Synopses & Reviews
Survivor.
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.
Review
"Since 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 and New Media
Review
“
Reality TV manages to cover a range of ideas and concepts about the genre . . . All watchers of reality TVeven those ashamed to admit itwould benefit from reading this text, if only to shake some of the preconceived ideas about the influence of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's
The Simple Life”
- M/C Reviews
Review
"The 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 Today
Review
"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."
"Since 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."
"The 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."
“Reality TV manages to cover a range of ideas and concepts about the genre . . . All watchers of reality TV—even those ashamed to admit it—would benefit from reading this text, if only to shake some of the preconceived ideas about the influence of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's The Simple Life”
Review
“Reads like a novel with a detailed cast of characters! With stripper poles an increasingly ubiquitous fixture in the media, there remains surprisingly little scholarship written about the day-to-day lives of people working in strip bars. Price‒Glynn reveals the grit beneath the pop‒video clichè in Strip Club, offering the reader an insiders gaze on the employees of the Lions Den. Strip Club exposes a taken for granted sexism we need to be reminded of in our Girls Gone Wild culture.”
-Bernadette Barton,author of Stripped: Inside the Lives of Exotic Dancers
Review
“The second I entered The Lions Den, passing the doorman through darkened hallways toward a parquet dancing stage, Price‒Glynns rich description brought me into the dilapidated and ironically profitable (for some) world of the strip club. Her deeply affecting observations make us keenly aware of the social practices that perpetuate gross inequalities. Her ethnography is both brutally honest, and sociologically sophisticated in its examination of both the fragility and tenacity of social rankings based on gender, sex, and social class.”
-Lisa Jean Moore,co‒editor of The Body Reader:Essential Social and Cultural Readings
Review
"Price-Glynn contrasts the aspirations of the strippers with the club's design, rules, expectations, and practices, all of which served to exploit their labor. She argues that without listening to sex workers and addressing their abuse and lack of power, feminists will never take the real battle- the one against structural oppression- to the ring."-Ms. Magazine,
Review
-J.R. Mitrano,Choice Magazine
Review
"Price-Glynn has a real knack for what anthropologists and sociologists call 'thick description,' thereby ably transporting readers into the setting of this particular sexual subculture."-CHOICE,
Synopsis
A collection of essays that parse out the seemingly unprecedented rise of reality television
Survivor. 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.
Synopsis
Survivor.
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.
Synopsis
In
Strip Club, Kim Price‒Glynn takes us behind the scenes at a rundown club where women strip out of economic need, a place where strippers stories are not glamorous or liberating, but emotionally demanding and physically exhausting.
Strip Club reveals the intimate working lives of not just the women up on stage, but also the patrons and other workers who make the place run: the owner‒manager, bartenders, dejays, doormen, bouncers, housemoms, and cocktail waitresses.
Price‒Glynn spent fourteen months at The Lions Den working as a cocktail waitress, and her uncommonly deep access reveals a conflict‒ridden workplace, similar to any other workplace, one where gender inequalities are reproduced through the everyday interactions of customers and workers. Taking a novel approach to this controversial and often misunderstood industry, Price‒Glynn draws a fascinating portrait of life and work inside the strip club.
About the Author
Susan Murray is Associate Professor of Media, Culture and Communication at New York University. She is the author of
Hitch Your Antenna to the Stars: Early Television and Broadcast Stardom.
Laurie Ouellette is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin-Cities. She is author (with James Hay) of Better Living through Reality TV and of Viewers Like You? How Public TV Failed the People.