The Republic of Tyra
by: Anna McCarthy / New York University
Who would you rather run the country — Tyra or Simon?
Tag: Reality TV
Elevating Servants, Elevating American Families
by: L.S. Kim / University of California, Santa Cruz
The figure of the domestic servant and the television, come together to teach Americans parenting skills.
Nanny TV
by: Laurie Ouellette / Queens College
Are your kids a handful? Are you exhausted? Is your house a “zoo?” Do you need help juggling the demands of work and family? Me too.
I’m A Celebrity – Analyse Me: The Appeal of Celebrity Reality TV
by: Kirsty Fairclough / University of Salford, UK
What celebrity reality TV offers as opposed to its celebrity-constructing counterpart is not the transformation of the “ordinary” person into the “extraordinary,” but the opposite trajectory.
Belaboring Reality
by: Heather Hendershot / Queens College CUNY
In season one of The Simple Life, the apparently soulless Nicole Ritchie and Paris Hilton spend a month in rural Arkansas disappointing the Ledings, the humble, hard-working farm family that has agreed to take them in.
The Credibility of Reality TV and Its Lineage with other Photographic Arts
by: Mary Beth Haralovich / University of Arizona
Recently, I was asked to comment on the credibility of reality television as compared to the credibility of street photography by artists like Diane Arbus, Robert Frank and Cindy Sherman.
P.S. An Idol’s Pace
by: Mimi White / Northwestern University
This column is something of a postscript to the last one I wrote, concerning the differential paces of television.
Overhaulin’ TV and Government (Thoughts on the Political Campaign to Pimp Your Ride)
by: James Hay / University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign
These days, the expression “overhauling” is in the air (and “on the air.”)
Transform Me, Please…
by: Tara McPherson / University of Southern California
I have to confess that the chance to ‘look ten years younger’ in ten days has its appeal.
Domestic Reality TV
by: Allison McCracken / DePaul University
I have finally found a reality program that I can watch without cringing with embarrassment for the participants and/or becoming enraged at the producers. Not surprisingly, it’s trailing in the ratings and on the brink of cancellation.
Black Zen Masters in the Dojo of Reality Television
by: L.S.Kim / University of California, Santa Cruz
Typically in reality television, the host is white – famous examples include Jeff Probst in Survivor, Ryan Seacrest in American Idol, and Regis Philbin in Who Wants to be a Millionaire? whose through-the-roof ratings jump-started the reality programming watershed. But in America’s Next Top Model, The Road to Stardom, and Pimp My Ride, the hosts are African American and already stars.
The Boob Tube
by: Heather Hendershot / Queens College CUNY
“It’s like Jell-O on springs!” Jack Lemmon declares as he ogles Marilyn Monroe’s fleshy derriere in Some Like It Hot (1959). Lemmon himself is in drag, and watching this film recently for the umpteenth time, I am struck again by its strange combination of heterosexual prurience and queer exuberance. I am also struck by Monroe’s plumpness.