Editorial : participation framework revisited : (new) media and their audiences/users

Abstract

Long before the wide-spread use of computer-mediated, electronically-based communication, Goffman (1979) pointed out that the denominations hearer and speaker are overly simplistic and not useful, based on the assumption that there are two parties only in talk, that both are fully focused on their neatly alternating roles, and that their main concern is the talk at hand. Hence, a dyadic model of communication with a speaker and a hearer has long since been replaced by such concepts as production format and participation framework with different roles which individuals may display in relation to a given utterance (Goffman 1979, Levinson 1988). Going beyond interpersonal dyadic faceto- face talk-in-interaction, the application of these notions still remains unsatisfactory. So, for instance, regarding classic mass media, there are ongoing discussions about the status of the television audience as overhearers (O’Keeffe 2006). Also, in studies on CMC (computer-mediated communication) often a rather superficial notion of multiple authorship is posited (cf. Landow 1994, Storrer 2008, Crystal 2011), even though the genuine interactivity of the web 2.0 seems to provide fruitful ground for an analysis in these terms. Because of these ongoing debates and unexplored fields, we find it timely to revisit the notion participation framework and describe how different reception roles are inscribed in different media or forms of communication, or, in other words, how different production formats allow their users and audiences to position themselves.