Television as Culture as Communications

1. Television as Culture as Communications COMN 3316 March 18, 2011 Lecture

2. Agenda • Exam • Exam Review Session • Corrections: Arena 1: CBC and CTV: Funding and Corner Gas • Public television” as genre? • Public television: international considerations • CBC/BBC/PBS • New Technologies as “public television” • “Genres” influenced by public television: • Sit Com •Historical Docudrama •News •Talk shows • Documentary: (Socially Conscious &Environmental Television) • Finally and (also) Next class: Commercials & Commercialization and Television

3. Exam is April 01 • 1 hr and 50 min • Exam review session: After final lecture material (30 min) in next class

4. EXAM is April 01 • Make-up exams will require both: • a doctor’s note • deferment status form • Will be offered only those in situations that clearly warrant it, those missing exam without clear warrant will be given a zero for the exam • Alternative exams as conducted through York University’s Resource center: • when exam arrives in my office I will send an email to both you and your TA. The exam will be placed in the T.A.s box: you should receive your exam grade within 10 days or earlier from the time you receive the email saying it has arrived in my box. • If you do not hear from your TA, regards exam grade within 10 days after this, please email me immediately

5. Amphitheater (80-70 BC) to 1 AD 2100 to 1700 years old

6. News • Al Jazeera or ALJAZEERA (Al Jazera)

7. Corner Gas/Little Mosque on the Prairie:CTV/CBC • CTVc becomes BCE (Bell Canada Enterprises) • CRTC • CTF • Department of Canadian Heritage: nurturing excellence: funds • Corner Gas; Funding for, Funding 2

8. Public Television • Televisions most visible beginnings were public funded: Britain, Germany • Europe follows suit: • The US is the only country for a while with a “commercial system” – however when less “financially” endowed countries acquire television the adopt the US model • At first it was mainly just how those involved in TV thought it could be funded. • But later the public television becomes a means to unite over concerns regarding “cultural imperialism”

9. What is cultural imperialism? • It is a means of describing the way in which one cultural model, its symbology, motifs, images, ritual forms, music, costumes, props, rhythms, story telling forms, narratives- “colonizes” other cultural models, a kind of take over, a way in which the colonized models appear consistently inferior, insignificant, less important, “pushed to the margins” • An attempt to describe the means in which the colonized forms “loose the power” to chose, and are “forced” to interact with and “chose” the culturally imperial form, in order to be considered culturally “savvy”

10. What is cultural imperialism?

11. What is cultural imperialism? As form is colonized, it is pulled into the orbit of the the culturally imperial form and eventually merges with it (if it is unable to sustain an orbit

12. What is cultural imperialism? In capitalism, funds are allotted to for profit, ventures and thus these become culturally dominant forms, not necessarily because the culture that is exporting them, has chosen them, but because they can gather gravitational substance due to funding, faster and more consistently, than public forms which operate more nobly by chose mechanisms and their time delays, cuts and efforts to work within the realm of public choice: Commercial form becomes culturally ascendant As form is colonized, it is pulled into the orbit of the the culturally imperial form and eventually merges with it (if it is unable to sustain an orbit

13. What is cultural imperialism? In capitalism, funds are allotted to for profit, ventures and thus these become culturally dominant forms, not necessarily because the culture that is exporting them, has chosen them, but because they can gather gravitational substance due to funding, faster and more consistently, than public forms which operate more nobly by chose mechanisms and their time delays, cuts and efforts to work within the realm of public choice: Commercial form becomes culturally ascendant In today’s media, culturally imperialism crosses boundaries. It has for many years (example Canada and CBC), but new media heighten the passage, exponentially.

14. What is cultural imperialism? Cultural imperialism seems to have some natural trends: It seems to gravitate towards certain forms and not others: in a sense reducing cultural forms to the dominators that “sell the most”; “sell the fastest” “sell reliably” Junk food culture: image diet of addictive forms, forms that are proven to sell: sexualized forms, emphasis on cool, sleek, thin, partnered (heteronormative partnering), glamour, air brushed, not aged, single in the right way, moneyed In today’s media, culturally imperialism crosses boundaries. It has for many years (example Canada and CBC), but new media heighten the passage, exponentially.

15. What is cultural imperialism? In Canada, public broadcasting develops in response to the cultural imperialism of US programming which seems to operate unawares of the Canadian audiences imbibing at its edges. Government influence is invited to preserve cultural heritage of Canada in the face of the cultural imperialism of the US It is continued as a mandate to that heritage as it enlarges to include multiculturalism Public Broadcasting in the United States developed initially in reaction to initially cultural imperialism of “low brow versus “high brow” culture: There were complaints that the informational quality and commitment of commercial stations was such that they had no commitment to provide programming for the “public good”. McCarthy era

16. US: Inherits the high brow: informational tradition: symphonic, opera, art And social investigation, the main vehicle for the documentary to obtain a televisual showing; In many places it has a long history with state and local programming and thus is where children’s television got its start. Tends not to support comedy Public Broadcasting In Canada, public broadcasting develops in response to the cultural imperialism of US programming which seems to operate unawares of the Canadian audiences imbibing at its edges. Canada maintains its commitment to the CBC, but also offers public funding to support Canadian content: thus programming is investigative but also has this edge