Audience studies

As a theoretical discipline, audience theory emerged from literary theory, cultural studies, media studies, and government/industry propaganda. Audience theory was initially viewed (in the early 20th century) as the theory of how the government and the film industry could shape their message and pitch their products. Over the course of the 20th century the participatory aspects of the audience -- its choice of works, critical interpretation of the works, and so on -- assumed greater priority in the theory.

Audience theory is today principally concerned with two questions:

• It also considers the role of the audience in the creation of the work; how the creator/author imagines or addresses the audience or intends to address the audience. Here, it considers questions of propaganda, manipulation of the media, and so on.
• Audience theory considers the role of the audience in the conumption of the work: the ways that the audience interacts with and shapes the work, breaking down the distinctions between "author" and "reader". In a sense it reflects the philosophical conundrum, If a tree falls in the woods and no one hears it, does it make a sound? or the quantum mechanical insight captured in Schrödinger's cat: the cat exists in neither state until its state is observed. Here, the theory considers questions of critical thinking and media literacy.

Fan Studies incorporate insights of audience theory.