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- Volume 2, Issue 2, 2014
Journal of Popular Television, The - Volume 2, Issue 2, 2014
Volume 2, Issue 2, 2014
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Tracing bloodlines: Kinship and reproduction under investigation in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
By Sofia BullAbstractThis article examines discourses on kinship and reproduction in the forensic crime drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2000–). I argue that the programme stages a visual materialization of genetic kinship in order to assert its importance as a crucial type of forensic evidence, which evokes the traditional Darwinian framework of genealogy for understanding biological kinship as a substantial and enduring trace between generations. However, I show that CSI also participates in contemporary bioethical debates about new genetic and biomedical technologies that increasingly allow us to interfere in the human reproduction process. The programme engages with an emergent post-genomic re-spatialization of genealogy and acknowledges that the concept of kinship is increasingly being redefined, but it is still heavily invested in a normative understanding of sexual reproduction as a ‘natural fact of life’ and inadvertently constructs the nuclear family structure as an ideal framework for procreation.
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Mediation in David Milch’s John from Cincinnati
More LessAbstractDavid Milch’s short-lived HBO series John from Cincinnati (2007) has an unexpected political premise that was largely ignored or misunderstood when the show aired: that the American population has been conditioned by the logic of television serials to expect closure to political events and thus will demand genocidal retribution for the next terror attack after 9/11. This article explores how Milch explains his intent with reference to the concept of mediation and compares Milch’s use of the concept to Richard Grusin’s premediation.
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Policing across borders: Line of Duty and the politics of national identity
By Stuart JoyAbstractIn this article, I argue that the first series of Line of Duty (2012–) invites viewers to consider the wider politicized function of the police as well as depictions of criminality in Britain. I describe how the series reflects a broader shift in the understanding of the British crime drama as not simply a reproduction of national concerns, but in relation to new discourses of transnational anxiety. I analyse how representations of crime and criminality are viewed through the lens of current news media trends to examine the relationship between the British crime drama and the wider socio-economic and political concerns in which articulations of both national and increasingly transnational identities can become visible.
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South Park and social research: What cartoons can tell us about sustainable mobility
More LessAbstractThis article discusses a topic that has previously been the domain of business studies: sustainable mobility and, in particular, consumer attitudes to electric vehicles. In conducting a social research study into electric vehicle drivers, I was presented with a finding that was not properly accounted for in the extant literature. At a loss, my chief reference point became a television show: South Park (1997–). This incident is used to acknowledge that academic fields such as business studies would be improved by exhibiting greater openness to other disciplines, such as cultural studies. In the spirit of breaking down this barrier, the article highlights something of the knowledge that can be gained from even the most cursory glance out at popular culture from within the closed world of business studies.
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Media logic production: How media practitioners in Italian reality television localize TV formats and select ‘entertainment values’
More LessAbstractBased within the theoretical framework of the sociology of journalism, this article presents the results of a research project on the Italian production of reality television formats. The research (based on interviews and participant observation) focuses on the particular routines and daily practices of different media workers involved in the production of four different Italian reality TV programmes (Big Brother, Farm, Music Farm and Celebrity Survivor). The article details two different stage of this process: first, when broadcasters purchase a TV format; and second, when a TV company actually produces it. Media workers have to select and create a narrative from 24 hours of shooting. In order to manage this task – i.e. the selection of material and its construction in a narrative – two main groups of figures are involved: ‘entertainment gatherers’ and ‘entertainment processors’. The article describes the routines and logics that preside over these choices. At the same time, it discusses ‘entertainment values’ which, like ‘news values’, help media workers to choose between events and material in order to compose them in a coherent narrative. The analysis discusses what kind of media logic is at the stake in the production process.
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Ambivalent anti-heroes and racist rednecks on basic cable: Post-race ideology and white masculinities on FX
More LessAbstractThis article explores the representations of white masculinities and the depiction of racism in anti-heroic narratives on the basic cable network FX in the United States. By juxtaposing the ambivalent racial sensibilities of a morally ambiguous white protagonist with the overt racism of stereotypical depictions of the white underclass, The Shield (2002–2008), Sons of Anarchy (2008–) and Justified (2010–) acknowledge the continuing existence of racial prejudice in American society while also supporting the dominant colour blind rhetoric that denies the continuing impact of structural racism. Although some scholars interpret the popularity of hyper-masculine anti-hero shows that speak to the notion of ‘masculinity-in-crisis’ as indicative of the declining benefits associated with white, male privilege, this analysis uses G. Harris’ notion of ‘postmasculinist television drama’ to argue that the consistent deployment of white masculinities in these FX programmes reinforce the post-race ideology associated with hegemonic whiteness by ‘othering’ problematic racial attitudes yet still allow white audiences to take ‘ironic’ pleasure from expressions of overt racism.
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Book Reviews
Authors: Bronwen Calvert, Mark Richard Adams, Jamie Medhurst and Ken DvorakAbstractJoss Whedon: A Creative Portrait, David Lavery (2013) London: I. B. Tauris, 272 pp., ISBN: 9781848850309, p/bk, £10.99.
Doctor Who: The Eleventh Hour – A Critical Celebration of the Matt Smith and Steven Moffat Era, Andrew O’Day (ed.) (2013) London: I. B. Taurus, 288 pp. ISBN: 9781780760193, p/bk, £12.99
Transnational Television History: A Comparative Approach, Andreas Fickers and Catherine Johnson (Eds) (2012) London: Routledge, 176 pp., ISBN: 0145698603, h/bk, £85.00
Transnational Television Drama: Special Relations and Mutual Influence between the US and the UK, Elke Weissmann (2012) Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 240 pp., ISBN: 0230297753, h/bk, £50.00
The Triumph of Reality TV: The Revolution in American Television, Leigh H. Edwards (2013) California: Praeger, pp.199., ISBN: 9780313399015, h/bk, $37.00
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Review Essay
More LessAbstractThe television that dripped blood
True Blood: Investigating Vampires and Southern Gothic, Brigid Cherry (ed.) (2012) London: I. B. Tauris, 213 pp., ISBN: 9781848859401, p/bk, £12.99
TV Horror: Investigating the Dark Side of the Small Screen, Lorna Jowett and Stacey Abbott (2013) London: I. B. Tauris, 270 pp., ISBN: 9781848856189, p/bk, £14.99
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Symposium Report
By Beth JohnsonAbstractTV is the New Cinema: Exploring the Erosion of Boundaries between two Media, Liverpool John Moores University, 22 May 2014
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