Visual Cultures

Visual cultures

Instructor information

Michaela Santulli
Instructor: Andrea Quartarone
Email: Andrea.quartarone@unibocconi.it

Course structure

Meeting: at the end of Tuesday class

Television communication

• Languages
• Conditioning factors
• Communication theories

Course parts

Part 1: Television, generally speaking

Part 2: Television and society

Part 3.1: Ritual media events

Part 3.2: Disruptive media events

The exam

• Individual assignment
• Final oral exam

The test will start with some questions about the student’s assignment. In order to achieve a good final oral exam, attending students have to study:

• Lesson’s content: personal notes and slides
• Studying materials available on lib.unibocconi.it
• Studying materials, broad bibliography of suggested learning, slides

Assignment

Due: November 29
A short essay about the relation between television and society. The student is free to choose the specific object of analysis, even if it’s obligatory that it must have the teacher's approval.

Lesson 1: Creating order out of the television overload

Everything can be said about television, because television’s everywhere and everyone knows about it. Television works however, even if people say that they don’t like television, they’re talking about it. Television has to thank people who don’t watch television too. Television works every time, even if you don’t watch it.

Democratic vs totalitarian

Television is democratic; you can watch television almost for free. On the internet too, it’s very popular. Television is democratic because it gives you credibility. Television in theory can be one of the most powerful places. Television is selective; in choosing the reality it expresses an ideology. If you can control television and the web, you can control people’s lives. Television provides the sense of evidence, for example when the economy is low.

Public service television

It’s pretty diffuse in Europe, it’s a television founded by the government. If the TV is very powerful, it is under the control of the government, which has to guarantee a democratic representation.

Commercial television

US mode, which is commercial. It’s an interaction; above last years: deregulation, globalization, new technologies (internet and satellites), corporate influence over the institutions of the state. "Big Brother" is a very good representation of our lives. But at the same time, most people don’t let children watch it because of the contents. It’s a high-quality program and a low-quality program at the same time. The same thing we can say about a documentary; because it has good contents, but at the same time no one wants to watch it.

Regional vs global

Television is at the same time regional and global. It’s regional because if you are in Italy you are not able to watch French television. That’s the realization of “television nations.” Even if we share a lot of American series and several programs, it continues to be original, otherwise, we would watch the same television everywhere. At the same time, television is global because of the same format. This program, for example, is about a sort of soap opera. It was "Dallas," settled during the Second World War. It was a very difficult moment. What was the result? Those who lived in the Second World War were disgusted by this - it was so American, too emotional. But young people were fascinated by this because it was a huge success and more interesting than books. It was the only way for a lot of children to know some details about the Second World War. What’s the point? No point at all.

US vs others

When television speaks about something that is not near you, it does it just on the telegiornale. And you can bet that they are doing the same thing in other countries about Italy. At the same time, public broadcasters have to talk to the majority and minority. And you can choose to be a part of the minority or the majority. In addition, transnational TV provides a source for viewers to think about themselves and their social environment. You pay the fee because you have to pay for things that you don’t even watch.

Public vs private

Television is a window to the world. We assist at media events thanks to television. You can have a participation in world affairs. Televisions weren’t that much, but people were all together to watch it. In more than one way their domestic situations were a public domain. They feel a sense of participation. It’s a very old story, but we will see what’s happening in 2014. Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II; what was the problem? After six days of arguments, they switched off the program of the coronation. Even if the election of the president can seem similar to a public sphere, it can be very different, because everything can go bad in coronation, but it’s less probable than in an election. Sometimes, like in the case of a presidential election, it’s not that funny to watch it, it’s very boring. Television is private. In the US they talk about sex, but they don’t have it. In Italy, we have a lot of sex, why? Television is private because it is linked with our religion. Italy is Catholic, which is a religion that can confess. I can watch whatever I want, I can confess and I can be forgiven. In Italy, we have a lot of corrupted politicians and we forgive them because they confess. The sexual manner can be different in different countries because broadcasters can decide to broadcast different things. In Muslim countries, the presence of men and women in the same place is not even admitted.

Active and passive audiences

Advertisers don’t buy minutes, but they buy audiences. It’s proportional to the number of viewers. In Italy, we have different channels, UK 2 channels. We have different TV programs. We have a presenter who was a real teacher that taught how to write and how to read to a public, who is represented in a TV studio like the ones in the video. After the Second World War, a lot of people had the possibility to go to schools, but the older generation had just one opportunity to learn something: television. It was a success. The broadcaster was cool. All those old people showed in the program were the same people who were watching at home. This wouldn’t be a successful program now because we have choice. So something changed in 1980/90, because we have different people who watch what they want. Television starts to speak different languages for different people; kids, mommies, young people, families. 2000s: interactive television made the audience active. You can record everything and watch whatever you want. Today we are more active than in the past. But television cannot forget the past; when we see the parallel between the assassination of JFK and 9/11, we’ll see a lot of similar things.

Ordinary vs event

Television is ordinary because you can watch it every time you want. Events vs Media events. You don’t need to have a 9/11 or a war for a media event. Do you know what had people raise their hands and create a rebellion in Romania? Dallas; it was the most precise representation of the republican. It was full of money, sex, and relationships. Romania wanted to buy it in order to let Romanian people watch all the vulgarization in the USA. And in Dallas, they didn’t recognize it. They just saw a dream of freedom, something to fight for.

Lesson 2: Once upon a time

What is the first television broadcaster ever? Nazi television. Why? Propaganda. Before the II World War, the first televisions acted as a barometer of changing politics. It was very interesting because television was a problem. We have to wait until the late 50s to have television sets everywhere. Before that, televisions were in bars, restaurants, etc. They were very creative; they created the reality shows. Then they stopped it because sometimes a Jew passed in front of the camera, so it wasn’t a good policy for that. The first talent show was a radio talent in the US. The ones that we have now aren’t new. We had public systems and private systems. In order to best understand what was the true origin of television in the US, we are going to see a documentary broadcasted in the 40s by the navy. During the II WW television was a way to entertain, to inform. They tried to use it as a military tool. In Italy, we didn’t have television, just in the USA and UK. A new industry was going to be created.

Technologies

Only air wave. Electronical signal to an antenna that receives the signal and then you can watch the signal. First TV channels needed an amount of light in the subject, in order to be received by the antenna, they put a statue of wood sculpture, making it burn. You can imagine the difficulty of the television, because you cannot take this camera and put it in front of what you want, you have to light the object. During the comparison of the assassination of JFK and 9/11, we are gonna talk a lot about these technologies. In the UK we had one TV channel, in the USA 3 channels, in Italy not television at all. TV operated as a cultural institution. Why? Because we didn’t have so much choice. You have no choice, so you watch something that is a little boring. TVs were expensive, so people reunited. It was very rare that you could watch television alone. So you could discuss the topic, discuss about it.

Why public, why commercial?

After the II WW in Europe we had 2 big problems:

• We knew dictatorships; Mussolini, Hitler. We knew exactly what was it. If we can create a democratic structure, and if it works, it’s better to give the responsibility of broadcasting under the control of the government, which it’s supposed to be an expression of the country.
• We didn’t have a good entrepreneur, so we didn’t have a good man able to organize television, it needed a huge amount of money. No one in Europe had this kind of money. Culture, Identity in Europe were a mess.

Not because we had the fault, but because in every country we had differences, even inside them. After the II WW the Italian language was spoken by 20% of the population, the rest of it spoke dialects. There was the goal to create a social identity. Historically, socialism is not an insult in Europe, it’s ideology. Not in America. The BBC was born in 1922, paid by radio set owners. BBC is not directly controlled by the government but it can control it every x year and it can demand the cost of a fee. If BBC is not watched with a specific amount of audience, the government is free to determine a lower fee or not to renew the license of the broadcast. Every 5 or 6 years BBC has to think about this. It has to communicate to the government and this one has to approve. So it’s not controlled by the government, but it was an instrument of this. So it was an object of propaganda.

Lord John Reith

Who was a former director general of the BBC from 1927 – 1938. Broadcasting is a servant of culture. His opinion on broadcasting has to inform, educate, and entertain. First of all, television has to inform citizens, then to educate, because education wasn’t high, and later to entertain. But at a certain point, thanks to some critics, something changed and thanks to televisions act, the first television ITV started to broadcast. It was the first commercial television channel. Commercial private competitor. When you are a monopolistic competitor, and another competitor comes, you can remain there or change something. BBC changed something and they started to show entertaining programs. BBC attended to be more entertaining, it started to give the public what it wants. That’s what John Reith said. The big problem is that the public doesn’t want to be educated. BBC in its attempt to be more entertaining starts to create entertaining programs with comedians. Nothing vulgar, just no sense.

Question that could be asked at the exam

Television act -> television act in 1954. An historical refusal of necessary taxation. A good entrepreneurial feel. The II WW left America with a lot of loss. Society:

• Minimum government intervention into private life.

In America, there are a lot of flags all around; that’s because there are 51 countries all different from each other, that’s the only thing that they have in common. They need something to look at in order to feel a part of something important. They are very passionate in culture and traditions. They don’t have an ancient story so they have to create their all story. In the US, after the I WW, we had a debate:

• Many Americans believed that the government should be the new home of domestic broadcasting activities.
• Others rejected the amount of government intervention in private life.

Differences between a republican and a democratic.

Scene of a fiction

Discussion between Josh, a democratic, and Donna. Why doesn’t the government want to give this money to people? Because we are democrats, but it’s not the government’s money. Sure it is. I want my money back. In 1934 the federal communication commission FCC. 3 TV giants:

• NBC
• CBS
• ABC

That was a supervision of the television and radio field. Since the early 50s, in America there were a lot of TV networks, but those TV giants owned other local televisions. We had an oligopolistic system.

The PBS

It wasn’t a pure commercial television. Public broadcasting service founded in 1969. Democrats believed in a big government, according to republicans, having a big government is a big problem. They started to give a voice to the minority against Nixon, who decided to cut financing to the PBS, who was supposed to do things without money. So the PBS wasn’t able to produce so it bought too BBC. In a country where you have 3 giants where the only aim was to entertain, could the PBS show Shakespeare? No.

Network audience

Oligopolistic situation, where networks tried to provide something for everyone. At the same time, the public was a unifying identity. Television was conceived as a mass media.

Public and commercial TV, a resume

This is a table that shows the differences between public and commercial television. The environment of commercial television there are companies. The public was very important, the seek associations, to give the public what it wanted. High standards, that’s not what people wanted. For commercial institutions, numbers were important.

The multichannel era

We had several technological innovations. We had the remote control, which was a big change. The public started to be something moving. Then we had cables, another way to transmit television. Satellite, recorded devices. People meters.

Features

• More TV channels
• More choice
• Branded broadcasters

Thanks to the multichannel area and a new global economy, we started to watch programs from other countries (Ex. Dallas). In Bulgaria there was the wheel of fortune, after the autonomy from the US. Bulgarian people had the possibility to see other Bulgarian people winning new things, like refrigerators. In this sense, the prizes of these programs suggested you new ways of life. In order to give electricity for refrigerators, it was a really expensive process; too expensive for Bulgarians.

We had two main kinds of productions:

• Blockbuster TV programs; that can be interesting for the biggest part of the public. For example, sitcoms, soap operas, X Factor, realities.
• Products with “edge”; those were the newest ones. They finally had something for the small audience too.

People meter

It was a small box and it’s the way through technology allowed television to know who is in front of the TV and for how long. This black box had a specific remote control. This notes when the television is on, it knows what programs you are watching now. In this remove control you have all the buttons for channels and other groups of buttons affiliated to people of the family. So every time you watch a TV program, if you push a button, all the information will be given to TV. The industry that produced these black boxes, they just gave them to the population. The rating, the number and personal page into the show.

Ratings

The percentage of household tuned into the show, all over the country.

Share

The proportion between the number of televisions switched on.

Demographics

Human social economic features of the audience.

LA 7; every TV program is hosted and presented by important journalists. It costs, they are expensive, they are public personalities. But the audience share of LA 7 is very low and they have most of the biggest names in the journalism field. They know that people who watch this program are very educated and rich. So advertisements on LA 7 are sold in a more expensive way than on RAI 1, which is the channel most watched by Italians.

Brand channels

For instance, Fox, MTV; HBO, Bloomers; ESPN, TBN, HSN. So we had the pre-history of television; propaganda, military tool, economy.

Then we had a network area with not so much choice. Then we had a multichannel area, with a lot of channels. Now we live in the figital media post-network era.

Technologies

• Recording devices
• Digital broadcasting
• Video aggregators
• Portable devices

We have mixed media.