Reality TV : Remaking Television Culture

by Murray, Susan; Ouellette, Laurie

• ISBN13: 9780814756881
• ISBN10: 0814756883
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-04-01
• Publisher: New York University Press

Summary

View the Table of Contents. Read the Introduction.Offers the most insightful and significant scholarly analysis to date of the changes taking place in the economic globalization of television production. A delight to read, laced with wit and humor.--ChoiceSince reality television began to flood TV screens, we've had to deal with another phenomenon: a renewed debate about what is 'fun' versus what is 'good for you.' The essays in this volume enlighten that discussion and take us beyond it. They provide both the record of a strange moment in history and a contribution to contemporary cultural politics.--Toby Miller, editor of Television & New MediaThe book explores the genre's institutional and sociopolitical development, its place in the cultural landscape, and how it serves as a source of meaning and pleasure.--NYU TodaySurvivor. The Bachelor. Extreme Makeover. Big Brother. Joe Millionaire. American Idol. The Osbournes. It is virtually impossible to turn on a television without coming across some sort of reality programming. Yet, while this genre has rapidly moved from the fringes of television culture to its lucrative core, critical attention has not kept pace. Beginning by unearthing its historical roots in early reality shows like Candid Camera and wending its way through An American Family, Cops, and The Real World to the most recent crop of reality programs, Reality TV is the first book to address the economic, visual, cultural, and audience dimensions of reality television. The essays provide a complex and comprehensive picture of how and why this genre emerged, what it means, how it differs from earlier television programming, and how it engages societies, industries, and individuals. Topics range from the construction of televisual reality to the changing face of criminal violence on TV, to issues of surveillance, taste, and social control.By spanning reality television's origins in the late 1940s to its current overwhelming popularity, Reality TV demonstrates both the tenacity of the format and its enduring ability to speak to our changing political and social desires and anxieties.Contributors include: Nick Couldry, Mary Beth Haralovich, John Hartley, Chuck Kleinhans, Derek Kompare, Jon Kraszewski, Kathleen LeBesco, Justin Lewis, Ted Magder, Jennifer Maher, Anna McCarthy, Rick Morris, Chad Raphael, Elayne Rapping, Jeffrey Sconce, Michael W. Trosset, Pamela Wilson.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction	1	(18)
Laurie Ouellette and Susan Murray
I Genre
1 "Stanley Milgram, Allen Funt, and Me": Postwar Social Science and the "First Wave" of Reality TV	19	(21)
Anna McCarthy
2 "I Think We Need a New Name for It": The Meeting of Documentary and Reality TV	40	(17)
Susan Murray
3 Teaching Us to Fake It: The Ritualized Norms of Television's "Reality" Games	57	(18)
Nick Couldry
4 "Expect the Unexpected": Narrative Pleasure and Uncertainty due to Chance in Survivor	75	(22)
Mary Beth Haralovich and Michael W. Trosset
5 Extraordinarily Ordinary: The Osbournes as An American Family"	97	(22)
Derek Kompare
II Industry
6 The Political Economic Origins of Reali-TV	119	(18)
Chad Raphael
7 The End of TV 101: Reality Programs, Formats, and the New Business of Television	137	(20)
Ted Magder
8 Court TV: The Evolution of a Reality Format	157	(22)
Chuck Kleinhans and Rick Morris
III Cultural Politics
9 Country Hicks and Urban Cliques: Mediating Race, Reality, and Liberalism on MTV's The Real World	179	(18)
Jon Kraszewski
10 What Do Women Watch? Tuning In to the Compulsory Heterosexuality Channel	197	(17)
Jennifer Maher
11 Aliens, Nomads, Mad Dogs, and Road Warriors: The Changing Face of Criminal Violence on TV	214	(17)
Elayne Rapping
12 "Take Responsibility for Yourself": Judge Judy and the Neoliberal Citizen	231	(20)
Laurie Ouellette
13 See You In Hell, Johnny Bravo!	251	(20)
Jeffrey Sconce
IV Reception
14 Got to Be Real: Mediating Gayness on Survivor	271	(17)
Kathleen LeBesco
15 The Meaning of Real Life	288	(15)
Justin Lewis
16 "Kiss Me Kat": Shakespeare, Big Brother, and the Taming of the Self	303	(20)
John Hartley
17 Jamming Big Brother: Webcasting, Audience Intervention, and Narrative Activism	323	(22)
Pamela Wilson
About the Contributors	345	(4)
Index	349