ECREA16-Abstract

Friday, November 11

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History on TV: Historical TV Series and Their Audiences in Turkey

B. Ozcetin

Akdeniz University, Communication, Antalya, Turkey

This paper will analyze how popular cultural forms play a role in forging of political and cultural identities in Turkey, through focusing on a specific histor‑

ical TV series and its audience: Diriliş: Ertuğrul (Resurrection: Ertuğrul) which narrates the pre-foundation of the Ottoman Empire, the story of the father

of founder of the Ottoman state. The presentation will utilize the insights provided by media anthropology (Ginsburg, Abu-Lughod, Larkin, Mankekar) and

digital anthropology (Miller, Horst, Baym), and try to go beyond reception problematic through exploring adaptation of popular forms in everyday life with

“TV Talk”(Gillespie), and strategies of identity formation (Hall, Jenkins). In the last decade, TV series has been single televisual form that dominated Turkish

television. Every season 60 different serials are on air from comedy to action, and romance to family. Recently, a specific and controversial formhas emerged:

historical TV series. First generation of these dramas focused on historical events of the recent past. However, following the incredible success of Muhteşem

Yüzyıl (Magnificent Century) which focuses on the golden age of the Ottoman Empire and harem life during Suleiman the Magnificent's reign, several

historical dramas focusing on Ottoman and pre-Ottoman past of Turkish-Islamic community were produced. As it is well known, history is never ‘history’,

but has contemporary relevance. It is more about contemporary relations and structures of power and domination; and about making of political identities.

This is why historical dramas have been center of attention and matter of controversy for politicians, intellectuals and ordinary citizens alike. While some,

like Muhteşem Yüzyıl, are criticized for misrepresenting history and insulting historical figures; some others, like Diriliş: Ertuğrul, are openly supported by

the government and religious-conservative and nationalist constituency. As a part of a wider project on religious-conservative audience in Turkey, this pre‑

sentation will focus on some of the countless public spheres of deliberation and contestation opened up by Diriliş: Ertuğrul; and on“TV Talk”and its place in

forging of political identities. In addition to in depth interviews, focus groups with program viewers; the presentation will also rely on digital ethnography

of online communities constructed in Facebook, Twitter and fan-blogs. The analysis will situate fan experience within social relations and networks. These

networked spaces are places where“competing interpretations and evaluations of common texts are proposed, debated, and negotiated and where readers

speculate about the nature of the mass media and their own relationship to them”(Jenkins, Textual Poachers, p. 86). The paper will argue that audience is

not a ‘thing’or a self-apparent reality as such, but a social relation and experience, whose trails could be followed in such instances of negotiation, deliber‑

ation, and adaptation; a social relation which is deeply intertwined with identity making processes of viewers. Keywords: audience, media anthropology,

fandom, digital ethnography, religion, nationalism

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Alternative Spectatorship Experiences for Turkish Independent Cinema

G. Parlayandemir

Istanbul University, Radio-Television Cinema, Istanbul, Turkey

This study focuses on the cinema spectatorship for Turkish Independent Cinema in public and private spaces by taking three main facts about the current

situation into account. The first of them is the decreasing number of independent cinema halls which show independent movies. The second fact is the in‑

creasing film production with lower film budgets and with the public foundation provided by Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The third fact is the online

– and often free – spectatorship. The study aims to discuss the threats and opportunities that are enabled for independent cinema by newmedia and other

alternative spectatorship experiences. It tries to find out the differences on cognitive processes between watching movies with others and alone; watching

on cinema halls’screens and on mobile phones’screens; watching movies while spectators are able to change the screening conditions and watching movies

while they are not. It also asks the motivation of being freeloader for preferring watching online and underlines the unsustainability of film production as

long as the box office values and subvention for screening stay so low. The study is based on a previous audience research executed in 2015 that discusses

the alternative spectatorship experiences for the Turkish Independent Cinema. In the first chapter of the aforesaid study, the researches and theories about

cinema spectatorship; and spectatorship in public, private, and heterotopic spaces are mentioned. In the second chapter, the Turkish Independent Cinema

and the relationship of this cinema with its spectator are discussed. By taking into consideration the historical and theoretical information, which are

discussed in the first two chapters, four conditions for alternative spectatorship experiences are designed. The results of spectatorship interviews in four

conditions are used both for discussion and for designing a survey. The effects of condition on the cognitive process are investigated with that survey, too.

The current study summarizes the mentioned research. Therefore the data and opinions that are created in the aforesaid research, are compared to the cur‑

rent situation for Turkish cinema in 2016 by taking into account the idea due to the new media and cinema change rapidly, the issues that belong to that

topics which are expected to change. For the comparison part quantitative and qualitative methods are used.

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Keep Posted: Types of Audience Participation in New Mass Media Communication

I. Privalova

Saratov State Medical University, Department of Russian as a Foreign Language, Saratov, Russia

The given approach to understanding the peculiarities of audience participation in mediated communication employs as a theoretical underpinning “…

the perspective on the technology-media relationship focusing on the socio-cultural shaping” (Preston, 2009, p. 114) building on the theories of J. Carey

(2005, 2007), and R. Williams (1974). Not diminishing the importance of the influence of technologies on the process of communication, it is really hard

to debate that the new mass media have cultural peculiarities and national colorings. The analysis of audience participation practices used in new mass

media demonstrates that no“unified”mediated communication model is in operation across all countries of the world. In reality, successful mediated com‑

munication processes always evolve through interaction with local or national values and practices (Lwin, Stanaland & Williams, 2010). This presentation

discusses two major types of the Internet mediated communication, which can be observed in audience participation practices through new mass media