Too Little Heterogeneity?: Histories, Theories and Questions of Social Justice

All seven chapters included in the ‘Histories, Theories and Questions of Social Justice’ section are focused, in one way or another, on the need for greater awareness over matters of power, equity and inclusion in audience research practices. The authors in Part One argue for the unsettling of the field’s established patterns, habits and assumptions that are, upon reflection, informed by systemic racism, sexism and ableism (overt and subtle) by positing important questions about our methodological and narrative assumptions as audience researchers.

Here’s a sampling of some of those questions – many touching on notions of selfhood, identity and power – that inform the book’s chapters:  

• Ellen Dissanayake’s (Chapter 1) exploration of the role of the brain’s two hemispheres in the meaning-making operation, in which she observes that the ‘arts are mostly mediated in the right hemisphere.’ The problem, she notes, is that because the right hemisphere of our brain ‘does not “speak” or use words, Western education tends to dampen our awareness of its capacities or aptitudes, so we don’t pay attention to what it does.’
• Helen Freshwater’s (Chapter 2) application of contemporary nostalgia theory to the historian’s process, reminding us that ‘we need to stay alert to the possibility that public statements or descriptions of audiences may not always be accurate. Many historical descriptions of audiences have been revealed as exaggeration, half-truth or fabrication upon closer inspection.’ Nostalgia, she writes, is ‘now recognized as being underpinned and driven by ideological concerns, produced in part by historical moments of uncertainty and change.’
• Lynne Conner’s (Chapter 3) consideration of the ‘persistent positivism’ in quantitative research fields, including audience research. I argue that the notion that quantitative tools (numbers) are somehow objectively a-theoretical or supra-theoretical continues to guide methodologies in a wide range of disciplinary, industry and government operations that rely on statistical analysis. But as political scientist Deborah Stone states in Counting: How We Use Numbers to Decide What Matters, ‘numbers are filled with bias through and through’ (2020, Location 76).
• Laurie Hanquinet’s (Chapter 4) interest in ‘how to account for the fact that […] very personal experiences cannot be reduced to social structures, while recognizing that they are embedded in these structures.’ Hanquinet describes her process (borrowing from Bernard Lahire) for designing a museum visitor study that allowed her to ‘infer more clearly what art museum attendance represents in visitors’ everyday lives (a love of art, a quest for new experience, etc.)’ while also acknowledging that visitor tastes are ‘involved in larger power structures that need to be accounted for.’
• Jennifer Novak-Leonard’s (Chapter 5) observations on emerging data chronicling audiences’ experience of digital venues. She reports, ‘studies find that people engage most frequently with digital artistic engagements and the least frequently by attending performing arts events or visiting museums.’ These surprising data highlight the gap between the ‘relevance of these forms of engagement in people’s lives’ and the ‘level of attention that has been paid to them by large portions of the nonprofit and subsidized arts fields.’
• Glenn Odom and Giri Raghunathan’s (Chapter 6) explication of the Yorùbá notion of aṣẹ, a complex and layered term which ‘defies easy definition’ but can be understood as both a way to give authority and to exercise that authority. As they define aṣẹ, a participant must have authority in order to perform, but the ‘presence or absence of this authority is often only visible through the effects of a performance, which often depend on the audience’s reception of the potential authority.’ To have aṣẹ is to exercise aṣẹ, but aṣẹ ‘can only be validated and conferred through its own exercise. Authority requires an audience, but also requires actions on the part of the audience.’
• Doris Kolesch and Teresa Schütz’s (Chapter 7) reflections on how established terms such as ‘spectator’ and ‘audience,’ with their roots in visual and auditory perception, neglect ‘other forms of significant sensory and physical-psychological activity and multi-sensory involvement in contemporary theatre.’ They argue for the use of alternative designations rooted in the immersive theatre community (‘visitors,’ ‘co-players’ or ‘participants’) because they ‘undermine the power relations implicit in the term “spectator.”’