“Audience
“Audience Phantasm” for Media from Viewpoints of Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) Authorities’
Amir Abdolreza Sepanji
Assistant Professor of Communication and Media Studies
Abstract: Analyzing the image of audiences presented by IRI’s authorities including: policy makers, powerful official, religious leaders, and media officials and comparing it with theories have brought up by experts in the field of communication may consider media activities from all angles in Iran. Accordingly, as the abovementioned authorities' viewpoint of audiences exposed to media messages keeps distance from the true nature of media activities, media-message receivers and their current position in the booming market of media, as termed by Mohsenyan-e Rad as “Message Bazaar”, there will possibly be disastrous social, cultural, political, and even economic consequences with regard to media uses. So, the present article aims at the viewpoint by IRI (Islamic Republic of Iran)’s authorities concerning the characteristics and general nature of audiences and terms it as “Audience Phantasm”. It firstly notes that there will be consequences such as audience distancing themselves from local and official media in this country, if policy makers and media officials' imaginations of audiences become far from related bare facts have happened in the era of global media and the nature of audiences. After that, the article reviews the history and definition for the term “Audience”, and introduces the “Uses and Gratifications Theory “and “Audience Phantasm” phenomena as theoretical-research principles based on which it presents the characteristics of audiences. This article expresses the IRI’s authoritative audience phantasm with regard to audiences: that based on the available analyzed data, IRI’s authorities categorize audiences as passive and impressionable individuals, who have sat in front of "Menbar" and the tribune of oration or speech, they need protection from powerful media contents. The article, presents “Deep-Content Analysis”, a mixed research method, as its research method. It consecutively offers main results within a qualitative and quantitative analytical framework of the statements drown out of the IRI’s authoritative viewpoints. Note: "Audience phantasm" is a phenomenon have seen in the Islamic countries, like Iran, and because of it the authorities and governors seeing the audiences like who have sat in front of "Menbar" (the medium that uses in the Moslem mosques and Islamic ceremonies) and the tribune of oration or speech.
[Amir Abdolreza Sepanji. “Audience Phantasm” for Media from Viewpoints of Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) Authorities’ . Life Sci J 2013;10(4s):359-370] (ISSN:1097-8135). http://www.lifesciencesite.com. 55
Keywords: audience phantasm, uses and gratifications theory, audience, user, Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), qualitative analysis, deep-content analysis.
