Explorations in New Cinema History presents an original approach to writing and understanding the social and cultural history of cinema, focusing on cinema's audiences, the commercial activities of film exhibition and distribution, and the cinema as a site of social and cultural exchange.

If cinema history is to engage with broader social histories, this pioneering collection argues, it must concern itself not with the production of individual films, but with audiences, cinemagoing, and the role that cinema plays in culture at large. Bringing together a collection of essays written by scholars working on the leading edge of the field, this volume prompts us to question and revise our understanding of key periods of cinema history, and opens up cinema studies to long-overdue conversations with other disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.

Contributors describe the very different forms of cinema and the experiences they offer their audiences, from the luxurious first-run movie palaces and downmarket "grind houses" of the major metropolitan centres to the altogether different theatres in small-town and remote rural communities. Their essays employ empirical research methods such as the use of geographical information systems to provide illuminating insights into the uses of cinema, making this an engaging read for all students of film history and cinema studies.

Notes on Contributors.

Acknowledgements.

Part 1 Mapping Cinema Experiences.

1 New Cinema Histories (Richard Maltby).

2 Reimagining the History of the Experience of Cinema in a Post-Moviegoing Age (Robert C. Allen).

3 Putting Cinema History on the Map: Using GIS to Explore the Spatiality of Cinema (Jeffrey Klenotic).

4 What to do with Cinema Memory? (Annette Kuhn).

Part 2 Distribution, Programming and Audiences.

5 Social Class, Experiences of Distinction and Cinema in Postwar Ghent (Daniel Biltereyst, Philippe Meers and Lies Van de Vijver).

6 Distribution and Exhibition in The Netherlands, 1934-1936 (Clara Pafort-Overduin).

7 Patterns in First-Run and Suburban Filmgoing in Sydney in the mid-1930s (John Sedgwick).

8 From Hollywood to the Garden Suburb (and Back to Hollywood): Exhibition and Distribution in Australia (Mike Walsh).

9 Hollywood and its Global Audiences: A Comparative Study of the Biggest Box Office Hits in the United States and Outside the United States Since the 1970s (Peter Krämer).

10 Blindsiding: Theatre Owners, Political Action and Industrial Change in Hollywood, 1975-1985 (Deron Overpeck).

Part 3 Venues and their Publics.

11 'No Hits, No Runs, Just Terrors': Exhibition, Cultural Distinctions and Cult Audiences at the Rialto Cinema in the 1930s and 1940s (Tim Snelson and Mark Jancovich).

12 Going Underground with Manny Farber and Jonas Mekas: New York's Subterranean Film Culture in the 1950s and 1960s (Peter Stanfield).

13 Searching for the Apollo: Black Moviegoing and its Contexts in the Small-Town US South (Arthur Knight).

14 Film Distribution in the Diaspora: Temporality, Community and National Cinema (Deb Verhoeven).

Part 4 Cinema, Modernity and the Local.

15 The Social Biograph: Newspapers as Archives of the Regional Mass Market for Movies (Paul S. Moore).

16 Modernity for Small Town Tastes: Movies at the 1907 Cooperstown, New York, Centennial (Kathryn Fuller-Seeley).

17 Silent Film Genre, Exhibition and Audiences in South India (Stephen Putnam Hughes).

18 The Last Bemboka Picture Show: 16 mm Cinema as Rural Community Fundraiser in the 1950s (Kate Bowles).

Index.

Richard Maltby is Professor of Screen Studies and Executive Dean of the Faculty of Education, Humanities and Law at Flinders University, South Australia. He has written and edited several books and articles on cinema history, including Hollywood Cinema (Blackwell, 2003).

Daniel Biltereyst is Professor in Film and Media Studies at Ghent University, Belgium, and has written widely on the subject of film culture and controversy in the public sphere.

Philippe Meers is Associate Professor in Film and Media Studies at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He has published variedly on historical and contemporary cinema culture and audiences.