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330 Perry Hinton

encoding of the programme) or in oppositional terms. In his work on the audi-
ence of the British early evening current affairs programme, Nationwide, Mor-
ley (1980) identified the different readings of different groups, such as trade
unionists or students, of the programme. He showed the audience members were
not necessarily accepting the dominant ideology of the programme in their re-
ception of it (Morley 1993).
This led to the audience being seen as an ‘active audience’, making their
own meaning from the programme (Livingstone 1990). In her own work on the
British soap opera Coronation Street, Livingstone (1989) showed that the expla-
nations for events, such as a potential adulterous affair, proposed in the pro-
gramme through the script were not necessarily the ones chosen by audience
members. Indeed, the audience offered explanations (such as ‘being carried
away with their feelings’) that were not presented in the programme itself. Thus,
if a programme is shown in a different culture we may have a different interpre-
tation to that of the home audience.
This was supported by Liebes and Katz (1990) in their analysis of the hugely
popular US soap opera Dallas (concerning a rich oil-owning family) with dif-
ferent cultural groups. The studies involved focus groups of three couples who
watched an episode of the programme followed by a discussion with the re-
searchers. Fifty-five groups were tested, with around ten groups from each of
different cultures within Israel (Israeli kibbutz members, Israeli Arabs, Jewish
immigrants from Morocco and recent Jewish immigrants from Russia) as well
as groups from Los Angeles in the United States. Katz and Liebes (1985) noted
a range of differences and similarities in the interpretation by the different
groups. A common point throughout was that the rich were unhappy. The re-
searchers found that, in the discussions, the groups made sense of the different
issues raised through their own cultural backgrounds. For example, the Russian
viewers were more likely to cite the social roles (such as ‘businessman’) in their
discussions of motivation within the programme whereas the Americans and
kibbutz members tended to employ psychological explanations (Katz and
Liebes 1986). Also, the Arabs saw immorality in the programme whereas the
Russians focused on capitalism as the corrupting factor (Liebes and Katz 1989).
The groups also differed in the way they discussed the programme: ‘critically’,
in terms of the structure and conventions of the programme and ‘referentially’,
in terms of their own experiences.
Interestingly, one country where Dallas was not popular was Japan, where it
was only shown for six months before being cancelled. Employing the same
methodology as earlier, Katz, Liebes and Iwao (1991) examined Japanese
viewers’ discussions of the programme. Here eleven focus groups were em-
ployed. The authors argued that the Japanese groups were very critical of the
programme due to its ‘inconsistency’ or ‘incompatibility’ both in the story and
the characters (Katz, Liebes and Iwao 1991: 102). They were the most critically