Ronny's Midterm Paper

Rhiannon McLane
Comm. 405
Mid Term Paper
10/15/2009

When you turn on your television and flip to the TV Guide channel has the thought ever occurred to you that most of the shows (even on different networks) look identical? Is there no creativity? Do script writers and Hollywood hotshots just copy each other in order not to loose a buck? Has society really become a “homogenized culture” as Dwight MacDonald states (MacDonald p.12)? Have Americans just settled for bad television because we are unable to recognize art or any other form of an innovative idea? Or do Americans care about their scheduled programming and understand that they have the power to change it like Kyle Conway suggests? In this essay I will address these questions by comparing and contrasting Kyle Conway’s Technology Form: An Introduction to Media and Cultural Studies and Dwight MacDonald’s Masscult & Midcult so that you can form your own opinion about the relationships between producers, distributors and the audience.

“They try this and that and if something clicks at the box office, they try to cash in with similar products…” (MacDonald p.14). This sounds a lot like what happened after the movie, Twilight came out. All of a sudden you see television shows like HBO’s True Blood, The CW’s Vampire Diaries, new movies like Cirque de Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant, Day Walkers, not to mention Twilight’s sequel New Moon. Producer’s are trying to profit off of each others’ success, “A second device is that of the clone, where producers model a new program after a hit show, possibly on another network. In some cases, they follow the hit show’s formula fairly closely” (Conway p.56-57). MacDonald and Conway agree that which ever shows are in the spot light will have more “clones” to satisfy the demands the public. Producers believe that what was popular at one time will continue to be popular until the public gets bored and ratings of certain television shows decrease. I don’t believe the cycle of cloning will ever end, we as viewers want to be entertained, and when something is not aesthetically pleasing anymore we’ll lose interest, ultimately becoming interested in something new and watching clones of that pop up all over our TVs. Dwight MacDonald would probably agree to my above statement whole heartedly, believing that, “… it is easier to say the public wants this than to say the truth which is that the public gets this so it wants this” (MacDonald p.10-11). The public wants what is popular so every network will give it to them. MacDonald and Conway would agree that producers and distributors do “cash in” on popular box office themes in order to make money.

A difference between Conway and MacDonald is that Conway believes that people do have a say in what they watch/ view on television. Fox’s Family Guy which was introduced to attract “the young male demographic in the late 1990’s,” (Conway p.13) was canceled in 2001 but brought back to Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim when the DVD of the first season sold over 2 million copies (Conway p.13). “Fox executives realized that they might not be able to use the show to attract a large audience, but they could attract a loyal audience…” (Conway p.13-14) According to the ideals of Dwight MacDonald, we as consumers are a mass unable to recognize what we want, and just allow producers to give us what we think we want. Obviously there is proof that viewers have power and opinion over what they watch or what they want to watch and can persuade networks to give to them.

Another similarity between Conway and MacDonald is the fact they believe that Masscult was born to entertain and inform the masses, and to help them feel included in the world around them. Masscult is a tie between High culture and Low culture. It’s a way for everyone to be included, not only can the rich and middle class watch/read something, but so can the poor. Its availability is made ready to anyone who can afford to pay the cost of the product either being a magazine, newspaper, or movie. Rich people and poor could form an opinion on what was going on in the world; it was no longer just upper-class conversation. “Masscult is a dynamic, revolutionary force, breaking down the old barriers of class traditions, and taste, dissolving all cultural distinctions. It mixes, scrambles everything together, producing what might be called homogenized culture…” (MacDonald p.12). Conway attributes mass culture to the fact that during the post-World War II era, people were moving out of the city and into the suburbs, which left them feeling isolated (Conway p.18), television was a way unite people who were geographically isolated, “The developers of technologies like television had specific goals in mind. For instance, they wanted to find a way to deliver programming to large groups of viewers who were geographically isolated from each other” (Conway p.18).

Contrasting Conway and McDonald on MacDonald’s idea of the “Built in reaction,” MacDonald to sum up in a nut shell thinks people react to certain television shows the way we do is because we get cues from the producers, “That standby for provincial weddings, “I Love You Truly,” is far more “romantic” than the most beautiful of Schubert’s songs because its wallowing, yearning tremolos and glissandos make it clear to the most unmusical listener that something clearly tender is indeed going on” (MacDonald p. 29). During scenes an audience knows it ok to cry when they hear a sad song, so it’s ok to cry when Lassie has just died and there is a sad slow song playing along in the background. Although heaven forbid if the music was not playing we would not know if it was appropriate to mourn Lassie’s death. Conway gives an example about the show Arrested Development, and how it was not what you would call the stereotypical sitcom, because there was no laugh track, the lighting was flat, and the show was filmed using a hand held camera. It was innovative; it let people decide for themselves what was funny. Although the show had a small following it was not enough to save the show from cancelation. The same idea can be attributed to the movie starring Adam Sandler, Punch Drunk Love. There was no music to guide you through the scenes. It was like everyone was a critic. Because there was no influence by producers, it gave viewers a chance to take what they wanted out of the movie and laugh cry or be disgusted if they wanted to and have different ideas about the making of a scene than someone else. Conway’s ideas about genre and Arrested Development gives credit to people in being able to understand television with out helpful cues provided by producers.

In conclusion by comparing and contrasting Kyle Conway’s Technology Form: An Introduction to Media and Cultural Studies and Dwight MacDonald’s Masscult & Midcult I hope I have given insight to the relationships between producers, distributors and the audience. Hopefully by reading this you will understand Masscult and how it the public is treated as a whole with similar tastes. Also how we as an audience are not powerless when it comes to the choices of television shows, we have a say in what goes on television.

Works Cited

Conway, Kyle. Technology Form: An Introduction to Media and Cultural Studies . 1st. Grand Forks: Neo Office, 2009. Print.

MacDonald, Dwight. Aginst the American Grain: Masscult & Midcult. New York City: Random House, 1952. Print.