Victoria K. Gosling

The Myth of the ‘Puck Bunny’ Female Fans and Men’s Ice Hockey

This article presents a consideration of the female followers of men’s ice hockey in the UK, questions why this sport has been so popular in attracting a high proportion of female supporters and considers their place and location within this supporter base. In particular, the article argues that the perceived safety and accessibility of ice hockey has proved important in attracting many female supporters. However, this research argues that female followers of UK ice hockey continue to remain marginalized within this supporter community, and are deemed by many other (often male) supporters as not ‘real fans’ but simply ‘puck bunnies’ who are there to ‘lust’ after the players. These assertions, we suggest, originate in male supporters’ fears of losing their male-dominated domain and in insecurities concerning their own adulation of male sports stars. However, interviews with 37 followers of The Manchester Storm indicate no significant differences in the levels of knowledge and commitment between male and female supporters, or that the physical attractiveness of players performs any significant role in attracting women to ice hockey.

Game Scenes: Theorizing Digital Game Audiences

This article develops and expands on earlier work of the authors, which posits the idea of considering gamers as a (media) audience—enabling parallels to be drawn with wider literatures and debates on audience research and media fan cultures. In particular, drawing on some illustrative examples from qualitative research (funded by the British Academy) into the everyday lives of gamers, this article suggests that the concept of ‘‘scene’’ (borrowed most notably from music fan studies) allows us to understand how gaming and game-related narratives are located within the ordinary and everyday lives of gamers but take on greater significance within certain physical locations.

Is there an app for that? A case study of the potentials and limitations of the participatory turn and networked publics for classical music audience engagement

The participatory turn, fuelled by discourses and rhetoric regarding social media, and in the aftermath of the dot.com crash of the early 2000s, enrols to some extent an idea of being able to deploy networks to achieve institutional aims. The arts and cultural sector in the UK, in the face of funding cuts, has been keen to engage with such ideas in order to demonstrate value for money; by improving the efficiency of their operations, improving their respective audience experience and ultimately increasing audience size and engagement. Drawing on a case study compiled via a collaborative research project with a UK-based symphony orchestra (UKSO) we interrogate the potentials of social media engagement for audience development work through participatory media and networked publics. We argue that the literature related to mobile phones and applications (‘apps’) has focused primarily on marketing for engagement where institutional contexts are concerned. In contrast, our analysis elucidates the broader potentials and limitations of social-media-enabled apps for audience development and engagement beyond a marketing paradigm. In the case of UKSO, it appears that the technologically deterministic discourses often associated with institutional enrolment of participatory media and networked publics may not necessarily apply due to classical music culture. More generally, this work raises the contradictory nature of networked publics and argues for increased critical engagement with the concept.

'I've always managed, that's what we do': Social capital and women's experiences of social exclusion

It is evident that the concept of ‘social capital’ has recently come to the forefront of many governmental strategies aimed at combating social exclusion. In particular the interpretation of social capital used by many authors and agencies is one that emphasises the importance of not only social networks and contacts, but also a social responsibility to ones local community and wider society. Most notably it is poor people and poorer neighbourhoods that are seen to be lacking in these forms of social capital, and therefore emphasis is placed upon individual and community responsibility for tackling their own (and others) exclusion. Drawing on in-depth interviews with women living on a deprived inner-city housing estate in the north of England, this research considers existing practices, forms and gendered nature of social capital for these women. The paper concludes that contrary to popular beliefs, many of these women already possessed forms of social capital, and specifically, that this was beneficial in helping them cope and ‘get by’ within their everyday experiences of social exclusion. This research highlights the potential exclusionary nature of social capital for certain individuals and the limitations of social capital in helping excluded women to escape their poverty.

The material role of digital media in connecting with, within and beyond museums

The connective potentials of digital media have been positioned as a key part of a contemporary museum visitor experience. Using a sociology of translation, we construct a network of visitor experiences using data from a digital media engagement project at a large and multi-sited museum in the United Kingdom. These experiences relate to (dis)connections with the museum, museum objects and other visitors. Through this analysis, we disclose the often contradictory roles of the non-human, including and going beyond the digital, as contributors to the success and failure of attempts to change museum visitor experiences through engagement activities rooted in narratives of participation and connectivity.

Branded app implementation at the London Symphony Orchestra

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to consider the key findings of a yearlong collaborative research project focusing on the London Symphony Orchestra’s development, implementation and testing of a branded smartphone app. This app was designed to primarily sell discounted tickets, engage and inform a student audience. Design/methodology/approach – A mixed-method approach including an analysis of the technology, focus groups and interviews was used. Findings – Though the aims of app developers and marketers are often to provide customers with more choice and interactivity, this research suggests that though the app proved a useful mechanism for selling discounted tickets, it indicates that existing customers were mostly enroled and mobilised via a limited and focused functionality for the app. Originality/value – This paper is significant as mobile phone use remains comparatively under-researched, in particular there is still a relatively small literature on the growing phenomena of apps, and even less...