy Dunkley, "Kiddy Litter Rules H'wood," Variety (January 8, 2002), 1.
4. David Rooney, "Not ofThis Earth," Variety (January 4, 2004), !.
5. "Toy Biz Granted MasterToy License for One ofthe Most Highly-Anticipated Film Franchises
of All-Time," Business Wire (June 12, 2000), available at http://www.licensingmedia.
com/news/htmVddhistory2000.html (accessed April 30, 2004).
6. Michael White, The Lift and Work ofJ R. R. Tolkien (Indianapolis, IN: Alpha Publishers,
2002).
7. White, Lift.
8. There is a discrepancy in the reporting ofownerships rights at this point in time. Lowson et al.
say that UA maintained some rights, but the National Arbitration Forum states that Zaentz has
held the rights since 1976. See Iain Lowson, Keith Marshall, and Daniel O'Brien, World ofthe
Rings: The Unauthorized Guide to the World of]R.R. Tolkien {London: Reynolds and Hearn,
2002); National Arbitration Forum, "Start-upTrademark Opposition Policy Decision: The Saul
Zaentz Company v. Gandalf R.r.1.," Claim Number: FA0112000103063 (February 19, 2002).
9. Miramax actually began development ofthe first film, but let it go into turnaround to New Line
because they couldn't commit to financing three films at one time. ThUs, Miramax also receives
a piece ofthe "backend" ofthe films (Adam Dawtrey,"Will'Lord' Ring New Line's Bell?" Variety
(May 21-27, 2001).
10. See National Arbitration Forum.
11. White, 252.
12. Hugh Davies, "Lord of the Rings Royalties Owner Issues Pounds 11m Writ," London Daily
Telegraph (August 20, 2004), 7.
13. See Vanessa Juarez and Misty Schwartz, "Hell on Middle-Earth," Entertainment Weekly
(December 15, 2006), 17-18. This suit plus other copyright issues are currently complicating
NOTES I253
plans for the production of The Hobbit. Also, in 2003, Viggo Mortensen led a group of actors
in their demands for more compensation, and received undisclosed bonuses from New Line.
14. Nina Munk, Fools Rush In (New York: HarperCollins, 2004), 256.
15. John Lewis, "Following the Money in America's Sunniest CompanyTown," in Julian Stringer,
ed., Movie Blockbusters {London: Routledge, 2003), 61-71.
16. Biltereyst and Meers, "Blockbusters."
17. See MPAA, "Research and Statistics," available at http://www.mpaa.org/researchStatistics.asp
(accessed November 1, 2006).
18. See www.boxofficemojo.movies; see also John Horn, "Crossed Swords, Cold Cash," Newsweek
(December 10, 2001), 78.
19. Stephen Galloway, "Movies and the Media: Marketing Expenditures Spiral Ever Upward ... ,"
HollywoodReporter (July 1, 2006), available at http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003254883
(accessed November 17, 2006).
20. Toby Miller, Nitin Govil, John McMurria, and Richard Maxwell, GlobalHollywood (London:
British Film Institute, 2001).
21. Dawtrey, "Will 'Lord' Ring New Line's Bell?" Variety (May 21-27, 2001).
22. Biltereyst and Meers, "Blockbusters," 81.
23. Dawtrey, I.
24. "The Fellowship of New Line," Primedia {September 2001): 1.
25. Dawtrey.
26. "'The Lord of the Rings' Generates More Than 350 Million Hits on Website as New Line
Prepares to Unveil Footage in Cannes," PR Newswire (April 10, 2001).
27. Nigel Reynolds, "Stars Given Early Viewing of the First Hobbit Film," Daily Telegraph (May
11, 2001), 7.
28. Ibid.
29. Maris Matzer Rose, "NL 'Rings' in New Strategy," Hollywood Reporter (December 5, 2002), 1.
30. "26 million Lord ofthe Rings Bookmarks Help Deliver Youth Audience," PR Web {December
24, 2003), available at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2003/12/prweb95721.htm {accessed
December 1, 2004).
31. Bill Higgins, "Outwellington'ed," Variety (December 8, 2003), 79.
32. Claude Brodesser and Paul Sweeting, "Longer Two Towers Headed to Theaters ... ," Video
Business (August 25, 2003), 7.
33. Andy Seiler, "The Line for 'Return of the King' Tickets Goes around the World," USA Today
(November 28, 2003), 6E.
34. Pat O'Brien, "Tickets to 'Lord of the Rings' Trilogy up for Bid on eBay," Press-Enterprise
(December 7, 2003), FIO.
35. Dawtrey. See Eric Hedling, "Framing Tolkien: Trailers, High Concept and the Ring," in
Mathijs, ed., 225-237, for more detailed discussion of the LotR trailers.
36. See Jonathan Gray, "Bonus Material: The DVD Layering ofThe Lordofthe Rings," in Mathijs,
ed., 238-253.
37. VNU, "The Rings' Lord over the Entertainment Industry" (December 19, 2003), available at
http://www.nielsenmedika.com/newsrelease/2003/LOTR.htm (accessed November 17, 2006).
38. Aliya Sternstein, "Web Strategy Treads the Cutting Edge of High Tech," Variety (August
23-29, 2004), 41.
39. Ty Braswell, "In Search of QJ:IB: Gordon Paddison Interview," imedia connection (May 8,
2003), available at http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/1179.asp (accessed December 2,
2006).
40. Shefrin, 262.
41. Shefrin, 267.
42. Joseph Szadkowski, ''All Things Middle Earth in Site about Film Trilogy," Washington Times
Iiii
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254 INOTES
(December 27, 2003), Bl.
43. "'The Lord of the Rings' Generates."
44. VNU; Sternstein.
45. Sternstein reports that there were 400 LotR sites when New Line opened its site, and 300,000
sites after the first film opened in December 2001.
46. Erik Davis, "The Fellowship ofthe Ring," WiredMagazine (October 2001): 120-132; Braswell;
Sternstein.
47. Gillian Flynn, "Lordofthe Rings: Ringmasters," Entertainment Weekly (November 16, 2001), 44.
48. Sternstein.
49. "'The Lord of the Rings' Generates."
50. Braswell.
51. Dawtrey, 1.
52. "The Fellowship."
53. Rose.
54. "The Fellowship."
55. ''Airline to Middle-earth Scores a Flying Hat-Trickwith New'Lord ofthe Rings' 747," Business
Wi" (November 17, 2003).
56. New Line Entertainment, "New Line Home Entertainment Breaks New Ground with the Lord
of the Rings: The Two Towers Adventure Card," Press Release (August 13, 2003).
57. Dawtrey.
58. Brodesser and Sweeting.
59. Doug Desjardins, "Hot Ad Campaigns Pump Up Video Release ofHit Films/' DSNRetailing
Today (June 10, 2002).
60. Janet Wasko, How Hollywood Works (London: Sage, 2003), 170.
61. Time Warner, Factbook (New York: Time Warner, Inc., 2003), 4. .
62. "Who's Afraid of AOL Time Warner?" The Economist (January 24, 2002), available at
http://www.economist.com/agenda/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=952225 (accessed December 1,
2004).
63. Jill Goldsmith, "With Billions at Stake, Toy Biz Is No Longer Child's Play," Variety (June 9,
2002), 1.
64. Ian Markham-Smith, "Lord of the Rings Films and Products Set to Out-Magic Even Harry
Potter," TDC Trade (December 28, 2001), available at http://www.tdctrade.com/
imn/01122804/filrnsOS.htm# (accessed December 1, 2006).
65. "Movie's Merchandise Proving a Big Hit," The Sentinel(Stoke) (December 19, 2003), 6.
66. Teresa Howard, "Now Playing at aToy Store Near You," USA Today (December 8, 2003), lOB.
67. "Rings Merchandise Hits $1.2 Billion," Dominion Post (April 30, 2004), 1.
68. A. W. Mathews, "Companies in Licensing Face-Off over 'Rings,'" San Diego Union-Tribune
(December 21, 2001), E-7.
69. "Movie's Merchandise," 6.
70. Gail Schiller, "News: Marketing," Hollywood Reporter (June 10, 2004), 2.
71. Schiller.
72. Mark Rahner, "Lords ofMerchandising Churn 'Out T chotchkes," Seattle Times (December 14,
2003), K4.
73. Mark Monahan, ''A Magic Formula to Print Cash," Daily Telegraph (September 29, 2001), available
at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2001/09/29/bfpott29.xml
(accessed December 1, 2006).
74. "New Line Cinema's 'Lord ofthe Rings: The Fellowship ofthe Rings' Ignites Marketplace," PR
Newswire (January 15, 2002).
75. apple-style-span>L. M. Holson, "apple-style-span>A Franchise Fantasy,"apple-style-span> New
York Times (November 9, 2003), Section 6, 28.
Ir
t~
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it·
NOTES I255
76. B apple-style-span>Ward, "37Things about Lord ofthe Rings," The Ottawa Citizen (December
13, 2003), 1-8. . .
77. See Wasko and Shanadi for a more detailed discussion ofLotR merchand1s1ng.
78. Rabner.
79. Biltereyst and Meers, 84-85.
80. See Stephanie Schorow, "BelovedTolkien Trilogy Sets Cash Registers Ringing," Boston Herald
(October 23, 2004), 25.
81. Ethan Gilsdorf, "Lord of the Gold Ring," Boston Globe (November 16, 2003), 12.
TWO. AN AVALANCHE OF ATTENTION: THE PREFIGURATION
AND RECEPTION OF THE LORD OF THE RINGS
1. Michael Atkinson, Village Voice (June 6, 2001).
2. Ji.irgen Habermas, Strukturwandel der Offintlichkeit (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1962).
3. For an elaboration ofthis approach, see Mathijs, The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture, 6-9.
4. See selected chapters in Mathijs, The Lordofthe Rings: Popular Culture; Mathijs and Pomerance,
From Hobbits to Hollywood As a symptomatic anecdote we would like to cite one story: inJanuary
2007, New Line executive Robert Shaye announced he would not consider offering the direction
of the in-development project The Hobbit to Peter Jackson as long as Jackson would not
drop his lawsuit for arrears in royalties of LotR ("Jackson Barred from Filming Hobbit,"
Vancouver Sun [Januafy 12, 2007], C11; "The Breaking ofthe Fellowship," Empire 212 [February
2007]: 24-25). This convolution ofthe aesthetic and the legal is indicative ofhow, as John Fiske
has it, "the role ofthe insurance assessor becomes indistinguishable from that ofthe critic," and
it demonstrates, once more, how the public presence ofa film at its production level is never just
about its textual or aesthetic properties. See John Fiske, "The C_ultural Economy of Fandom,"
in Lisa A. Lewis, ed., AdoringAudiences (London: Routledge, 1992), 44.
5. We would like to acknowledge several archives that have made information on the prefiguration
and reception ofLotR available. The Belgian Royal Film Archive has ~e.en o~ tremen~ous
assistance in providing press clippings from around the world, and the Bnt1sh Film Institute
offered valuable assistance in collecting U.K.-based press materials. The Aberystwyth-based project
enabled us to collect literally all the press materials relating to The Return of the King
between October 2003 andJanuary 2004, and gave access to invaluable information about 24,739
viewers' preferred use ofprefigurative materials in their preparation for The Return ofthe King.
Staffofthe Koerner Library at the University ofBritish Columbia assisted us in accessing virtually
all North American press materials between 2001 and 2004. Online archives and numerous
other sites have been helpful in completing an overall view ofLotR's public presence. We
would also like to thank the teams and researchers in Australia, Belgium, China, France,
Germany, Greece, Italy,The Netherlands, New Zealand, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, South Kore~,
the United Kingdom, and the United States for providing materials they collected from their
own local press. The full total of materials used lies around 6,500.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
See Davinia Thornley, "Wellywood and Peter Jackson: the Local Reception of The Lord ofthe
Rings in Wellington New Zealand," in Mathijs, The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular Culture,_ 101.
See "Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings at New Line" (posted August 23, 1998), available at
www.aintitcool.com/node/1948.
See "Where My Faith in Peter Jackson and Lord of the Rings Comes From" (posted August
25, 1998), available atwww.aintitcool.com/node/1970.
We use the term hype here in the meaning attributed to it by Biltereyst and Meers, 2006.
For a wider exploration ofthese developments, seeJennifer Lawn and Bronwyn Beatty, "On the
Brink ofa NewThreshold ofOpportunity: The Lord of the Rings and New Zealand Cultural
256 INOTES
Policy," in Mathijs, TheLordofthe Rings: Popular Culture, 43-60; and Barker and Mathijs, "Seeing
the Promised Land from Afar."
11. Jamie Wilson, "The Lord ofthe Web Causes Chaos," Globe andMail (June 23, 2000), R7; Fox
News website via nzedge.com (July 7, 2000).
12. Mark Burman, "Hobbit Wanted," Guardian (July 30, 1999).
13. See Ernest Mathijs, "Reviews, Previews, and Premieres: The Critical Reception of The Lordof
the Rings in the United Kingdom," in Mathijs, The Lordofthe Rings: Popular Culture, 119-142.
By far the weirdest connection to local British-or in this case Scottish-concerns and speculations
about the impact of The Lordofthe Rings is one short article in the Scotsman, in which
the author expresses fears that a successful reception of the films might lead to a deterioration
in personal hygiene among Britain's youth culture, inciting youngsters to be filthy. According
to the writer, "Tolkien fanaticism has long been a barometer of idiocy and poor personal
hygiene," and she is clearly scared that the films' popularity might encourage "dippy, unwashed"
appearances (Hannah McGill, "Youth Culture Risks Picking Up a Filthy Hobbit," Scotsman
[November 3, 2000], 5).
14. In some very early reports Sean Connery was also frequently mentioned, as a contender for the
part ofGandalf; see "New Line Cinema," Screen Finance (September 7, 2000).
15. Jerry Mosher, "Morphing Sean Astin: Playing 'Fat' in the Age of Digital Animation," in
Mathijs and Pomerance, 301-318.
16. Philip Kemp, "Gone to Earth," Sight and Soundll, no.l (January 2001): 23.
17. And it did not stop at national media. Regional media used similar tactics. Wales on Sunday
reported on the move from shooting to postproduction of The Lord ofthe Rings on the back of
the assumption that Tolkien's Welsh connection (he spent time as a youth in Mid Wales)
would make the story ofinterest to readers.
18. It is indicative of the local pen~tration that even papers as local as the Bristol Evening Post
{January 25, 2001) considered reporting on this part of their remit.
19. A typical example is the report iri the Italian Corriere Della Serra (May 12, 2001), which highlights
the prices and amounts of money at stake.
20. Erik Hedling, "FramingTolkien: Trailers, High Concept, and the Ring," in Mathijs, The Lord
ofthe R;ngs.· Popular Culture, 225-237.
21. Julian Dibell, "Lord of the Geeks," Village Voice(June 6,2001).
22. Specific case studies ofthe box office figures (from the opening weekend as well as the subsequent
weeks and months), and the reception ofthe trailers, DVDs, soundtrack, spin-offspoofs
(which ofcourse also contribute to the presence oftheir subject ofridicule), distribution, the location
industry (including museums, pilgrimages, and visits), and critical reception in New
Zealand, Germany, Belgium, the United States, the United Kingdom, The Netherlands, and
Denmark are available in Mathijs, The LordoftheRings: Popular Culture; Mathijs and Pomerance;
and Biltereyst and Kuipers, Tijdschrift.
23. Suman Basuroy, Subimal Chatterjee, and S. Abraham-RaVid, "How Critical Are Critical
Reviews?The Box Office Effects ofFilm Critics,·Star Power and Budgets,"journalofMarketing
67, no. 4 (2003): 103-117; Chin and Gray.
24. Roman Jakobson, Essais de Linguistique Ginirale {Paris: Editions du Minuit, 1963).
25. Shefrin.
26. For a more detailed overview ofLotR fan activity we refer to selected chapters in Mathijs, The
Lordofthe Rings: Popular Culture, in particular the case studies by Kirsten Pullen and byJennifer
Brayton. Two remarkable characteristics ofthe Lordofthe Rings fandom are its high degree of
media literacy (see the chapter byJudith Rosenbaum), and its sense ofan imagined community-a
feeling ofshared thought. See also Mathijs and Pomerance.
27. Houston Chronicle (December 14, 2003). Similar considerations are also at the front ofJennifer
Brayton, "Fie Frodo Slash Frodo: Fandoms and The Lordofthe Rings," in Mathijs and Pomerance,
NOTES J 257
137-153.
28. For reasons of space, we are leaving out a more detailed discussion of the use of"television."
29. The Times affiliated itself strongly with the immediate run-up to the releases, as did the New
York Times in the United States. New Line considered both as "privileged partners" who could
count on extra materials (fold-outs, free posters, website materials, photos, and so on) to woo
readers. Their mentions seem 1:0 confirm New Line's strategy ofattempting to control the hype
by proffering preferential media treatment. See Mathijs, "Reviews, Previews, and Premieres."
30. Philip French, "Are the Critics Able to Stop a Turkey in Its Tracks?" Observer (May 21, 2006);
Jay Stone, "Why We Movie Critics Are Feeling a Little Insecure," Vancouver Sun (December
2, 2006), Fl7.
31. See, among others, Daniel Biltereyst and Philippe Meers, 'Blockbusters and/as Events:
Distributing and Launching The Lord ofthe Rings, in Mathijs, The Lord ofthe Rings: Popular
Culture, 71-87.
32. As reported in Publishers Weekly (December 23, 2003).
THREE. PROMOTIONAL FRAME MAKERS AND THE MEANING
OF THE TEXT: THE CASE OF THE LORD OF THE RINGS
1. Throughout this chapter I will make reference to the group effort ofthis project. I wish to thank
to DejanJontes and Tanja Oblak for their excellent contributions to this paper.
2. The film premiered in Slovenia on January 17, 2004; the world premiere took place on the weekend
before Christmas, or four weeks in advance ofthe first showing in Slovenia.
3. D. Stephen Reese's definition says that frames are "organizing principles that are socially shared
and persistent over time, that work symbolically to meaningfully structure the social world." D.
Stephen Reese, "Prologue: Framing Public Life: A Bridging Model for Media Research," in D.
Stephen Reese et al., eds., Framing Public Life (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2003), 11.
4. Additionally, 91.5 percent ofthe Slovene respondents/viewers were under thirty-five years old
and 98.1 percent were under forty-five years old. The demographic composition ofLord ofthe
Rings audience reflects the cinema-going demographics in Slovenia, where more than 90 percent
of cinema-goers are younger than forty-nine, and confirms that t~e viewers ofLotR were
casual audience-that is, the regular cinema-goers or a bit younger--and not the committed
readers ofTollcien's books who would have some preknowledge ofthe Tollcien's trilogy. On cinema
attendance in Slovenia, see Mediana TGI, Institute for Market and Media Research,
Mediana, Ljubljana, 2006, "Obiskovalci Kinematografov po Starosti in Izobrazbi [Cinema
Visitors According to Age and Education], 2003, 2004, 2005," in Statistical Yearbook ofthe
Republic ofSlovenia, available at http://www.stat.si/letopis/index_letopis.asp (accessed February
5, 2007).
5. Nicholas Abercombie and Brian Longhurst, Audiences (London: Sage, 1998), 121.
6. John Fiske, '.'The Cultural Economy ofFandom," in Lisa A. Lewis, ed., The AdoringAudience:
Fan Culture and Popular Media (London: Routledge, 1992), 30-49.
7. Cornel Sandvoss, Fans {Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005), 29.
8. From December 1, 2003, to February 1, 2004, we monitored all major Slovene media: all five
Slovene daily newspapers (Delo, Slovenske novice, Finance, VeW, Dnevnik); ten weeklies {six
general-interest weekly magazines, two women's weeklies, two teen magazines: Dru ina, Mag,
Lady,Jana, Nedeijski Dnevnik, Stop, Smrkija, Pi!Plus, Mladina, 7D); the monthl}r Premiera, devoted
solely to film; one magazine devoted to popular culture in general; and two national television
stations (national public service TV and commercial POP TV).
9. For a discussion ofa reception ofLotR and ofdomestification ofglobal culture in Slovenia, see
Breda Luthar, "Kulturna Globalizacija, Film in Promocijski Re im'' [Cultural Globalisation,
258 INOTES
Film, and Promotional Regime: The Case ofLord ofthe Rings]," Teorija in Praksa43, nos.1-2
(2006): 5-24.
10. Nick Couldry, Inside Culture: Re-imaginingthe MethodefCulturalStudies (London: Sage, 2000),
86.
11. For a different understanding ofthe text as an event that places the emphasis on the aesthetic
background at the expense ofsocial, cultural, and economic context, see Hans RobertJauss, "The
Identity of the Poetic Text in the Changing Horizon ofUnderstanding," in James L. Machor
and Philip Goldstein, eds., Reception Study: From Literary Theory to Cultural Studies (London:
Routledge, 2001), 7-28 (originally published 1978).
12. Janet Staiger, Interpreting Films: Studies in the HistoricalReception efAmerican Cinema (Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), 36.
13. Ibid., 46.
14. Similarly,Janice Radway argues that changes in textual features or generic popularity should not
be considered as the direct evidence ofideological shifts in the culture. What she calls the "institutional
matrix" ofthe cultural industry should be taken into consideration (publishing and marketing
of romance novels in her case). The institutional matrix is the necessary context in
which we can understand their textual form (Reading the Romance [London: Verso, 1984],
19-45).The buying ofbooks and the reading ofbooks are thus not merely the result ofthe interaction
betvveen book and reader. They are also influenced by publishing as an organised culture
and the technology ofproduction, distribution, advertising, and other promotional techniques.
15. See Justin Wyatt, High Concept: Movies and Marketing in· Hollywood (Austin: University of
Texas Press, 1994), 25.
16. See Robert Sklar, Movie-Made America: A Cultural History ofAmerican Movies {New York:
Vintage Books, 1994), 323, on the changed distributional strategies in the film industry ofthe
1970s. According to Wyatt (23), high-concept films are differentiated within the marketplace
through an emphasis on style and an integration with their marketing. ·
17. See Janet Wasko, How Hollywood Works (London: Sage, 2003), 194.
18. This is reflected in their answers to the question of the kind of story The Lordofthe Rings was
for them. The largest proportion of"casual"/unskilled viewers defined it as a fight ofgood versus
evil.
19. Dnevnik, December 2, 2003; on the world premiere.
20. Dnevnik, January 9, 2004.
21. An author's byline is not necessarily an assurance ofan· independently authored text. Usually it
merely designates the person who compiled information from the promotional material or
someone who used promotional press releases, Internet sources, or foreign press sources to put
together an article that is mainly promotional in style and content and reproduces the framing
of the film offered by promotional discourse.
22. See Karen S. Johnson-Certee, News Narratives andNews Framing (Lanham, MD: Rowman &
Littlefield, 2005), 133, on the strategic ritual offactism in journalism.
23. P. David Marshall, "Intimately Intertwined in the Most Public Way: Celebrity and Journalism,"
in Stuart Allan, ed.,journalism: CriticalIssues {Maidenhead: Open University Press, 2005), 19.
24. See Angela McRobbie, ''Jackie Magazine: Romantic Individualism and the Teenage Girl," in
McRobbie, ed., Feminism andYouth Culture {Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000), 86.
25. Ibid., 84.
26. The difference between the film role and the private celebrity persona is usually completely erased
in magazines aimed at young women. The male stirs ofThe LordoftheRings, Mortensen, Wood,
Bloom, and Astin are represented as the embodiment of some of the features of their fictional
fitffi· personalities and portray the values ofthe fictional characters they play in the film.
27. Short news reports on her weight problems and her supposed resistance to Hollywood beauty
standards were also part of the publicity for the first and second parts of the trilogy: ''Dieting,
tf;:
lffi;
t
NOTES I259
No Thanks," Pi!Plus (January 16, 2004); "Happy and Fat" Lady (December 17, 2004); "Liv Has
Gained Weight," Slovenske Novice (January 3, 2004).
28. Graeme Turner, Fame Games (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 158.
29. I don't want to engage in a deeper discussion ofthe cultural aspects of the phenomenon. Very
briefly, the overall expansion ofthe phenomenon ofcelebrity is, according to P. David Marshall
(Celebrity andPower: Fame in Contemporary Culture [Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press,
1997], 26), an effective means for the commodification ofthe se1£ At the same time, however,
the phenomenon is an embodiment ofthe egalitarian nature ofmodern culture and is thus associated
with capitalism as well as with democracy. David Chaney (Cultural Change andEveryday
Life [Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2002]) defines the modern types of fame as an articulation of the
transformation of the concept of authority and prestige in mass societies, where the traditional
foundations ofauthority have been eroded. Authority no longer rests on role/position, which
would confer authority independent ofthe actor occupying a given position.
30. The classification offorms ofreading/reception ofDallas in different culturaVnational contexts
is made by Tamar Liebes and Elihu Katz, The Export ofMeaning: Cross-Cultural Readings of
Dallas (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993).
31. Cultural domination is tied not to a lack of information, but to the "exclusion from the power
of naming."
32. ND, January 25, 2004.
33. See Colin Campbell, "The Desire for the New," in Roger Silverstone and E. Hirsch, eds.,
Consuming Technologies: Med£a andInformation in Domestic Spaces (London: Routledge, 1992),
56.
34. See H. White, FiguralRealism {Baltimore, MD:Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 70. See
also Allan's argument on gendered nature and masculinist epistemology ofobjectivist discourse.
FOUR. WHAT DO FEMALE FANS WANT?
BLOCKBUSTERS, THE RETURN OF THE KING, AND U.S. AUDIENCES
1. New York Times (December 21, 2003).
2. Melanie Nash and Martti Lahti, "'Almost Ashamed to Say I Am One ofThose Girls': Titanic,
Leonardo DiCaprio, and the Paradoxes of Girls' Fandom," in Kevin S. Sandler and Gaylyn
Studlar, eds., Titanic: Anatomy ofa Blockbuster (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press,
1999), 64-88.
3. Letter, New York Times (January 4, 2004).
4. David Bordwell, The Way Hollywood Tells It: Story and Style in Modern Movies (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 2006), 58, 59, 60.
5. The exact figures for female participants are: 431 students under sixteen; 900 students, sixteen
to twenty-five; 48 professionals, sixteen to tvventy-five; and 237 professionals, twenty-five to
thirty-five years of age.
6. Along the same lines, the information doesn't warrant categorical statements about how female
responses differ from male responses. Random sampling ofthe data does suggest, however, that
women express the importance of the emotions raised by the epical filmmaking ofRotKmore
explicitly and in much more detail than male viewers.
7.
8.
To analyze individual responses from the groups that form the basis of my study, I examined a
random sample ofapproximately thirty questionnaires for each group by age and occupation. I
want to thank Katarzyna Chmielewska, my research assistant, for her substantial help in quantifying
the U.S. database. I also want to thank Bjorn Ingvoldstad for his research assistance in
the project's early stages.
As Annette Kuhn argues, the theatre has often constituted a memorable world for moviegoers.
260 INOTES
See DreamingifFredandGinger: Cinema and CulturalMemory (New York: NewYork University
Press, 2002).The blockbuster does not monopolise the creation ofthis outer world, then; it stands
as a particularly visible instance ofthe meaningfulness ofthis world to fans. Further, the "inner"
and "outer"worlds blockbusters generate for their fans are part oflarger processes involving other
kinds of films and other kinds of moviegoers. For more on this see Kuhn's "Heterotopia,
Heterochronia:-Place and Time in Cinema Memory," Screen 45, no. 2 (2004): 106-114.
9. See chapter 12 in this volume.
10. Exact figures for age were: sixteen to twenty-five, 36 percent; twenty-six to thirty-five, 23 percent;
and thirty-six to forty-five, 16 percent.
11. Figures for other professions are: 3 percent each for self-employed, executive, and service; 2 percent
each for home/child care, unemployed, and skilled manual; and 1 percent for retired.
12. The ability offandoms to create communities among women and others is a familiar formulation
in fan studies and has emerged in discussions offandom in relation to many media, from
literature to the Internet. See, for example, Janice Radway, Reading the Romance: Women,
Patriarchy, and Popular Literature (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984);
Henry Jenkins, Textual Poachers: Television and Participatory Culture (New York: Routledge,
1992); Nancy Baym, Tune In, Log On: Soaps, Fandom, and Online Community (Thousand Oaks,
CA: Sage Publications, 2000).
13. For more on Trilogy Tuesday, see theonering.net/features/newsroom/files/.
14. As Tom Gunning writes, "The realism of the image is at the service of a dramatically unfolding
spectator experience, vacillating between belief and incredulity" (''An Aesthetic of
Astonishment: Early Film and the (In)Credulous Spectator," in Leo Braudy and Marshall
Cohen, eds., Film Theory and Criticism [New York: Oxford University Press, 2004], 865).
Gunning's work on the early"cinema ofattractions" has been widely used in relation to specialeffects
cinema. Not all points ofhis argument apply here, but they provide a framework not only
for thinking about the contrasting potentials ofeffects within classical cinema, but also the role
ofcontemporary epic CGI adaptations in heightening the play between realism and illusion in
the viewing experience.
15. On this point, see, for example, Jenkins; Constance Penley, NASA/Trek: Popular Science and Sex
in America (New York: Verso, 1997).
16. On this point, for example, see Ien Ang, Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the Melodramatic
Imagination, trans. Della Couling (London: Methuen, 1985).
17. For example, a professional identifying herselfas a political science student wrote, "I had to very
consciously ignore the Europeanness ofthe good guys and the otherness ofthe bad guys (especially
the Southrons and the Haradrim). I also admit to wondering ifwhite nationalist types like
the movie and hoping that they don't" (26-35).
18. Richard Dyer, Only Entertainment (London and New York: Routledge, 1992), 18.
19. Ibid.
20. For example, "Hollywood vs. Women," Entertainment Weekly (October 6, 2006).
21. New York Times (October 11, 2006).
FIVE. THE BOOKS, THE DVDS, THE EXTRAS, AND THEIR LOVERS
1. Various writers identify the first major exploration in this area as George Bluestone, Novels into
Films: The Metamorphosis ofFiction into Cinema (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1957).
2. See, f0r instance, the arguments ofSeymour Chatman, "What Novels Can Do That Films Can't
(and Vice Versa)," in Gerald Mast, Marshall Cohen, and Leo Braudy, eds., Film Theory and
Criticism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 445-60.
NOTES I261
3. See, for instance, the tart comments on "adaptation-as-betrayal" in Andrew S. Horton and Joan
Magretta, eds., Modern European Filmmakers and the Art ofAdaptation (New York: Frederick
Ungar, 1981)-a book that proposes an alternative account via the concept of"twice-told tales."
4. Brian McFarlane, Novelto Film:An Introduction to the Theory ofAdaptation (Clarendon: Oxford,
1996). "Fidelity critiques" do not go away so easily. Robert Giddings and Erica Sheen responded
in their (edited) The Classic Novel· From Page to Screen (Manchester: Manchester University
Press, 2000).
5. See the comments on the ''jejune" state of adaptation theory as a result of the dominance of
literary-connected film programmes in the United States, in James Naremore, ed., Film
Adaptation (London: Athlone Press, 2000).
6. See also, for example, the sardonic commentary in Lynda E. Boose and Richard Burt, eds.,
Shakespeare the Movie: Popularising the Plays on Film, TV, and Video (London: Routledge, 1997).
7. A clear statement ofthis notion can be found in Neil Sinyard, Filming Literature:TheArt ofScreen
Adaptation (London: Croom Helm, 1986), this quote p. ix.
8. See, for instance, two essays on Cape Fear in McFarlane, 171-193; Kirsten Thompson, "Cape
Fear and Trembling: Familial Dread," in Robert Stam and Alessandra Raengo, eds., Literature
through Film: A Guide to the Theory and Practice ofFilm Adaptation (Oxford: Blackwell 2005),
126-147.
9. See especially recent work on remakes (the renaming is a good signal, in fact), for instance
Andrew S. Horton and Stuart Y. MacDougall, eds., Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes
(Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press, 1998); Constantine Verevis, Film Remakes (Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press, 2006).
10. This is broached, for instance, in John Orr and Colin Nicholson, eds., Cinema andFiction: New
Modes ofAdapting, 1950-1990 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1992).
11. For a clear example ofthe former kind, see Carol N. Dole, "Austen, Classics and the American
Market," in Linda Troost and Sayre Greenfield, eds., Jane Austen in Hollywood (Lexington:
University ofKentucky Press, 2001), 58-78; for an extraordinarily lazy set ofdeclarations about
the "knowing audience," see the chapter "Audiences" in Verevis.
12. In a separate essay we are exploring some fascinating patterns our questionnaire data and materials
revealed concerning the distribution ofkinds ofdisappointment across generations ofreaders.
13. Most notably, Humphrey Carpenter,]RR Tolkien:A Biography (London: Allen & Unwin, 1977).
14. See, in particular, Catherine A. Lutz andJane L. Collins, ReadingNational Geographic (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1993); Zhang Chengzhi, "The Eyes You Find Will Make You
Shiver," Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 5, no. 3 (2004): 486-490.
15. We do not wish to overplay this example. There are clearly other processes at work. Bearing in
mind that this documentary was first available before the release of The Return ofthe King, it
had to avoid "spoilers."This might throw light on another oddity. During the comparison with
Agincourt, the voiceover suggests that King Henry's rousing speech at Agincourt can be equated
with the appearance of the Elves at Helm's Deep. No mention is made of the fact that this
was a key change between book and film-nor is there any reference to what would have been
the more obvious analogy: namely, Aragorn's direct invocation ofHeniy's speech in the final battle
before the Gates of Mordor (also not present in the books). Keeping this high-drama
moment back was surely a marketing decision, whereas the Elves' arrival needed justifying to
suspicious fans.
16. This glossing over of potentially problematic aspects ofTolkien's work is further evidenced in
both the National Geographic and extended edition documentaries, where Jackson and Boyens
appear to elide the class dimensions ofSam and Frodo's relationship in the book, and stress pure
friendship rather than the notion ofupper-class gentleman and lower-class gardener or "bat-
man."
17. As we will go on to argue, we see these documentaries as complementary, with each building
262 INOTES
on and complementing the argument ofthe last. For us, this seems justifiable, in the sense that
these two documentaries are located together, one after another, on the same menu page ofeach
extended DVD (and, ihdeed, and as Craig Hight has also noted, if the viewer selects the "play
all" function on this page, these extras will always play in the order given on the menu). For us,
our aim: here is to consider, as Hight does, how "possible combinations" ofextras on particular
DVDs can function "as part oftrajectories, shaped bythe disc's interface." Craig Hight, "Makingof
Documentaries on DVD: The Lordofthe Rt'ngs Trilogy and Special Editions," Velvet Light
Trap 56 (2005): 11.
18. Arguably, this "collective voice" strategy could also be seen to serve two other, related purposes.
Firstly, to demonstrate that the experts on Tolkien have given the filmmakers their seal of
approval-that they are aligned with the views and interpretations ofthe filmmakers, and that,
therefore, lovers ofTolkien's books can trust these filmmakers to do appropriate service to the
books. Secondly, this strategy also seems to highlight to viewers that the cast and crew working
on the films all know and understand Tolkien's books and, equally, understand how and why
Jackson is adapting the books in the way that he is.
19. Interestingly, this "correction'' argument is given a further seal of approval by key Tolkien
"guardian" Christopher Lee, in the Fellowship ofthe Ring"Book to Script" documentary. There,
Lee notes that many of the changes made to the first film were not only necessary but also, in
many cases, improvements on the book. Lee's assertion of the necessity of omitting Tom
Bombadil from the first film would surely have derived force, for devotees, from his wellknown
status as a lifelong fan ofthe books. Notably, Lee's contribution lessens in the extras on
the Return efthe Kt'ng DVD, no doubt because ofhis heavily publicised discontent at being cut
from the theatrical version of the Return efthe King film.
20. See Hight, 13, for further discussion of these discursive strategies in other LotR extended
extras.
21. The success of this discursive strategy was acknowledged by many of our U.K. project interviewees,
with, for instance, one respondent noting that "ifyou do have any criticism ofit, it kind
of makes you forget them ... because of the fact that so much work went in to it" (including
"the amount of time they had to edit down the script"), another noting that "Philippa Boyens
has got a clear understanding ofwhat some ofthe messages are in the book," and another commenting
that "it's quite interesting when you buy the DVDs and you watch howJackson's done
it, he's quitefrank about it, he's got to portray a story" and "he can't put everything in."
22. This, coupled with Boyens's discussion of the need to balance the focus on fidelity to the book
with the commercial concerns of the studio {cited earlier in the chapter), runs counter to
Hight's argument (13) that the LotR extended extras make no reference to the economics ofthe
film production or to the reactions and views ofthe Tolkien fan base. This suggests, firstly, that
the adaptation extras may serve a different discursive function to the more filmmaking-specific
extras on the extended DVDs, and, secondly, that Hight's argument may be rather driven by
a residual ideological commitment to "prove" that filmmakers work to conceal their material
interests.
23. For a more elaborated consideration of this notion of~'completeness" among our respondents,
see Martin Barker, "Envisaging 'Visualisation': Some Challenges from the International Lord
efthe Rings Audience Project," Film-Philosophy 10, no. 3 (2006): 1-25.
24. Pavel Skopal, for instance, notes that 25 percent ofthe 20 million copies ofthe Fellowship efthe
Ring DVD sold on the North American market were extended DVD copies, and that, clearly,
these were aimed at "high-value customers" willing to pay out the higher price for another, more
extended version of the film. Pavel Skopal, "The Adventure Continues on DVD: Franchise
Movies as Home Video," Convergence 13, no. 2 (2007): 185-198, this quote 186.
25. This sense ofa long-term marketing campaign extends much wider than just the extended editiol)-.DVDs.
At the outset, LotR was seen as a risky proposition, not at all guaranteed to be a
NOTES I263
success. This meant, among other things, that merchandisers were initially hard to recruit.
Following the dramatic success of the first film, all this changed. For one good source on this,
see Buzz McClain, "The Lord of the Marketers," DVD Exclusive (May 2004), 20, 23.
26. Barbara Klinger, Beyond the Multiplex: Cinema, New Technologies, and the Home (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 2006), 61.
27. Skopal, 6.
28. Hight, 6.
29. Klinger, 61 and 78-85.
SIX. UNDERSTANDING DISAPPOINTMENT: THE AUSTRALIAN
BOOK LOVERS AND ADAPTATION
1. Sian Powell, "Readers Choice," The Australian (October 15, 1997).
2. Michael Kennedy, email message to author {July 26, 2006). As manager of the Australian Tol
Harndor list, Kennedy suggested that it was a literal toss-up as to whether the founders would
establish a Monty Python Society or a LotR society. Tolkien won the toss.
3. Personal telephone call with author (July 26, 2006).
4. Gordon Farrar, email message to author (August 7, 2006).
5. Curious but true. The first Australian publication ofLotR was a Braille edition, put out in 1975
by the Qyeensland Braille Writing Association.
6. Stam and Raengo, 3.
7. The Australian sample constituted 551 respondents the majority ofwhom (74 percent) found
the third film "extremely enjoyable."The second largest group (20 percent), found it "veryenjoyable."The
majority also considered it"extremely important" to see the film (70 percent) and suggested
that it was the books that largely formed their expectations of the films (60 percent),
although the next largest grouping (30 percent) suggested that it was the two prior films. By far
the majority ofthe Australian respondents were students (41 percent) in the sixteen-to-twentyfive
age range and female (59 percent), with the next largest grouping being twenty-six-to-thirtyfive-year-olds
(24 percent) and professional (30 percent).
8. Stam and Raengo, 3.
9. Hills, Fan Cultures, 2.
SEVEN. INVOLVEMENT IN THE LORD OF THE RINGS:
AUDIENCE STRATEGIES AND ORIENTATIONS
1. For an approach to The Lordefthe Rings as a blockbuster and genre film, see Susanne Eichner,
Lothar Mikos, and Michael Wedel, "Apocalypse Now in Middle Earth: Genre in the Critical
Reception ofThe Lordofthe Rings in Germany," in Mathijs, The Lwdofthe Rings: Popular Culture,
143-159.
2. The research team in Babelsberg consisted ofDr. Lothar Mikos (project leader), Dr. Elizabeth
Prommer, Dr. Michael Wedel, Susanne Eichner, and Sabrina Schafer, and the students Ulrike
Aigte, Nadine Baethke, Angela Burghagen, PatrickJantke,JeskoJockenhOvel,JOrn Krug, and
Cornelia Robe. The project, titled "Production, Marketing, and Reception of'The Lord of the
Rings' in Germany," was carried out from September 2003 through March 2005, in the degree
course on audiovisual media studies at the University ofFilm and Television, Babelsberg. The
findings are to be published in 2007.
3. Lothar Mikos and Elizabeth Prommer, "Das Babelsberger Modell, " in Lothar Mikos and
I
ii
II
Iu
R
"I
I!
11
I
I
I
I
iifItl
264 INOTES
Claudia Wegener, eds., Qua/£tative Medienfarschung: Ein Handbuch (Konstanz: UVK, 2005),
162-169; Lothar Mikos et al., Im Auge der Kalnera: Das Fernsehereignis ''Big Brother" (Berlin:
Vistas, 2000); Lothar Mikos, "Big Brother as Television Text: Frames of Interpretation and
Reception in Germany," in Mathijs and Jones, Big Brother International, 93-104.
4. Lothar Mikos, Fern-Sehen: Bausteine zu einer Rezeptionsiisthetik des Fernsehens (Berlin: Vistas,
2001); Ien Ang, "Ethnography and Radical Contextualism in Audience Studies," in her Living
Room Wars: Rethinking Media Audiencesfar a Postmodern World (London: Routledge), 66-81;
Lawrence Grossberg, "Introduction: Birmingham in America?" in his Bringing It All Back
Home: Essays on Cultural Studies (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997), 1-32; Lothar
Mikos, Film- und Fernsehanalyse (Konstanz: UVK, 2003); Uwe Flick, "Triangulation in
Qyalitative Research," in Uwe Flick, Ernst von Kardorff, and Ines Steinke, eds., A Companion
to QualitativeResearch (London: Sage, 2004), 178-183; Uwe Flick,An Introduction to Qualitative
Rmarch (London: Sage, 2006).
5. Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, "Introduction: Entering the Field of Qyalitative
Research," in Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, eds., The Landscape ofQualitative
Research: Theories andIssues (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998), 4.
6. Uwe Hasebrink, "Nutzungsforschung," in Gunter Bentele, Hans-Bernd Brosius, and Otfried
Jarren, eds., 6.fftntliche Kommunikation: Handbuch Kommunikations- und Medienwissenschajt
(Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2003), 117; Andreas Fahr, "Involvement," in Gunter Bentele, HansBernd
Brosius, and Otfried Jarren, eds., Lexikon Kommunikations- und Medienwissenschaft
(Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2006), 113.
7. Peter Vorderer, Fernsehen als Handlung: Fernsehfilmrezeption aus Motivationspsychologischer
Perspektive (Berlin: Edition Sigma, 1992), 83.
8. Ibid., 84; Donald Horton and R. Richard Wohl, "Mass Communication and Para-Social
Interaction: Observations on Intimacy at a Distance," Psychiatry 19 (1956): 215-229; Christian
Metz, Psychoanalysis and Cinema: The Imaginary Signifier (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1990);
Murray Smith, Engaging Characters:Fiction, Emotion, andthe Cinema (Oxford: Oxford University
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
Press, 1995).
Mikos, Film- undFernsehanalyse.
Thompson,"Fantasy, Franchises, and Frodo Haggins," 46.
A term coined by Michael Wedel in a project group discussion.
Thompson.
Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction:A Social Critique ofthejudgement ofTaste (Cambridge, 1\1.A.: Harvard
University Press, 2002); Herbert Gans, Popular Culture and High Culture: An Analysis and
Evaluation ofTaste (New York: Basic Books, 1974).
The following evaluation is based only on the 880 German-language responses to the online
survey.
Online questionnaire, question 5: "What kind ofstory is 'The Lord of the Rings' to you?"
Qyestion 3 in the cinema audience survey: "What are your spontaneous thoughts about the
film?"
In addition to demographic data, the cinema audience survey also asked about fan status (question
4, "Would you describe yourselfas a 'Lord ofthe Rings' fan?") and knowledge ofthe books
(question 7, "Have you read the 'Lord of the Rings' books?").
J. Distelmeyer, "Zuhaus in Mittelerde: Das Fantasy-Genre und seine Fans," epdfilm 12 (2002):
18-23.
Claudius Seidl, "Hinter tausend Kriegern keine Welt," FrankfurterAllgemeine Zeitung (December
17, 2003).
S. Horst, "Willkommen in Bruchtal!," Freitag (December 19, 2003), 52.
Ibid.
Jens Balzer, "Erl6st," Berliner Zeitung (December 17, 2003).
NOTES I265
23. Ibid.
EIGHT. GLOBAL FLOWS AND LOCAL IDENTIFICATIONS?
THE LORD OF THE RINGS AND THE CROSS-NATIONAL
RECEPTION OF CHARACTERS AND GENRES
1. The Dutch research was done in conjunction with a group ofstudents of communication science
at the University ofAmsterdam. We want to thank Monique van Bracht,Tisha Eetgerink,
Sabrine Englander, Arlette de Haas, and Pauline van Romondt van Vis for their enthusiastic
participation in this project. Moreover, we want to thank Daniel Biltereyst, Philippe Meers,
Martin Barker, and Ernest Mathijs for their helpful comments.
2. See, for instance, Ulrich Beck, "The Cosmopolitan Society and Its Enemies," Theory, Culture
& Society 19, nos. 1-2 (2002): 17-44; Michele Lamont and Laurent Thevenot, Rethinking
Comparative Cultural Sociology: Repertoires of Evaluation in France and the United States
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).
3. Liebes and Katz, The Export ofMeaning; Wasko et al., Dazzled by Disney; Mathijs and Jones,
Big Brother; Anne Cooper-Chen, Global Entertainment Media: Content, Audiences, Issues
(Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2005).
4. Sonia Livingstone, Making Sense ofTelevision: The Psychology ofAudienceInterpretation (London:
Routledge, 1998).
5. Becaus·e of the large number ofrespondents, we had to resort here to a rather crude recoding:
every answer that contained a specific name was seen as an answer where this character was
named as a favourite. This means that recoding sometimes didn't completely represent the
respondent's answer, for instance with answers like "In the book I preferred Frodo, but in the
film my favourite was Aragorn" (favourites: Frodo and Aragorn); or "My favourite is Sam
because of his loyalty to Frodo (Sam, Frodo). However, this is only a problem in a very small
number ofcases. Also, it was not possible to include languages with a non-Romantic language
(Chinese, Russian, Greek) in this analysis.
6. See G. Hofstede, Culture's Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviors, Institutions, and
Organizations acrossNations (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2001); G. Hofstede and G.J. Hofstede,
Cultures and Organizations: Software ofthe Mind (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005).
7. C. Hoffner, "Children's Wishful Identification and Parasocial Interaction with Favourite
Television Characters,"JournalofBroadcasting & ElectronicMedia 40 (1996): 389-402;Jonathan
Cohen, "Parasocial Break-up from Favourite Television Characters: The Role ofAttachment
Styles and Relationship Intensity,"Jou7-nal ofSocial and PersonalRelationships 21, no. 2 (2004):
187-202; A. M. Rubin and M. M. Step, "Impact of Motivation, Attraction, and Parasocial
Interaction on Talk-Radio Listening," journal ofBroadcasting & Electronic Media 44 (2000):
635-654; for a critical discussion, see also Barker, "The Lord ofthe Rings and 'Identification."'
8. Michele Lamont, Money, Morals, andMa'nners: The Culture ofthe French andAmerican UpperMiddle
Class (Chicago: University ofChicago Press, 1992); M. Lamont, The Dignity ofWorking
Men: Morality and the Boundaries ofRace, Class, and Immigration (New York: Russell Sage
Foundation, 2000); Lamont and Thevenot.
9. The reason for this is that we didn't find clear relations between the various modality choices
or favourite characters, but also there weren't very strong correlations between particular character
preferences and modalities. Neither personality choice nor character preference, moreover,
was strongly linked with appreciation. However, see chapter 9 in this volume.
10. See Biltereyst, "Blockbusters"; Meers, "Fandom."
11. This means that differences from the average are converted into standard deviations. A differ-
Ii
266 INOTES
ence of 1 means that the score is 1 standard deviation higher than the average; -1 means that
the score is 1 standard deviation lower than the average.
12. See Daniel Biltereyst and Philippe Meers, "The International Telenovela Debate and the
Contra-flow Argument: A Reappraisal," Media, Culture & Society 22, no. 4 (2000): 393-413;].
D. Straubhaar, "Beyond Media Imperialism: Asymmetrical Interdependence and Cultural
Proximity," Critical Studies in Mass Communication 8, no. 1 (1991) 39-59.
13. See Stuart Hall, "Encoding/Decoding," in Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, ed.,
Culture, Media, Language: Working Papers in Cultural Studies, 1972-79 (London: Hutchinson,
1980), 128-138; David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon, The Nationwide Television Studies
(London: Routledge, 1999).
14. See Hall.
15. Lamont, Dignity.
16. See Barker, "The Lord ofthe Rings and 'Identification.'"
17. See also Biltereyst.
18. Jenkins, Textual Poachers; John Fiske, Reading the Popular (New York: Routledge, 1991);
Understanding Popular Culture (New York: Routledge, 1994).
19. See Biltereyst; Thomas Elsaesser, Hollywood op Straat: Film en Televisie in de Hedendaagse
Mediacultuur [Hollywood on the Street: Film and Television in Today's Media Culture] (Amsterdam:
Amsterdam University Press, 2000);Julian Stringer, ed., Movie Blockbusters (London: Routledge,
2003).
NINE. THE FUNCTIONS OF FANTASY: A COMPARISON OF
AUDIENCES FOR THE LORD OF THE RINGS IN TWELVE COUNTRIES
1. This owes a great deal to comments, often critical, from colleagues in the LotR network around
the world. Many thanks to all ofyou.
2. For reasons of space, this essay cannot explain every procedure followed, each methodological
decision made, or how the key findings Were located. For anyone who has a particular interest
in examining these, a much fuller version of this essay is available on request from the author.
3. Based on thirty-eight responses, which was the full set of"Spiritual journey'' mentions excluding
"Epic."
4. In the 1960 and '70s, a substantial debate took place within the social sciences over this.
Triggered in part by the Sapir-Whorfhypothesis (see, for instance, P. Kay and W. Kempton,
"What Is the Sapir-WhorfHypothesis?"AmericanAnthropologist 86, no. 1[1984]:65-79) that
languages embody and thus enforce separate cultural understandings ofthe world, and then carried
into the philosophy of the social sciences by Peter Winch's influential The Idea ofa Social
Science and Its Relation to Philosophy (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1958), this kind of
extreme cultural relativism underwent stringent criticism. For one particularly astute challenge,
which criticises Winch at both epistemological and political levels, see David Lamb, "Preserving
a Primitive Society," Sociological Review25, no. 4 (1977): 689-719.
5. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Ori'gin and Spread ofNationalism
(London: Verso, 1991).
6. Michael Billig, BanalNationalism (London: Sage, 1995).
7. See, for instance, Dominic Strinati and Stephen Wagge, eds., Come on Down? Popular Media
Culture in Post-War Britain. (London: Routledge, 1992); Philip Davies, ed., Imagining and
RepresentingAinerica (Stafford: Keele University Press, 1996).
8. Karl Mannheim, "The Sociology of Generations," in his Essays on the Sociology ofKnowledge
(London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1952), 276-320.
9. On 1960s readers ofTolkien, see, in particular, Martin Barker, "On Being a 1960s Tolkien
'%'"
£
NOTES I267
Reader."
10. See, in particular,Joseph Ripp, "Middle America Meets Middle-earth: American Discussion and
Readership ofJ RRTolkien's The Lordefthe Rings, 1965-69," Book History 8 (2005): 245-286.
11. See, for instance, Speake, "The Power of the Ring.''
12. Personal message to Sue Turnbull.
13. Yannis Skarpelos, email to the author, June 2006.
14. Krysla Diver, "Troubled Germans Turn to Lord ofthe Rings," Guardian (October 4, 2004).
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
TEN. BEYOND WORDS: THE RETURN OF THE KING
AND THE PLEASURES OF THE TEXT
Jenkins, Textual Poachers; Will Brooker, Using the Force: Creativity, Community andStar Wars Fans
(New York and London: Continuum, 2002); Hills, Fan Cultures.
Kurt Lancaster, Interacting with Babylon Five: Fan Performances in a Media Universe (Austin:
University ofTexas Press, 2001).
Hills, 180.
Lancaster, 155
Hills, 71.
Hills, 129.
Sue Harper and Vincent Porter, "Moved to Tears: Weeping in the Cinema in Postwar Britain,"
Screen 37, no. 2(Summer1995): 152-173.
See Martin Barker and Julian Petley, Ill Effects: The Media Violence Debate, 2nd ed. (London:
Routledge, 2002).
Brian Massumi, Parablesfor the Virtual· Movement, Affect, Sensation (Durham, NC, and London:
Duke University Press, 2002).
Garth Jowett et al., Children and Movies: Media Influence and the Payne Fund Controversy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 69.
Massumi, 28.
Wendell S Dysinger and Christian Rucknick, The EmotionalReactions ofChildren to the Motion
Picture Situation (New York: Macmillan, 1933).
Klaus Scherer, "What Are Emotions? And How Can They Be Measured?" Social Science
bifbrmation 44, no. 4 (2005): 695-729.
Ibid.
Stam and Raengo.
Pseudonyms have been used to ensure confidentiality.
Vivian Sobchack, Carnal Thoughts: Embodiment andMoving Image Culture (Berkeley and Los
Angeles: University of California Press, 2004).
Sobchack,2004,65.
Hills, 28.
ELEVEN. HEROISM IN THE RETURN OF THE KING
1. "Tolkien's 'basic passion' was for 'myth (not allegory!) and for fairy-story, and above all for heroic
legend on the brink of history' [letter, no. 131 to Milton Waldman, 1951]. This passion was
dramatically expressed in a body ofwork unique in the history of English-language literature.
So unique, in fact, as to lead us to consider with incredulity the reading The Lord ofthe Rings as
nothing more than a ripping good yarn." Wright, Tolkien in Perspective, 33.
2. " ... in fact, that The Lord ofthe Rings is at least partly an attempt to restore the hero to mod-
1i
268 INOTES
ern fiction" {Wright, 60).
3. "Roger Sale, one ofthe sages under whom I studied at the University ofWashington, went so
far as to claim, 'In any study ofmodern heroism, ifJ.R.R. Tolkien's The Lordifthe Rings did not
exist it would have to be invented Why? Precisely because of the Stultifying effects of modernism."("Tolkien
and the Fairy Story," in Isaacs and Zimbardo, Tolkien and the Critics, 247).
Oddly enough, Reilly sees Tolkien's work as "a major contribution to modern literature" (Wright,
61).
4. "One reason The Lordofthe Rings works for so many contemporary readers is that it provides
a world in which we can glimpse an authentic and powerful truth, one that we know is correct
even though great powers ofevil and error threaten to overwhelm it. His heroes seem like authentic
heroes because doubt and despair-the great threats of modern world-are legitimate
enough threats that they claim would-be heroes such as Saruman and Denethor" (Joe Kraus,
"Tolkien, Modernism, and the Importance ofTradition," in Bassham and Bronson, 148.
5. "The same 'Wisdom that his heroes use to escape from the evils ofMiddle-earth serves as a story
that lets his contemporary readers escape, briefly, from the challenge of the modern. Middleearth
has enough landmarks to tell us that it 'Will one day develop into our own, but it remains
more magical" (Kraus, 149).
6. Petty, 256.
7. "His fiction reiterates an anti-'heroic' theme. The sorrows of the Elves in Beleriand, in The
Silmarillion, stem from FCanor's vengeful decision to pursue the crimes ofMelkor with war"
(Rosebury, Tolkien, 163-164). "The heroes of the Lord ofthe Rings do not like the war, they
morally win by rejecting this source." (Matthew Dickerson, Following Ganda(f[Grand Rapids,
Ml: Brazos Press, 2003], 81).
8. "The seemingly inexhaustible ability ofconsumers ofpopular culture to experience personal identification
with a tremendous range of heroes, from Spiderman to Obi Wan Kenobi to Neo to
Van Fanel to Frodo, reveals a need for heroes that has never died away. Tolkien's books continue
to supply a grand smorgasbord ofheroes for generation after generation-his 'epic temperament,'
as he described it, was not at all lost on readers accustomed to short attention span and
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
novels that could be easily devoured in a few hours" (Petty, 259).
Ibid., 258.
Barker, "The Lord ofthe Rings and 'Identification."'
''Aragorn is a fair king" (survey, male, 36-45, skilled manual). "His physical appearance and the
role he plays as a king are very attractive to me" (survey, male, 36-45, self-employed). "He is the
king who has to recover his throne. He is strong, brave and loyal" (survey, male, 26-35, creative).
It is worth noting that the largest proportion of complaints related to the suppression of
Saruman.
Kayla McKinneyWiggins, "The Art ofthe Story-Teller and the Person ofthe Hero," in Croft,
Tolkt"en on Film, 114.
Ibid., 121.
Petty borrows these terms from Northrop Frye's typology and applies them to these two characters,
among others. See Petty, 252.
For this author, "Popular heroes are often public servants, such as police officers, fire-fighters,
or co-workers in an office, who perform extraordinary acts of heroism while doing their regularjobs.
When plaCed in life-threatening conditions or situations well beyond their previous experience,
they rise to the task of helping others. They have no supernatural gifts, but their very
nature allows them to respond heroically'' (Porter, Unsung Heroes, 20).
17. "The recoil ofthe wounded hero is mainly, however, on Sam. He longs to stay with Frodo forever,
but Sam has achieved true maturity; and as the Heroic Age passes, he longs to put down
roots into the soil of the Sb.ire and raise a family'' (Marion Zimmer Bradley, "Men, Halflings,
and Hero Worship," in Zimbardo and Isaacs, Understanding, 90).
I
TWELVE. THE FANTASY OF READING: MOMENTS
OF RECEPTION OF THE LORD OF THE RINGS:
THE RETURN OF THE KING
NOTES I269
1. The authors wish to thank Ann Leysen and Philippe Meers, as well as the Ghent University
Research Fund (BOF), for help and support 'With this project.
2. V~vian Sobchack, "The Fant~stic,'.' in Geoffrey Nowell-Smith, ed., The OxfordHistory ofWorld
Cinema (Oxford: Oxford Un1vers1ty Press, 1996), 316.
3. Ibid., 319.
4. See Biltereyst and Meers, "Blockbusters and/as Events."
5. Se~'. for e~ample,_David Morley, The "Nationwide"Audience: Structure and Decoding (London:
Bntish Film Institute, 1980); Thomas Lindlof, Qualitative Communication Research Methods
(Thousands Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1995); Martin Barker, From Antz to Titanic:
Reinventing Film Analysis (London: Pluto, 2000).
6. This an~ysis is based on the research project The Export of Fantasy: The Lord of the Rings,
Gl~bal ~dm Cul~re and Blockbusters (2004-2005, BOF, Ghent University Research Fund).
~~is pro1ect combined a political-economic analysis of the distribution, marketing, and exhib1t10?
of The Retu_rn ofth~ King, ~ith a discourse analysis of the press and media coverage in
Belgium, and a wide-ranging audience and reception analysis of the movie. The research was
also developed as part of the U.K. International Lord of the Rings Research Project. This
chapter relies upon the Belgian data, out ofthe worldwide survey, as well as the qualitative audience
(reception) analysis.
7. In terms ofsociodemographics, the group consisted mainly ofadolescents (the age group ofsixteen
to twenty-five years: 66.8 percent, followed by people in the twenty-six-to-thirty-five age
group: 16 percent), with a slight overrepresentation of men (56.3 percent) and ofhigher-educ~ted
respondents (for example, 23.7 percent were university trained). Most respondents were
still students (62.3 percent), were familiar with Tolkien's books (60.7 percent had read one or
more ofthe books~, and considered themselves film fans (92.5 percent). See Ann Leysen et al.,
The Lord ofthe Rings: The Return ofthe King: A Quantitative Analysis ofthe Film Reception
(Ghent: Department of Communication Studies, 2005).
8. In total thirty-seven focus group interviews were conducted using a semistandardised format·
s~e David Morga~, The Focus Group Guidebook (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998). The inter~
Vlewees were _recruited from the survey respondents. The group ofinterviewees consisted offifty
males and thirty females. The data were collected as an ethnographic abstract and reported in
a research paper: Ann Le~sen et al., The Lord ofthe Rings: The Return ofthe King: A Reception
Study on T_he L~rds ojthe Rings: The Return ofthe King in Relation to theFilm Text, Film Experience
and the F~lm ~ewtng Context (Ghent: Department of Communication Studies, 2005).
9. See D~n1el B1ltereyst, "Resisting American Hegemony: A Comparative Analysis of the
Reception of Domestic and US Fiction," in Denis McQyail, Peter Golding and Els de Bens
e~s.•. Comm.~~ica~on Theory andResearch:An E]CAnthology (London: Sage, .2005), 70-88; als~
B1rgitta Ho1Jer, Studying Viewers' Reception of Television Programmes: Theoretical and
Methodological Considerations," European]ournal ofCommunication 5, no. 1 (1990): 29-56.
10. Hans Robert Jauss, Literaturgeschichte als Provokation (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1997).
11. Se~ also Jo~? Davenport, "Happy Endings and Religious Hope: The Lordofthe Rings as an Epic
Fa~ryTale, in Bassh~m and Bronson, The Lord ofthe Rings and Philosophy, 204-217.
12. Ehhu Katz, "The Ring ofTolkien and Plato: Lessons in Power, Choice, and Morality," in
Bassham and Bronson, 5-20.
13. Elana Shefrin, "Lord ofthe Rings, Star Wars, and Participatory Fandom."
270 INOTES
THIRTEEN. UNDERSTANDING TEXT AS CULTURAL PRACTICE
AND AS DYNAMIC PROCESS OF MAKING
1. Tony Thwaites, Lloyd Davis, and Warwick Mules, Introducing Cultural and Media Studies: A
SemioticApproach (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2002), 77.
2. Lothar Mikos, Film- und Fernsehana!yse (Konstanz: UVK, 2003); Richard Johnson, "What Is
Cultural Studies Anyway?," in John Storey, ed., What Is Cultural Studies? A Reader (London:
Arnold, 1996), 75-114; Mikko Lehtonen, The Cultura!AnalysisofTexts (London: Sage, 2000);
Alan McKee, TextualAnalysis:A Beginner's Guide (London: Sage, 2003).
3. Wolfgang Iser, The Act ofReading: A Theory ofAesthet£c Response (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1978).
4. John Storey, Cultural Consumption andEveryday Lift (London: Arnold, 1999), 65.
5. John Fiske, Television Culture (Londort: Methuen, 1987), 115.
6. Qyoted in Hight, 6.
7. Hight, 12.
8. Alexander BOhnke, "Mehrwert DVD," Navigationen 5, nos.1-2 (2005): 213-223.
9. Jim Taylor, Mark R.Johnson, and Charles G. Crawford, DVDDemystifted(NewYork: McGrawHill,
2006), 17.
10. Thompson, "Fantasy, Franchises, and Frodo Baggins," 60.
11. Hight, 10.
12. Gerard Genette, Paratexts: Thresholds ifInterpretation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1997).
13. Fiske.
14. Chin and Gray, "One Ring to Rule Them All," 1.
15. Ibid., 2.
16. Ibid., 15.
17. Jonathan Gray, "New Audiences."
18. Couldry, 69.
19. John Frow, "On Literature in Cultural Studies," in Michael Berube, ed., TheAesthetics ifCultural
Stud;es (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005), 52.
20. Bennett and Woollacott, 64.
21. Couldry, 70.
22. Bennett and Woollacott, 64.
23. Matt Hills, How to Do Things with Cultural Theory (London: Hodder Arnold, 2005), 26.
24. Lothar Mikos and Elizabeth Prommer, "Das Babelsberger Modell," in Lothar Mikos and
Claudia Wegener, eds., Qualitative Medienfarschung: Ein Handbuch (Konstanz: UVK, 2005),
162-169.
FOURTEEN. OUR METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES
AND SOLUTIONS
1. For a fine critical evaluation, see Milly Williamson, The Lure efthe Vampire: Gender, Fiction and
Fandomfrom Bram Stoker to Bu.ffy (London: Wallflower, 2005).
2. Perhaps the most important attempt to follow in his footsteps has been Tony Bennett, Michael
Emmison, and John Frow, Accountingfar Tastes: Australian Everyday Cultures (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1999).
3. Ofcourse what counts as "mainstream'' is inevitably heavily culturally defined, as the case ofLatin
American telenovelas well demonstrates. "Mainstream" to scholars from this region, this research
NOTES I271
can appear exOtic to others.
4. The signs of this weakness are to be found in the fact that still the most quoted book on theatre
audiences is Susan Bennett's entirely theoretical account (Theatre Audiences: A Theory ef
Production andReception [London: Routledge, 1998]). Other works, such as Neil Blackadder's
excellent historical/archival research into theatre riots (Performing Opposition: Modern Theater
and the ScandalizedAudience [Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003]), are rarely mentioned.
5. See, for instance, the four volumes of essays edited by Melvyn Stokes and Richard Maltby,
American MovieAudiences:From the Turn ofthe Century to the Early SoundEra (London: British
Film Institute, 1999); Identifying Hollywood'sAudiences: CulturalIdentity andtheMovies (London:
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
British Film Institute, 1999); HollywoodSpectatorship: ChangingPerceptions ifCinema Audiences
(London: British Film Institute, 2001); Hollywood Abroad: Audiences and Cultural Exchange
(London: British Film Institute, 2004).
For a recent overview, see Leah Price, "Reading: The State of the Discipline," Book History 7
(2004): 303-320.
Michael Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy: A Primer in the Social
History ifPictorial Style (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988).
See, for instance, Sarah Thornton, Club Cultures: Music, Media and Subcultural Capital
(Cambridge, MA: Polity Press, 1995); Ruth Finnegan,The Hidden Musicians: Music-Making
in an English Town (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
On this see Daniel Dayan's recent essay, "Mothers, Midwives and Abortionists: Genealogy,
Obstetrics, Audiences and Publics," in Sonia Livingstone, ed., Audiences and Publics: When
CulturalEngagement Mattersfar the Public Sphere (London: Intellect, 2005); 43-76.
On this see Livingstone.
See, for instance, David Buckingham, The Making ifCitizens: Young People, Media and Politics
(London: Routledge, 2000).
John Urry, The Tourist Gaze (London: Sage, 2002).
See, for instance, Russell W. Belk, Melanie Wallendorf, and John F. Sherry,Jr., "The Sacred and
the Profane in Consumer Behavior:Theodicy on the Odyssey,"]oumalofConsumer Research 16,
no. 1(1989):1-38.
See www.participations.org.
There are ofcourse complex histories within mass communications research. Histories from the
inside would note increasing sophistication in statistical methods, the growth offield studies,
and the rise ofparticular theorisations (one thinks ofthe increasing influence ofDolfZillman's
theorisations-see, for instance, his essay"Dramaturgy for Emotions from Fictional Narration,"
in Jennings Bryant and Peter Vorderer, eds., The Psychology ofEntertainment [Hillsdale, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum, 2006), 215-238). Histories from the outside would note both the persistence
in moral and political agendas and the lack of a real critical evaluation of past work, but
also subtle shifts-as, for instance, the rise of"public health" metaphors within recent research.
16. Kim Schr0der, Kirsten Drotner, Stephen Kline, and Catherine Murray, ResearchingAudiences
(London: Arnold, 2003), 16.
17. Natasha Walters, ''A Hero for Our Time," Guardian (July 16, 2005), G2, 27.
18. A very good example ofthis is the fine study by Livingstone and others ofthe place ofnew media
in the lives ofyoung people. For all its great strengths as a study, its arguments are made almost
entirely by its statistical enquiries. The role ofquotations from interviews rarely rises above the
illustrative, and they certainly never provide the grounds for any new discoveries of their own.
19. This research was published as "The LordoftheRings and 'Identification': A Critical Encounter,"
European journal ifCommunication 20, no. 3 (2005): 353-378.
20. One example: Ernest Mathijs uncovered a complex set of special interests in the film among
those reporting themselves as creatives. These were presented under the title "Professional
Activity and the Enjoyment ofPopular Culture" at "The Art ofComparison: 6th ESA Research
272 INOTES
Conference on the Sociology of the Arts" (November 3-5, 2004, Rotterdam).
21. Jerzy Neyman, "On the Two Different Aspects ofthe Representative Method: The Method of
Stratified Sampling and the Method ofPurposive Selection,"Journalofthe RoyalStatisticalSociety
97 (1934): 558-625.
22. A good reference on probability sampling, for its completeness, is C. A. Moser and G. Kalton,
Survey Methods in SocialInvestigation (London: Heinemann, 1971).
23. On theory-driven samples, see Barney G. Glaser and Anselm L. Strauss, The Discovery of
GroundedTheory: Strategiesfar Qualitative Research (Chicago: Aldine, 1967), 45.
24. M. B. Miles and A. M. Huberman, Qualitative DataAnalysis (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1994).
25. Alberto Trobia, La Ricerca Sociale Quali-Quantitativa (Milan: Franco Angeli, 2005), 32-35.
26. S. Sarantakos, Social Research (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 169-170.
27. Richard Dyer, Only Entertainment (London and New York: Routledge, 1992).
28. Laura Mulvey, "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema," Screen 16, no. 3 (1975): 6-18.
29. Jim McGuigan, CulturalPopulism (:Condon: Routledge, 1992).
30. Sadly, the one or two overviews of research tend to restrict themselves to these theoretical
debates, and are hardly aware of-empirical research contributions. See, for instance, Barbara
O'Connor and Elizabeth Klaus, "Pleasure and Meaningful Discourse: An Overview ofResearch
Issues," International Journal ofCultural Studies 3, no. 3 (2000): 369-387. See also Patricia
McCormack, "Pleasure, Perversion and Death: Three Lines of Flight for the Viewing Body,"
available at http://www.cinestatic.com/trans-mat/MacCormack/PPDcontents.htm (accessed
August 7, 2006).
31. Ien Ang, "Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination (London: Methuen,
1984).
32. Barker and Brooks, KnowingAudiences.
33. Austin, Hollywood, Hype andAudiences.
34. Aphra Kerr, Julian Kticklich, and Pat Brereton, "New Media-New Pleasures?'', International
Journal ofCultural Studies 9, no. 1(2006):63-82.
35. For interesting analyses oflocal struggles over meanings, see Colin Barker, "Social Confrontation
in Manchester's Qyangoland: Local Protest over the Proposed Closure ofBooth Hall Children's
Hospital," North West Geographer 1 (1997): 18-28; Chik Collins, "To Concede or to Contest?
Language and Class Struggle," in Colin Barker and Paul Kennedy, eds., To MakeAnother World:
Studies in Protest and CollectiveAction {Aldershot: Avebury, 1996).
36. See, for example, Elizabeth A. Clark, History, Theory, Text: Historians and the Linguistic Turn
{Cambridge, :MA: Harvard University Press, 2004); Victoria E. Bonnell and Lynn Hunt, eds.,
Beyondthe CulturalTurn: New Directions in the Study ofSociety andCulture {Berkeley: University
ofCalifornia Press, 1999).
37. Two recent books have done a very good job of delineating the range of approaches currently
available and showing something ofthe nature ofthe debates among them. The second provides
a very helpful account of the different methods and illustrates_ the kinds of findings they produce.
Margaret Wetherell, Stephanie Taylor, and Simeon J. Yates, eds., Discourse Theory and
Practice: A Reader, and Discourse as Data: A Guidefar Analysis (both Milton Keynes: Open
University Press, 2001).
38. For these and other examples, see Carla Willig, ed.,Applied Discourse Analysis (London: Sage,
1999).
39. On this, see Abigail Locke and Derek Edwards, "Bill and Monica: Memory, Emotion and
Normativity in Clinton's Grand JuryTestimony," Britishjournal ofSocialPsychology 42 (2003):
239-256.
40. Michael Billig, BanalNationalism (London: Sage, 1995).
41. In a forthcoming essay, Martin Barker has closely examined works ofrecent discourse analysis,
to bring these two issues into view. See his "Discourse Analysis and the Problem ofResearching
'Impossible Objects,"' in Mike Pickering, ed., CulturalStudies Methods (Edinburgh: Edinbur··6.:.;::~::;
University Press, 2008). g
42. The exceptions to this general statement are those approaches that use computer fiacil·~
d
. . . . . ~~~
stu y :1ord frequencies and relationships. See the d1scuss1on of corpus analysis in Wetherell et
al., Discourse as Data.
43. !he early work in developing the:e ideas arose with the ideas of "ethnoscience." See, for
instance, Jerome S. Bruner, Jacqueline J. Goodnow, and George A. Austin, "Categories and
Cognition," and Charles 0. Frake, "The Ethnographic Study of Cognitive Systems," both in
James Spradley, ed., Culture andCognition: Rules, Maps andPlans (Toronto: Chandler Publishing
1956), 168-190, 191-205. ,
44. Thomas McLaughlin, Street Smarts and Critical Theory: Listening to the Vernacular (Madison:
UniversityofWisconsin Press, 1996).
45. Rick Altman, Film/Genre {New York: American Film Institute, 1999).
46. Barker et al., The Crash ContrO'Versy.
47. Barbara Klinger, Beyondthe Multiplex, 164-176.
48. The concept of isotopy (iso ="same"; topos ="place") was initially proposed by A.J. Greimas, in
1966, in order to define the recurrence, in phrases or texts, of group ofwords sharing certain
semantic features. It refers to an idea ofmeaning as a "contextual effect," something that does
not belong to words considered one by one, but as a result oftheir relationships within texts or
speeches. See F. Lancia, The Logic ofa Textscope (2002), available at http://www.mytlab.com/
textscope.pd£ A typical technique that yields isotopies is Lexical Correspondence Analysis
(LCA) (see below).
49. Because we wanted to be able to pursue these investigations deeply, we inevitably preferred those
countries with large sets ofresponses. The advantage also was that these tended to be the countries
in which we had active research groups, who could comment on and interpret our findings
for us.
50. Again for practical reasons, we limited our choices here to English-language responses-which
anyway generated a very large dataset. We returned to other languages, to explore similarities
and differences, at a later stage of this set ofsearches.
51. For more details on cluster analysis, see B. S. Everitt, S. Landau, and M. Leese, ClusterAnalysis
(London: Arnold, 2001).
52. Trobia, 49-53.
53. L. Lebart and A. Salem, Statistique Textue!le (Paris: Dunod, 1994).
54. The description ofthese algorithms would require many pages and formulas and it's beyond the
aim of this writing.
55. See http://eng.spadsoft.com, for SPAD, and http://www.tlab.it, forT-LAB.
56. ]. P. Benzecri, quoted in Lancia, 14.
57. For further details, see Trobia, 55-62.
58. David Silverman, Interpreting Qualitative Data:MethodsfarAnalysing Talk, Text andInteraction
(London: Sage, 2001).
59. Sarantakos, 346. Tesch, instead, listed twenty-six different kind of approaches. See R. Tesch,
Qualitative Research:Analysis Types andSoftware Tools (New York: Falmer Press, 1990), 77-102.
60. For instance, N. Blaikie, "A Critique of the Use ofTriangulation in Social Research," Quality
and Quantity 25 (1991): 115-136.
61. Wood, 1978;· David Bordwell, "Textual Analysis Etc." Enc!itic 10, no. 5 (1981): 125-136;
Altman.
62. Janet Staiger, Interpreting Films;Janet Staiger, Perverse Spectators: The Practices ofFilm Reception
{New York: New York University Press, 2000); Barbara Klinger, "Film HistoryTerminable and
Interminable: Recovering the Past in Reception Studies," Screen 38, no. 2 (1997): 107-128;
Ernest Mathijs, "AIDS References in the Critical Reception ofDavid Cronenberg: 'It May not
274 J NOTES
Be Such a Bad Disease after All."' Cinemafournal 42, no. 4 (2003): 29-45.
63. "Content analysis is a research technique for the objective, systematic, and quantitative description
of the manifest content of communication." Bernard Berelson, Content Analysis in
Communications Research (New York: Free Press, 1952), 18.
64. See, for instance, the critical evaluation posed by Brian Winston, "On Counting the Wrong
Things," in Manuel Alvarado and John Thompson, eds., The Media Reader (London: British
Film Institute, 1990).
65. Content analysis is a technique that shows the inadequacy ofthe traditional separation between
qualitative and quantitative methods ofresearch. For a critical review ofthe definitions, see G.
Shapiro and]. Markoff, ''A Matter ofDefinition," in C. W. Roberts, ed., TextualAnalysisfar the
SocialSciences: Methodsfar Drawing StatisticalInferencesfrom Texts andTranscripts (Hillside, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum, 1997), 9-31.
66. See F. Lancia, 5-6.
67. Karl Erik Rosengren, "Time and Gulture: Developments in the Swedish Literary Frame of
Reference," and Marcus Hudec and Brigitte Lederer, ''AText Model for the Content Analysis
of Messages in the Print Media," both in Gabriele Melischek, Karl Erik Rosengren and].
Stappers, eds., Cultural Indicators: an International Symposium (Vienna: Verlag der
Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1984) 273-299.
68. Rosengren, 284.
69. Janet Wasko, "The Political Economy of Film," in Toby Miller and Robert Stam, eds., A
Companion to Film Theory (London: Blackwell, 1999), 221-233; Dallas Smythe, "The Political
Economy ofCommunication,"journalism Quarterly (August 1960): 156-171; Adam Smith,An
Inquiry into the Nature and Causes efwealth efNations (London: Everyman's Library, 1904
(1776]).
70. Commentators tend to locate its earliest appearance in E. ]. Webb, D. T. Campbell, R. D.
Schwartz, and L. Sechrest, Unobtrusive Measures: Nonreactive Measures in the Social Sciences
(Chicago: Rand McNally, 1966).
71. See his The ResearchAct, a book that has been through a number ofeditions {Chicago: Aldine,
1970, 1976, 1981, 1989, and so on), and in which the discussion oftriangulation changes over
time. Most notably it changes from being, in the earliest versions (in which he was closest to
symbolic interactionism), very clearly an additional ground of validity, to a more limited and
hermeneutic multiplicity ofpossible accounts (as Denzin moved closer to postmodernism).
Compare: "My last criterion under the category ofvalidity ... is the triangulation of methodologies"
(Denzin, 27) and "Triangulation is not a tool or strategy ofvalidation, but an alternative
to validation" (Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln. The Landscape ofQualitative
Research: Theories andIssues. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998, 2).
72. See, for instance, the discussion in Michael Qiinn Patton, Qualitative Evaluation andResearch
Methods (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1990), 467.
73. See especiallyY. S. Lincoln and E. G. Guba,Naturalisticinquiry(Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1985).
74. For a clear account of a number of these criticisms, see Alexander Massey, "Methodological
Triangulation; or: How to Get Lost without Being Found Out," in A. Massey and G. Walford,
eds., Explorations in Methodology: Studies in EducationalEthnography, vol. 2 (Stamford, CT: JAI
Press), 183-197.
75. We are ofcourse by no means alone in perceiving these problems within ways ofconceiving the
"cultural circuit." As just one example, take Ulrike Meinhof's statement ofthe problems ofthe
relations among "the triad of communication between author ... , text, and reader/recipient:"
"it is the relative privileging ofone interpretative focus over the other that influences the appreciation
or denial ofthe power ofan audience to assert his or her own readings. An emphasis on
production rarely integrates textual analysis and variant readings. A textual analysis usually relegates
the reader to that ofan implied reader, who activates textual structures that impose their
NOTES I27S
own authofity through the semiotic codes themselves.... Audience studies, on the other hand,
tend to emphasise the multiplicity of meanings that are activated by readers. Attempts to
analyse dynamic interactivity between production/author, the text, and reader/audiencethough
often asserted as desirable in theory-tend to privilege one perspective over the other'"
(Ulrike Hanna Meinhof, "Initiating a Public: Malagasy Music and Live Audiences in
Differentiated Cultural Contexts," in Livingstone, 115-116). Meinhof's solution is to find a relatively
less complicated situation of live performance (a World Music performance in which
musicians and audience directly exchange), and look at the "loops" between the three aspects
within this special situation. We believe our solution may have wider application.