Television Truths: Forms of Knowledge in Popular Culture

Television. Love it or hate it, it is still the most popular pastime ever. It reflects and shapes our knowledge of contemporary life across the economic, political, social and cultural spectrum, and yet TV is still among the most criticized phenomena of modern life. Everyone watches it, but everyone’s also a critic. This engaging book, written by one of television′s best known experts, invites us to explore television’s most controversial coverage and fascinating formats: TV citizenship, live TV, ‘plebiscitary’ shows, reality TV, synchronized sports and TV’s own history. At a time of unprecedented change in technologies and business plans, Hartley explores television’s evolving place and transforming role in our knowledge–based society.

List of Figures. List of Tables. Acknowledgments. 1. Television Truths (Argumentation of TV). Part I: Is TV True? (Epistemology of TV): . 2. The Value Chain of Meaning. 3. Public Address Systems: Time, Space, and Frequency. 4. Television and Globalization. Part II: Is TV a Polity? (Ethics/Politics of TV):. 5. Television, Nation, and Indigenous Media. 6. A Television Republic?. 7. Reality and the Plebiscite. Part III: Is TV Beautiful? (Aesthetics of TV): . 8. From a “Wandering Booby” to a Field of Cows: The Television Live Event. 9. Shakespeare, Big Brother, and the Taming of the Self. 10. Sync or Swim? Plebiscitary Sport and Synchronized Voting. Part IV: What Can TV Be? (Metaphysics of TV):. 11. “Laughs and Legends” or the Furniture that Glows? Television as History. 12. Television in Knowledge Paradigms. References. Index

John Hartley is a Distinguished Professor at Queensland University of Technology and Adjunct Professor of the Australian National University. Hartley is the author of 15 books, including Creative Industries, A Short History of Cultural Studies , and Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key Concepts . He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.

“John Hartley’s Television Truths is a complex and engaging work, inspired by an ambitious project of knowledge — a distinctive characteristic of this original and farsighted scholar.” ( International Journal of Communication , April 2009) “Grand in scope, bold, witty, and engaging, Television Truths fashions a provocative new philosophy for the study and appreciation of both TV and a TV polity.” ( Jonathan Gray, author of Watching with The Simpsons: Television, Parody, and Intertextuality , co–editor of Fandom: Identities and Communities in a Mediated World) “As always, John Hartley’s provocative arguments and examples push against the boundaries and restrictions of conventional approaches. His focus on the multiple contexts of television adds greatly to our store of key questions about ‘television.’” ( Horace Newcomb, Director, George Foster Peabody Awards, The University of Georgia)