Oprah frequently states that discrimination is the result of fear, ignorance, and misunderstanding.11 Links to an external site. In this sense, discrimination is effectively defined as an irrational process that can be remedied by supplying information that shows the “majority” (or the powerful) that the “Other” group is nothing to be feared, is really just like “us.”

Jolene’s story could just as easily have been set up so that it was interrogated in terms of the constraints and limited (or nonexistent) choices and support available to women who cannot afford to pay for child-care or to run two cars.

Both All the Family is Gay and Would You Leave Your Kids Home Alone? illustrate graphically the disjuncture between the apparent democracy of “free space” for saying one’s piece and the oppressive reinforcement of common sense that can be produced in such contexts.

In this section, we will explore the ways in which the Oprah Winfrey Show negotiates the competing assumptions characteristic of these politics, politics where, for example, speech is assumed to be free

Indeed, the many permutations of American Dreaming have arisen precisely out of this “melting pot” of seemingly irreconcilable political trajectories that are, nonetheless, held together through a peculiarly American tradition of liberal politics, both of the left and of the right

There is no one American Dream. American Dreaming is grounded in competing versions both of American nation and of the renaissance of the individual within it.

Contrast the United States: there, eschewing UHF, the internationally agreed thirteen VHF channels, reduced to twelve by a 1952 FCC decision, were used exactly to achieve the opposite result, i.e. a maximising of the number of different signals to create a competitive television marketplace.

The earliest video-technologies, the Sony Portapak and other cheap (by broadcasting standards) equipment, were being made the basis of a call for a more democratic television culture

The most significant of this strand of decisions was that of the Supreme Court in Fortnightly Corporation vs. United Artists Television (1968).

Four radio dealers in Lansford, George Bright, William McDonald, Robert Tarlton and Rudolph Dubosky, established the Panther Valley Television Company

. In the Netherlands, the need for signal enhancement and a taste for the importation of distant foreign stations provided the supervening necessities for radio cable systems

Yet, more than that, cables have always been used for the distribution of radio and television signals to the home

In part, this laughter came from industry observers who saw the landscape of mid‐1980s television so altered by the expansion of cable, new audience measurement tools, and new technologies that trying to establish a new over‐the‐air broadcast network in the midst of dwindling network audiences and advertising revenue seemed foolhardy.

“When 20th Century Fox announced in October 1985 that it was going to launch FOX, a fourth network in direct competition with powerhouses ABC, CBS and NBC, the channel was the laughing stock of the industry” (Acuna 2012)

The multi‐channel transition marked a period of gradual but steady change, in which the basic rules of television were altered, while certain functions of programming remained the same.

From the shifts in technology (the introduction of the VCR, remote control, and the evolution of communication satellites) to significant regulatory changes (the repeal of the Financial Interest and Syndication Rules (Fin‐Syn) and passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996)

By the mid‐1980s, such dismal predictions about the future of broadcast television were commonplace among industry observers.

In 1986, the cover of the Hartford Courant featured a cartoon‐style graphic depicting the shrinking network television audience between 1979 and 1985

Other scholars emphasized the political‐economic and cultural significance of TV’s rhythms by contextualizing the Big Three’s schedules’ organization through segmentation and flow geared for profit‐maximization

early analyses from feminist thinkers regarding the pleasures offered by popular TV genres and the “rhythm” of program “flow” across the viewing day

This chapter focuses on scholarly approaches to the history of the classic era as they themselves have transformed over time but with an emphasis on scholarship from the early 1990s to the present

In an era characterized by the Cold War, John F. Kennedy’s New Frontier, the civil rights movement, and the Vietnam War, government and industry officials, scholars and critics, and the public alike repeatedly questioned the networks’ commitments to balancing mass‐audience entertainment appeals and “consensus” programming with more challenging, riskier “quality” and “enlightened” program address

Culturally, the “American system” was defined by programming and scheduling conventions, each of which struggled to balance structuring paradoxes or “essential tensions” between private profit and public service, between national coherence and local responsiveness, and between consensus and provocation

Television production transitioned, for the most part, from New York to Los Angeles, and from live programming to filmed programming, as well as from 60‐minute programs to a predominance of 30‐minute shows across the schedule.

Institutionally and technologically the “mature structure” initiated with the inception of the classic era has been summarized as follows

The “classic” era in network television describes an historical period when the “American system” (Hilmes 2007a) of broadcast television solidified and the “Big Three” national, commercial networks

Lucy taught television about its potential as a medium.

Oppenheimer’s role as both a writer and a producer proved extremely threatening to a community of writers who saw producers as management, and therefore their adversaries in contract and labor negotiations

Oppenheimer was a young radio writer, director, and producer on a number of hit series including Fanny Brice’s The Baby Snooks Show

So, then, how did a television series that was such an overwhelming success “run” without a showrunner? Or was there a showrunner who was never celebrated as such? And if there was, who then deserves credit for I Love Lucy?

it is quite likely we would be ascribing its success to a particular person: the series showrunner, heralding this person (or in some instances, persons) as a brilliant leader, technician, author, and, perhaps, creator.

. Lucy was a major force for ushering in certain changes that would ultimately define American commercial television

In 1953, Lucille Ball made history by giving birth to two boys in one night, 3,000 miles apart. One, Desiderio Arnaz, arrived by Caesarean section in Los Angeles; the other, Little Ricky Ricardo, was the first child to arrive via television airwaves into homes across the country from a fictional New York.