A Companion to Television

by Wasko, Janet

• ISBN13: 9781405198776
• ISBN10: 140519877X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-12-21
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Summary

A Companion to Television is a magisterial collection of 31 original essays that charter the field of television studies over the past century Explores a diverse range of topics and theories that have led to television's current incarnation, and predict its likely future Covers technology and aesthetics, television's relationship to the state, televisual commerce; texts, representation, genre, internationalism, and audience reception and effects Essays are by an international group of first-rate scholarsFor information, news, and content from Blackwell's reference publishing program please visit www.blackwellpublishing.com/reference/

Author Biography

Janet Wasko is Professor in the School of Communication and Journalism at the University of Oregon. Her many books include Hollywood in the Information Age: Beyond the Silver Screen (1994), Consuming Audiences? Production and Reception in Media Research (1999), Understanding Disney: The Manufacture of Fantasy (2001), and How Hollywood Works (2003).

Table of Contents

List of Figures

Notes on Contributors

Introduction

Theoretical Overviews

The Development of Television Studies

Critical Perspectives on Television from the Frankfurt School to Postmodernism

Television/History

Television and History

Our TV Heritage: Television, the Archive, and the Reasons for Preservation

Television/Aesthetics and Production

Television as a Moving Aesthetic: In Search of the Ultimate Aesthetic The Self

Locating the Televisual in Golden Age Television

Television Production: Who Makes American TV

Television/The State and Policy

Who Rules TV? States, Markets, and the Public Interest

Public Broadcasting and Democratic Culture: Consumers, Citizens, and Communards

Culture, Services, Knowledge: Television between Policy Regimes

Television/Commerce

Television Advertising as Textual and Economic Systems

Watching Television: A Political Economic Approach

Keeping "Abreast" of MTV and Viacom: The Growing Power of a Media Conglomerate

The Trade in Television News

Configurations of the New Television Landscape

The Study of Soap Opera

The Shifting Terrain of American Talk Shows

Television and Sports

"Where the Past Comes Alive": Television, History, and Collective Memory

"How Will You Make it on Your Own?": Television and Feminism Since 1970

Television and Race

Television/The Public and Audiences

Television, Public Spheres, and Civic Cultures

Television and Public Opinion

Reality TV: Performance, Authenticity, and Television Audiences

A Special Audience? Children and Television

Television/Alternative Challenges

Local Community Channels: Alternatives to Corporate Media Dominance

International Television/Case Studies

Latin American Commercial Television: "Primitive Capitalism"

Television in China: History, Political Economy, and Ideology

Japanese Television: Early Development and Research

Change and Transformation in South African Television

Television in the Arab East

Index

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