Book Description

In the mid-1980s, Neil Postman claimed that television made entertainment the natural format for the representation of all experience. While Postman’s argument still is pertinent to a description of contemporary television shows, it also seems increasingly more accurate to argue that “reality-based” entertainment is quickly becoming the referential format for televisual representations of our experience in the 21st century. Chapters in this edited volume explore reality television’s place within contemporary media landscape in terms of its potential for political engagement. The authors engage with a variety of issues such as politics of authenticity and performance, audience reception of political issues, ethics and media regulation, politics of self-presentation, modernity, and collective identity. The diversity of perspectives and issues presented in this book cautions readers both against quickly dismissing reality television’s potential as a platform for political discourse and against subscribing to the celebratory rhetoric regarding the democratic potential of reality television. Reel Politics: Reality Television as a Platform for Political Discourse furthers our understanding of the semiotic openness of the reality text and the variations in social, cultural and political contexts across which the reality television genre formulas migrate.