Historical text analysis and research

TV dramas are always thought to be a female-viewer-attracted industry, especially for soap operas. However, the same as other types of television programs, TV dramas represent and reinforce the majority’s ideology of modern western culture: patriarchy. 

In 1975, McNeil tested a 7-point critique outline (as following), and he found out that most of them are true.

• Female characters are fewer in number and less central to the plot.
• Marriage and parenthood are considered more important to a woman’s than to a man’s life.
• Television portrays the traditional division of labour in marriage.
• Employed women are shown in traditionally female occupations, as subordinates to men and with little status or power.
• TV-women are more personally-and less professionally-oriented than TV-men.
• Female characters are more passive than male characters.
• Television dramatic programming ignores the existence of the women’s movement.

The American Sportsman

The show ran from 1965 to 1986 on ABC in the United States. A typical episode featured one or more celebrities, and sometimes their family members, being accompanied by a camera crew on an outdoor adventure, such as hunting, fishing, hiking, scuba diving, rock climbing, wildlife photography, horseback riding, race car driving, and the like, with most of the resulting action and dialogue being unscripted, except for the narration. 

Up Series

The Up Series is a series of documentary films produced by Granada Television that have followed the lives of fourteen British children since 1964, when they were seven years old. So far the documentary has had eight episodes spanning 49 years (one episode every seven years) and the documentary has been broadcast on both ITV and BBC.

From this we can see that reality TV shows held more educational purposes in the past however they now hold entertainment value. Social realism is something the British have always done well. We live in a country more liberal than most, where contentious opinions have often been tackled through drama. Television has helped break down certain social barriers by educating the populace. Coming of age in the 80s and early 90s, my education came through books and especially television. It is only when considering the developments in television in the 00s that it becomes apparent we enjoyed something of a golden age of social realist drama starting with Delaney and co and leading to the socially aware 80s and censor-bothering 90s.