Next session (November 7th): From the old Sovjet Union to modern China

In the November session of TViT, we have a very interesting double-presentation by the visiting scholars Xiaoxio Zhang (The Chinese University of HongKong) and Lars Lundgren (Södertörn University Stokholm). See below for a short description of their work and background.

The time and location:
7 November 2o11,  Janskerkhof 13, room 0.06, 3.30 pm – 5.30 pm.

Presentation 1: Xiaoxiao Zhang
“The Chinese Ugly Betty: TV cloning and local modernity”

In her presentation, Xiaoxiao Zhang will examine the themes inherent in the serial Ugly Wudi, a Chinese version of the Ugly Betty. Mainly by textual comparing the Chinese version with its American counterpart, her research analyses the modifications made by the producers in Ugly Wudi, such as the modifications to the ethnicity and homosexuality issues. It is argued that the modifications in the Chinese version are deliberately made to suit the local understanding and acceptance of modern television dramas. Unlike the American Ugly Betty, the Chinese Ugly Wudi is positioned within a more politically restrictive but rapidly liberalizing economic climate. Thus Ugly Wudi bears the marks of attempts to merge the demands of market forces with those of the paternalistic state, as its producers seek to embrace the global popular aesthetics of modern television dramas.

XioaXiao Zhangs presentation is based on a chapter of her dissertation entitled “Western Modernity and TV Cloning: A Case Study of the Chinese Version of Ugly Betty”. Based on this chapter, a journal paper has been published in International Journal of Cultural Studies (co-authored with Anthony Fung). Zhang’s presentation provides insights into the way Chinese producers deal with global television formats and the reasons accounting for it.

Xiaoxiao Zhang is a Ph.D. Candidate of School of Journalism and Communication, The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research interest mainly lies in TV study and cultural studies.

Presentation 2: Lars Lundgren
“Through the Iron Curtain: Early Transnational Broadcasting and Television Discourses”

In spring 1961 the Soviet Union broadcast live images through the Iron Curtain for the first time in history. The broadcasts suggested a possible future of television as an integral part of a symbolic struggle where images could travel without regard to national borders and political landscapes. In hindsight these broadcasts have earned a minor role in the history of transnational television, clearly overshadowed by the introduction of US satellite television a few years later. With this in mind the aim of the project is to understand how early Soviet transnational broadcasts at he height of the Cold War form the idea of television and thereby broaden the perspectives on transnational broadcasting by studying its early history in Europe. The analysis is organized around three types of material; 1) archive material from international broadcast organizations and four national broadcasters 2) the broadcasts in four national contexts; 3) contextual media material in four national contexts. The project address three urgent issues in broadcast history. First, it emphasizes the dialectics between the national and transnational contexts of broadcasting. Second, it historicizes perspectives on international broadcasting and place it in a transnational context. Third, it acknowledges not only western initiatives in transnational broadcasting but the relation between Western and Eastern Europe.

Lars Lundgren is senior lecturer in Media & Communication Studies at Södertörn University in Stockholm. His current research interest is directed towards early transnational television in Europe, with a particular focus on programme exchange across the Iron Curtain during the 1960s. He is currently heading the research project Through the Iron Curtain: Early Transnational Broadcasting and Television Discourses (2011-2014, funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond).

Lundgren received his Ph.D in January 2008 after defending his thesis “Culture and Transmission: The technological and cultural reach of international syndicated radio” at Stockholm University. The dissertation explores how internationally syndicated radio programme Solid Steel reach its listeners around the world. At the centre of the study lie questions of how to understand communication both as a means of bridging geographical distances and as the production of shared values and meaning in an international media culture.

Location change!

The TViT meeting next Monday (September 5th)  will take place on Munstraat 2a, room 1.11. More information about the meeting can be found in the former post.

Next session (September 5th): Indonesian television, corporate interests and social functions

TviT starts the academic year of 2011-2012 with a fresh and interesting session. First of all, as part of his PhD-research into local television in Indonesia, Bram Hendrawan will present the findings of this latest field trip and article called “Televising the ‘Local’: Between Corporate Interests and Social Functions”.

Here’s the abstract:

“Studies  on  Indonesian  local  television  focus  on  the  social  function  of  local television  as  a  medium  for   the  construction  of  public  sphere  and  cultural identity.  This  social  approach  to  local  television  misses   an  important character  of  these  new  stations  namely  their  commercial  characters.  This paper  looks   at  corporate  strategies  (structure  of  ownership,  the  expansion of  service  area  and  modes  of   generating  income)  employed  by  two private local  television  stations  in  Yogyakarta  and  Solo:  Jogja   TV  and  TATV.  The main  question  is  whether  and  how  such  corporate  strategies  limit  the social   function  of  local  television.  It  is  argued  that  corporate  strategies  of these  two  television  stations  limit   the  potential  of  local  television  to  carry out  its  social  function  as  it  is  envisioned  by  its  proponents.   The  logics  of profit  making  pose  a  threat  to  the  creation  of  diversity  that  is  envisioned to  be  the   characteristic  of  local  television.”   

Next to Brams presentation, Jasmijn van Gorp and Marc Bron (UvA) will demonstrate and test the new search tool they have developed for the Dutch Institute for Sound and Vision. This demonstration is part of their BRIDGE project. So bring your laptop and see you all on Monday September 5th, 3.30 p.m. at Janskerkhof 13, room 0.06.*

*Please note that the location has not been confirmed yet, so keep checking your e-mail and/or this website for additional changes.

Next session (june 6th): ‘Liveness and E-jamming’

In the last session of this academic year, Karin van Es will present her case study research on ‘Liveness and E-jamming, which is part of her PhD project described below. The session will take place at Janskerkhof 13, room 0.06. Afterwards, it’s time to close the academic year with dinner and drinks (location will follow)!

Karin van Es’ PhD project is on liveness in the Web 2.0 age, wherein the symbolic power of ‘the media’ (Couldry 2000 and 2003) is seemingly challenged by multiple online production/consumption centers, but, as she argues, the media’s framing function is maintained through (platform) design. More specifically, Karin sets out to analyze the constellations of liveness in eJAMMING (online music collaboration), YouTube (video-sharing platform), Facebook (social networking site) and in the television program The Voice of Holland (2010) examining how these forms of liveness help construct the ‘ritual category’ liveness (Couldry 2000; 2003; 2004) and, by extension, how they help underscore the power of the media to frame the social (ibid.). Analyzing the constellation involves analysis of: 1) the discursive construction of liveness through paratexts around the platform, 2) the construction of liveness via the platform and 3) a consideration of user practices.

Not Only Entertainment

Eggo Müller has just released his new book on television entertainment, which offers a theory of entertainment and analyses its revaluation in the past 25 years. The book us available at Herbert van Halem Verlag in Cologne or at amazon.de for the equivalent of € 25,-. Here’s the abstract:

‘Since the introduction of commercial broadcasting in Europe and the emergence of digital media, entertainment has become a dominant cultural concept in political, economic, pedagogical, scholarly and aesthetic discourses. In his collected essays on the Pragmatics and Aesthetics of Television Entertainment, Müller develops an aesthetically grounded theory of entertainment and analyses the revaluation of entertainment as cultural concept and practice. His critical analyses of trend-setting programs and genres of television since its deregulation, such as football programming, music videos, soap operas, American quality drama series, shows how television entertainment works as a formative economic and aesthetic power in the digital media landscape. In constant dialogue with academic debates, the book not only contributes to a new understanding of entertainment, it also sketches out new perspectives for the research into media entertainment in an era of convergence and participatory media.’

Next meeting: May 9th, 2011, 3.30 p.m. – Mock defense Jacco van Sterkenburg

In preparation of his upcoming PhD defense, Jacco van Sterkenburg will present his PhD thesis and answer our critical questions. His thesis, called ‘Race, Ethnicity and the Sport Media’ will be publicly defended later this year in the Academy Building of Utrecht University. Date and time will be announced soon.

Next meeting: April 4, 2011, 3.30 p.m. – Member brainstorm: What TViT is and could be.

After more than a year of meetings and presentations, it’s time to take the center to the next level: How do we see the future of TViT? What can we do internally and externally to make the center an even greater succes? These and other issues will be discussed in the April meeting.

Next meeting: March 14, 2011, 3.30 p.m. – Analyzing interviews with documentary participants: the what and the how

There are various ways to approach the analysis of qualitative data, and more specifically interview data. Apart from studying what respondents say, attention may be given to how they say it. I will address two approaches that both start from the perspective that information conveyed in interviews should not only be analyzed for its content: deconstruction and constructionism.

Deconstruction is aimed at exposing the ideology that underlies respondents’ accounts, or rather how ideology limits what respondents can say. However, deconstruction can also be used to explore the ideology of the analyst. Strategies for deconstruction include looking for silences and gaps, dismantling dichotomies, and analyzing disruptions such as unfinished or unclear sentences and hesitations.

Constructionism regards interviews as situated conversations in which both interviewee and interviewer are engaged in a continuous process of meaning-making. In this approach, interview answers are accounts constructed in an encounter between people. Analyzing how respondents answer is part and parcel of analyzing what they answer. Strategies for constructionism include looking at interview accounts as cultural stories and investigating stereotypes, looking at identity work, i.e., how interviewees position themselves towards the topic and towards the interviewer, and narrative reflexivity.

During the seminar Willemien Sanders will give a brief explanation of these approaches, after which a working session will be held to try and apply them to some of her interview data. Willemien interviewed documentary participants about their experience of being in a documentary project.

Date: March 14, 2011
Time: 3.30 p.m.
Location: Kromme Nieuwe Gracht 80, room 1.06 (‘Ravenstein’)

Next meeting: Feb 7, 2011, 3.30 p.m. – Quality in Nowegian Public-Service Television

Prof. Roel Puijk, Lillehammer University College (Norway), will present his research into Quality in Norwegian Public-Service Television.
While general questions of the quality of television, and of public-service television in particular, have been discussed, there has been little research into what public-service broadcasters actually do to maintain the quality of their programming. Based on his research into the Norwegian public-service broadcaster NRK, Prof. Roel Puijk, Media Studies, Lillehammer University College’ discusses how quality is defined by the braodcaster, how ideas about quality have evolved, and what institutional procedures for assessing quality have been implemented over the past 15 years. Puijk’s research is part of the emerging within Media Studies, nowadays referred to as Production Studies.

Date: February 7,  2011
Time: 3.30 p.m.
Location: OGC, Janskerkhof 13, room # 0.06

PhD Defence: The Power of Television: Including the Historicizing of the Live Romanian Revolution

Date and time: 4 February 2011 10:30
Location: Academiegebouw – Domplein 29, Utrecht
PhD student: Dana Mustata
Faculty: Faculty of Humanities
Supervisor 1: Prof. dr. J.S. de Leeuw / Co-supervisor 1: Dr. A. Fickers

Dana Mustata’s dissertation is a first history of Romanian television, dealing for the first time with the history of television under a former communist regime. It shows that despite the oppressive regime, television was not necessarily and not always an instrument of political control. Roemeense revolutie 1989 The dissertation develops an innovate method for understanding television in a coercive regime. The method studies television as an agent of power. Based on this method, the dissertation reveals brand new data on the televised Romanian Revolution in 1989: the event was not a spontaneous public outburst, but a decade-long rehearsed process that took place in the private spaces of television viewers and which was silenced, controlled and manipulated by the Securitate, the former Romanian secret services. Being a first television history of a former communist country, the dissertation opens up this field of research in Eastern Europe, making a significant contribution to European television history. The dissertation is based on so far undisclosed and classified documents of the Romanian communist secret services.