Critical Approaches to Television

I. Theoretical and Critical Foundations

1. The Context for Criticism: Television and Society

2. Foundations of Television Criticism

3. Critical Approaches to Television Discourse: An Overview

4. Writing Television Criticism

II. Text-Centered Critical Approaches

5. Semiotic/Structural Criticism

A Sample Study: John Fiske's "Popularity and Ideology: A Structuralist Reading of Dr. Who"

6. Genre Criticism

A Sample Study: Matthew P. McAllister's "Recombinant Television Genres and Doogie Howser, M.D."

7. Rhetorical Criticism

Two Sample Studies: Bonnie Dow's "Murphy Brown: Postfeminism Personified"; Sarah R. Stein's, "The 1984 Macintosh Ad: Cinematic Icons and Constitutive Rhetoric in the Launch of a New Machine"

8. Narrative Criticism

A Sample Study: Bruce E. Gronbeck's "The Visual and Narrative Rhetoric of Redemption: American Culture Responds to 9/11"

III. Producer-Centered Approaches

9. Auteur Criticism

A Sample Study: Richard Campbell and Jimme L. Reeves's "Television Authors: The Case of Hugh Wilson"

10. Production Context Criticism

A Sample Study: Elana Levine's "Toward a Paradigm for Media Production Research: Behind the Scenes at General Hospital"

11. Ideological Criticism

A Sample Study: Mark P. Orbe's "Constructions of Reality on MTV's The Real World: An Analysis of the Restrictive Coding of Black Masculinity"

IV. Reception-Centered Approaches

12. Reader-Oriented Criticism

A Sample Study: Lawrence A. Wenner's "The Dream Team, Communicative Dirt, and the Marketing of Synergy: USA Basketball and Cross-Merchandising in Television Commercials"

13. Audience Ethnographic Criticism

A Sample Study: Rona Tamiko Halualani and Leah R. Vande Berg's "'Asian or American': Meanings In, Through, and Around All-American Girl"

14. Cultural Criticism: General Approaches

Two Sample Studies: Heather L. Hundley's "The Naturalization of Beer in Cheers; Cathy Sandeen's "Success Defined by Television: The Value System Promoted by PM Magazine"

15. Cultural Criticism: Mythic, Feminist, and Psychoanalytic Approaches

Three Sample Studies: Susan Owen's "Vampires, Postmodernity and Postfeminism: Buffy the Vampire Slayer"; Robert Westerfelhaus and Teresa A. Combs's "Criminal Investigations and Spiritual Quests: The X-Files as an Example of Hegemonic Concordance in Mass-Mediated Society"; Sonia Livingstone and Tamar Liebes's "Where Have All the Mothers Gone? Soap Opera's Replaying of the Oedipal Story"

V. Ethics and the Critical Approach

16. Television, Ethics