Free Download Meta Television: A History of US Popular Television’s Self-Awareness
English | 2024 | ISBN: 1032366346 | 165 Pages | PDF (True) | 3 MB
The idea of metatextuality is frequently framed as a recent television development and often paired with the idea that it represents genre exhaustion. US television, however, with its early "live" performances and set-bound sitcoms, always suggested an element of self-awareness that easily shaded into metatextuality even in its earliest days. Meta Television thus traces the general history of US television’s metatextuality throughout television’s history, arguing that TV’s self-awareness is nothing new-and certainly not evidence of a period of aesthetic exhaustion-but instead is woven into both its past and present practice, elucidated through case studies featuring series from the 1970s to the present day-many of which have not been critically analyzed before-and the various ways they deploy metatext to both construct and deconstruct their narratives. Further, Meta Television asserts that this re- and de-construction of narrative and production isn’t just a reward to the savvy and/or knowledgeable viewer (or consumer), but seeks to make broader points about the media we consume-and how we consume it.
