A Critical Forum on Media and Culture
A Critical Forum on Media and Culture
Film is the New Low, Television the New High: Some Ideas About Time and Narrative Conservatisms
by: Hector Amaya / Southwestern University
Are television viewers more receptive to aesthetic and narrative sophistication than film viewers?
The Final Frontier: Myth and Meaning in Science Fiction Television
by: Jennifer Warren / Independent Scholar, San Francisco Bay Area
What are we trying to tell ourselves about ourselves through the lens of science fiction narrative?
Editorial: “They finally killed off Kat”: Battlestar Galactica and the Limits of its Politics
by: Jean Anne Lauer / FLOW Staff
Battlestar Galactica takes on some tough issues, but the death of Kat closes off a potentially rich area for further social critique.
Television, Ecotourism, and the Videocamera: Performative Non-Fiction and Auto-Cinematography
by: Adam Fish / UCLA
In two first-person cinematographer ecotourist programs, the difficulties and joys of being a small camera crew are as important as what the cameras record.
Borat In (Next To!) The Balkans
by: Daniel Marcus / Goucher College
For those in the former Yugoslavia, Borat offers a rich field of representations to express and explore their self-definitions as emerging participants in Western culture and social practices.
Read moreThe Simultaneous Dawning and Twilight of Broadcast Network Narrative
by: Craig Jacobsen / Mesa Community College
It isn’t hard to imagine a future in which broadcasting serves the role of advertising and secondary revenue stream for the primary medium: complete seasons of episodes packed for sale on DVD or for download.
Below Average
by: Alan McKee / Queensland University of Technology
Why it’s best to stick to shows with singing, dancing, or, preferably, both.
Television Sets Grow Up
by: Ray Cha / Independent Scholar
Part two of three in a series describes a control or possibly “on demand” nature more important than a effeciently planned experience and delivery of “television.”
On Our Best Behaviour
by: Gareth Palmer / University of Salford
Television’s engagement with surveillance of all kinds is fashioning a productive shame, reproducing models of ever more restricted “outer-focused” identities.
Is There a Detective in the House?
by: Chandler Harriss / Alfred University
An examination of the use and usefulness of genre in television studies.
Micro-Ethnographies of the Screen: Sign-Off
by: Dan Leopard / St. Mary’s College of California
For his final column, Dan Leopard examines the television sign off.
Rooting for Betty
by: Mary Beltrán / University of Wisconsin-Madison
Ugly Betty: Are beauty and worthiness equated with whiteness?