Date of Award
8-3-2006
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Communication
First Advisor
Ted Friedman - Chair
Second Advisor
Angelo Restivo
Third Advisor
Kathy Fuller-Seeley
Abstract
This analysis of the professional wrestling genre attempts to understand the complex reading practices employed by wrestling’s fan community. I argue that wrestling fans consume these texts in the context of both the official narratives of media producers and the meta-narratives that exist independently of the official texts. In addition, I argue that wrestling fans display characteristics normally reserved for traditional media producers, collaborating with those producers over the direction of the official narratives. This process of collaboration is indicative of the blurring of the boundaries between textual producers and consumers and necessitates a theoretical conception of the audience that accounts for these unique fan practices. I have called this audience conception the productive audience model.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.57709/1061281
Recommended Citation
Toepfer, Shane, "A Community of Smarks: Professional Wrestling and the Changing Relationship between Textual Producers and Consumers." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2006.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/1061281