How was television figured as a “window on the
world” during the period of 1948-1955, according to Lynn Spigel? Do
you think television fulfills (or is portrayed as fulfilling) a similar role
today?
Spigel argues that television is a "window on the world" in that it brings some social and physical aspects previously only found in the outside world into the viewer's own home. In midcentury ladies' home magazines and architectural monthlies, the the screen has implications as a literal window. Women were supposed to design around it, opening up their hallways and living rooms into spacious caverns so that, even while doing housework, they could watch their soaps. Almost like prying on neighbors even just being outside, the television screen opened up a new public realm for even the farthest reaches of America-- the suburbs, women, the bored and repressed. With its ability to depict faraway places and decadent lifestyles, television was like a vacation away from the real world. The screen dressed America up as it should be, and masqueraded as a realistic window on the world. It gave a panoramic view of a perfectly-recorded scene, an ideal view, the best seat in the house in the comfort of your own house. According to Spigel, television was a window on the world because the viewer could see everything as a silent nonparticipant watching from the sidelines.
I don't necessarily think television is exactly how Spigel describes it today. Mainly her concept of the screen being a source of embarrassment and anxiety, and a family's tendency to keep it locked away when not in use, definitely seems outdated. In my own home (and I'm sure many others), the television is the center of the living room, with chairs and couches arranged in the best possible angle so those pesky afternoon rays don't hit the screen and cause an ugly glare. Spigel goes into the design of midcentury living rooms and their incorporation of TVs, but not a trace of the stigma of having a television remains today. People love to brag about their big-screens, and take every opportunity to put them on display for their neighbors. That being said, I do still think television offers a metaphorical window on the world, showing us a privileged panoramic view of a scene. It's even more relevant with shows like Breaking Bad or Mad Men, in which every shot is planned to give the best view and portray a certain emotion. In my opinion, television will always have the quality of being designed and spectatorship will always be built around watching something new and informative (a view on another world), and it's only the opinions on the window itself that have changed over time.
Technology has long been thought of as a way for everyday citizens to bring that, which is far away, closer. Spigel quotes Leo Marx who said, “The dream of eradicating distances was a central trope of America’s early discourse on technology.” According to Spigel, this idea of technology began after the Civil War when transportation technology had advanced enough to bring us the train, and later cars, airplanes and so on. As technology improved it moved from the outside world to inside the home. When the 19th century ended, technology had developed enough to become an essential part of our homes. It brought us the telegraph, telephone, radio, and eventually the television. All of these technologies were used to bring conversations, ideas, and other issues from the outside world into the home. A television in your home meant that you had access to discussions and images of other people, places, and things, all from the comfort of your own home. If you could not afford to travel to another world, you could catch a program about it on the television. News about other parts of the worlds was able to travel via cables to your home whether you lived in the city, country, or suburbs. You might even be able to learn about city life from the comfort of your country house. The placement of the television in the home directly reflected this. Housewives were encouraged to place their television in settings, which would help to produce the feeling of traveling. It was suggested that television be placed alongside panoramic window views or perhaps next to globes and colorful maps. With this placement you were encouraged to think about the television as a tool to transport you to other parts of the world. Television served as an instrument to educate viewers about worlds or situations outside their own. Television provided them with a view of the world that they might otherwise have been unable to get. Television helped to give individuals a “window on the world” from within the privacy of their own homes. I believe that television can be just as powerful of a tool for learning about the world today, though I think that it has an overall less important part in the quest. The Internet has taken over some of television’s previous abilities. Instead of waiting for a program to appear on the television, individuals can search the Internet for pictures, news stories, even videos about other locations. Although television cannot guess what you might be interested in learning about, it might produce a story about something you had not previously considered. If we are willing to let it, television still has the power to bring new ideas and places into our homes. To this day, television still occupies an important part in our homes. We continue to place them in dominant locations and center certain rooms around the placement of them. Often we still look to television to provide with us information about places both close to and far away from us. Although there are other possible sources, I believe that television still provides individuals with a glimpse of other worlds.
Throughout Lynn Spigel’s paper, she applies the idea of television to being like a “window on the world” to many different aspects of modern life. Much like a true window, the television invited images from the outside world into the American home. Although the physical television’s power over the interior design and decoration of homes is quite interesting, I think Spigel’s discussion of the social changes it brought about is far more interesting.
Some of the issues that developed in homes after the introduction of television are ever present. One that particularly stuck out to me was a quote from TV Guide: “[Before TV] a girl thought of her boyfriend or husband as her prince charming [...] now [...] she thinks of her man as a prime idiot.” Although this clearly was an issue before the advent of television (when women could perhaps turn to cinema and literature for an escape), these Hollywood casanova-types so to say were much more pervasive. Essentially, they were in the home whenever a woman wanted them to be, all with the click of a few buttons. This is not at all different from today’s world, except this type of entertainment is even more “on demand” than before the invention of DVRs, online streaming, etc. I think there are plenty of people today who dream of having romantic lives and partners as interesting as the ones characters on shows like Entourage and Friends (amongst many, many others) experience. However, television of the 21st century also plays its own devil’s advocate in this respect. Various reality TV shows (i.e. Millionaire Matchmaker, The Bachelor/ette) are constantly reminding viewers how difficult it is to find a quality romantic partner.
Though I realize this wasn’t the focus of Spigel’s piece, I think it’s a good part to focus on in reflection of television’s changing role. While it remains a “window on the world,” it has ceased to produce solely retouched images of the outside world, and has begun to broadcast true realities as well.
There are many ways to think of television being a "window on the world". First, there is the most obvious answer that television can bring images of far off and exotic places into the comfort of the American home. Although this was a time when travel was becoming easier (with trains, planes and automobiles (heh)) this was also the time period where the concept of convenience was becoming extremely popular. The post-war economic boom allowed for more items to be sold rather than made at home and advancements in technologies like washers and dryers made housework much easier (although still quite a chore). The television's ability to help the viewer travel to these exotic places without ever having to leave their living room would have fit in quite well with the demand for convenience and instant gratification that was growing at the time.
In addition to being able to offer the sights of the world to the viewer without them having to leave their homes, television also acted on as a window to the idealized world that most middle-class Americans were striving for. The television showed happy families in lovely and comfortable homes living the American Dream, and in doing so it offers a view into what many Americans saw as the ideal way of living. Building off this, looking at the television showing these images as a window implies a certain closeness or achievability in these images, as though the viewer is not far away from living this idealized life, it’s so close they can see it through the window.
I think that we can still see television as a window on the world. The TV still offers images of places that not everyone is able to visit and therefore still bridges the gap between the viewer and the outside world. And many of today’s TV shows offer an idealized view on how we live our lives (I’m looking at reality TV in particular). However the television’s influence has certainly dwindled in recent years, with the emergence of the internet—where you can not only see these new and exotic lands but learn anything you want about these new and exotic lands—TV, and especially TV sets, have been becoming less and less important.
In her piece, Spigel talks about how postwar America’s move to the suburbs caused a kind of falling out with the public life associated with an urban atmosphere. She says, “they secured a position of meaning in the public sphere through their new found social identities as private landowners.” This is very much the start of how television was seen as a “window on the world.” Because homeowners were seemingly isolated, television acted as a way to view the world from the inside. The article goes on to explain that TV was a “form of ‘going places’ without even the expenditure of movement.” Spigel compares television’s rapid growth with that of the train in the post-Civil War years, and later with the telephone and radio; these new technological advancements allowed people to ‘conquer space.’ She talks about how family-based sitcoms perpetuated this idea by having grand landscape pictures in the windows of the set and how the characters were often sent traveling to scenic destinations.
Today, the world is much more accessible in terms of traveling and seeing. But I do, however, think that television can act, in ways, as a “window on the world.” Much of television today is portrayed as reality, that real people are portrayed in real events. And while I think most everyone knows the scripted nature of these shows, they still act as something different than the comforts of your own home. Even scripted dramas can work in these ways because they depict lives and events not about the viewers own family. In many ways, the “window on the world’ idea of the 40s and 50s was about this very concept: making something inaccessible accessible.
According to Spigel, Television was figured as a “Window to the world” in that it is a form of ‘going places’ without even moving. Television is literally brining the world to people’s doorsteps. During this time period advertisers marketed the television using illusions of the outside world to promote the ideology of the “window to the world.” It was a ‘global’ village in a box. An example of this would be the Goldbergs. This is one of those shows where you can physically see the “window to the world.” Before each episode Mrs. Goldberg would lean out her window, talk directly to the camera and tell all the viewers who the sponsor was. Afterword she would turn her back and start the episode. Because of the direct acknowledgment of the camera by Mrs. Goldberg the audience feels welcome into her home as the episode starts. They are welcomed into the world of the Goldbergs through the television. There then came a point where people wanted to hide their television because they were afraid the TV’s were watching them. It also brought viewers a view of the world that the human eye could never see, Television was an ‘electronic eye.’ So this “window to the world” allowed for many different views of places and things. I think that television fulfills a different role today. Though we still get many shows that are similar to the Goldbergs, television is mainly something that people go to as a source of entertainment rather than seeing what the world is like today. If people want to find more information about what is going on in the world or see what it looks like, many of us will turn to the internet. The internet provides a vast amount of information on subjects that is readily available to our fingertips. I believe that with today’s technologies the “window of the world” would be recognized as the internet because it is more accessible to people’s wants and needs than television.
There are many ways that television can act as a “window to the world.” In Lynn Spigel’s article, she discusses the migration of people from urban areas to the surrounding suburbs in the late forties and early fifties. This movement isolated families from the general hustle and bustle of city life, and created a new kind of culture that depended on information transmitted through the television. The television was thought of as a way to connect with other worlds, through common advertisements that told people what was hot to buy, to television shows that feature families going on scenic vacations. The television gave those families isolated in the suburbs a chance to understand what was going on beyond the four walls of their home and bring the public life of culture into the private home.
Even today, we use television as a way to expand beyond our own horizons. We can transmit almost any kind of television show from around the world, giving us exposure to all cultures and even bringing a sense of comfort to those who have to relocate. Those on the east coast know what’s happening with those on the west coast. The concept of news on television, especially global news, allows those who have never traveled out of the state to know the political tensions on the other side of the world. Although we are moving toward more niche programming, this niche programming now doesn’t necessarily have to be produced, directed, or even about the people similar to you in your life.
Televisions purpose as “a window on the world” was meant to bring other aspects of life not often seen into the home. People typically kept at home (meaning women and children) didn’t have too much experience with life outside of their towns and communities. Television let them experience life on the coasts, life in a busy metropolis. After returning from the war, men moved their families to the suburbs to begin pursuing the American Dream, which meant fresh air and a big yard at the time. Life in the cities was foreign to them, but they could watch the television and see what it was like to live in a city. They could see a different life without ever leaving their homes. I think television is still fulfilling a similar role today, allowing those who watch it to venture into places beyond our reach. However, instead of merely going to the city, television takes us into places normal people never really see (prison in Orange Is The New Black) or a different time (The Borgias) or even into fantasy realms (Once Upon A Time). People now can travel much more easily, but television still connects people to another world, one they can never truly visit. Though people can now go out and see the places television originally took them, they still watch it, going to more fantastic places than ever.
In the period of 1948-1955 America was in a mass consumer economy with migration from the cities to uniform suburban life. WIth the move to the suburbs and transformation to a more standard "American" way of life, television offered families a "window to the world" or in other words allowed families to connect with far parts of the world in the comfort of their living room. It was presented in advertisements as a literal window or centerpiece in the home that women were to design around and often was presented next to large windows and images from around the world or objects like a globe. This idea that TV was a "window to the world" meant it provided images that were representative of the world around. Whether a viewer wanted to watch a news or informative program with images from some far away country or if a viewer wanted entertainment, the program was considered to be a close substitute for actually being present in the place. Sitcoms even began to represent the American suburban life.
I think today the role of television has changed. In the period between 1948 and 1955 there were limited options for programming and television had a greater role in shaping perceptions of the world. With so many options for programming, today television often reinforces the viewers already established ideals and is more of an escape or form of entertainment rather than a view into the world. I think news programming still tries to fulfill the role of bringing the world into the living room as stories are often portrayed throughout the globe and stories can come out of a local location or a far off land.
Spigel describes the television as a device that established connections between people as well as the public and private spheres. As the idea of open floor plans and the blurring of the line between interior space and the outside world became popularized, the addition of the television in many homes offered another opportunity to bring the rest of the world into one’s home. Television acted as a “window on the world” for many families by offering a view that was not accessible from the other windows in the home: a view of far off, glamorous places and of “typical” families in their own homes (carefully designed sets, more accurately). While it was not, and still is not, socially acceptable to peer through neighbors’ windows, a similar act was made possible by the television screen; the lives of others were put on display for owners of TVs to see. Furthermore, people were allowed to catch a glimpse of exciting places such as Hollywood or New York by looking through the windows of the homes they saw on television. This sort of observation that was popular in the early days of television has, in some ways, become amplified today. Viewers can now tune in to a show featuring a real family or collection of people, not actors (although this is sometimes debatable) go about their daily lives. The variety of reality TV shows on air today suggest that Americans are just as, if not more interested in watching another world through the “window” offered by a television. Audiences can be a fly on the wall in a real family’s home and are riveted as the drama unfolds. The TV set itself does not seem to hold the same meaning as it once did because, for example, it has become commonplace in many homes today so people are often less conscious of its presence in their homes when it is not in use. Additionally, it is playing a less important role in the access of TV shows as the Internet is providing a greater opportunity to watch them on other devices. Yet, the idea behind it still stands: audiences turn to TV shows to provide a representation of the rest of the world.
Thirty years ago I think one may have been able to still argue that there was a certain level of resistance to allowing the “window to the world” to invade ones home. That was still a time when people didn’t have a TV in every room, and computers were just coming into existance. Now the argument is invalid. Today, it’s almost weird for people to not have atleast one, and more often multiple TVs in their homes. I find it interesting that there is this fascination with being able to use TV to view the lives of others, but people are so fearful of being viewed themselves. Today, I don’t think there is much consideration given to this idea of being viewed through the television. Instead we have transferred this fear this with computers and webcams and such.
I have to agree also with Bridget’s point that the implication that TV has changed the way we look at our husbands and boyfriends is not necessarily looking at the grand picture. History has seen a change in male/female dynamics that has nothing to do with television. It has to more to do with the fact that over the past century, women have become more independent, more outspoken, and now possess an equality with their male counterparts in the home and workplace that was not present in the early days of television. This in itself affects the way relationships are perceived and what qualities a woman might look for in her husband or boyfriend. So while TV certainly has the capacity to influence our view of the world, we also have to consider other outside factors as well.
In Lynn Spigel's piece "Installing The TV," she provides us with a clear historical picture of post-war times and how certain economic factors related to the need for television-- specifically as a "window on the world"-- during this period. After WWII, Spigel notes that the suburban housing boom made it cheaper for young couples to purchase a pre-made house rather than an apartment in the city (5). Women's magazines at the time knew how to cater to the desires of these women. They provided them with ideas for a continuous floor plan and sliding doors to magnify a room's size; however, TV was able to take this notion further. The TV industry during this post-war period was able to complement the new housing utopia. While the husband was out working, the wife would take care of the house and the children. But what could she do while keeping house to entertain herself? Use the TV as an escape. Magazines even helped solidify this notion by suggesting to place the set near windows or globes in order to promote "the image of the television as a 'global village'" (9). Spigel continues by exploring how TV sitcoms profited on the homemaking woman's dream to see outside of her private sphere: sitcoms were often situated in TV homes with illusions of outside spaces, and some shows even featured their starlets escaping the home to a far distant land (10).
I would argue that TV fulfills a similar role as a "window on the world" in our media-centered lives. Advertising, reality TV shows, and our favorite dramas often feature characters going off to explore a new and exciting place-- an Old Spice rep rides a horse down a luxurious beach, the Jersey Shore cast spends a season in Italy... They are all going places and doing things that we wish that we could be doing. We live vicariously through these images and stories on our TV, and television still has a lasting impact, similar to this post-war period, on our lives.
Spigel argues that television became a “window to the world” in the way it brought the possibilities of travel, and the various cultures of the country and world into the living room of the common American family, without the price of a plane ticket or the hassle of traveling. In the late 40’s and 1950’s, the common American family was transforming due to the Baby Boom and the suburbanization of families who chose to move out of the city and into more rural areas. With this move, the American people had to find a way to bring the outside world into their own lives instead of going out to find it themselves. This is where television came in. Through sitcoms, they were now able to see seemingly common American families who lived in the very city that was once their home. It would seem as if they never left. The television offered a distraction to the somewhat boring and monotonous lifestyle that surrounded suburbia. The new life with television began to shape the way every home would begin to look like. Instead of travelling to the theater, the homes began to be “theatricalized”, as televisions began to become a substitution for going out to the theater. Spigel suggests that the theatricalization of the home was positive for the man of the household, but negative for the common housewife who was stuck inside with the television all day. As television became a “window to the world”, the need to go outside the house lessened, and the housewife’s idea of a night on the town became to crumble. The husband’s idea of date night became sitting at home watching television, while the wife still wanted to go out.
According to Spigel, one way that television served as a "window on the world" during the period of 1948-1955 was its ability to show viewers far away places. As Spigel describes, one aspect of technology is the ability to "eradicate distances", and for the television this is certainly true. The television allows viewers to see places and things that normally they would not be able to see, and one factor that could prevent them from experiencing these places in the real world is distance.
Another example Spigel uses to describe television as a "window on the world" is the idea of blurring the lines between the inside world and the outside world, or the natural world and the home. One example of this affecting television is the scenic backgrounds used in numerous television shows, which frequently depicted natural and/or exotic spaces and made them more accessible to viewers by bringing them in to the private domain. Furthermore, Spigel discusses how various television shows depicted homes with large picture windows to better see the outside space. One effect of this was allowing less affluent audiences the ability to feel as if they are experiencing these exotic outside spaces along with the characters.
I feel that television does fulfill a similar role in today's society, even though with increasing technology and globalization it is easier than ever to travel or to learn about different places through the internet, books and magazines as well as television. As someone who has never been out of the country, some of the shows I enjoy watching most are those set in different countries, whether they are reality shows or scripted. Also, the prevalence of reality shows with stars who often have exaggerated personalities and lead extravagant or interesting lives gives many viewers the chance to see into a world that normally they could not, and some viewers may wish that they could be a part of the world they see on television.
I think the way that television was seen as a "window to the world" is in the sense that it was a source of showing the world to viewers at home. Spigel explains that there were many ad's that showed the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben as backdrops, and these far away fantasies were even present in sitcoms. The television was a way that ordinary families could look at different places around the world, and experience things that they could never see if it wasn't for their television set. At the same time, a different way to look at is is that the realism of the American family could be seen through television. At the same time that luxury was portrayed, the comfortable living environment that the common American experienced was also seen in television. This is another example of how the window to [the average american's] world was seen because of television. Spigel explains this realism could be used as an advertising advantage. in an example of I Love Lucy, "the sponsor's product literally served as the stage of representation for the narrative." This helps to show that real-life products were used in advertisements in fantasy television shows, which strengthens Spigel's point that television is "a window to the world". This helps prove that the differences between reality and television are hard to decipher.
In her essay, Spigel spends a lot of time talking about the large post war migration to the suburbs and its effect on the American people. Basically there was this feeling of separation and isolation and television was a way to shrink the world. It was able to bring these far away places into the living room. This among other aspects was her basis for arguing that television was a window on the world.
For the most part I can agree with what she said. In particular I found advertising’s role to be most interesting. Though television today does not seem to have the same family uniting qualities, I think the message still makes its way through. A majority of the popular programs depict seemingly real-life people and for the viewers it can act as a type of escape. At least for me while the show is on the rest of the world seems to vanish. I become engrossed and I feel like I am actually there. While it is not a window on the world in the sense that we are traveling to exotic locations while sitting in our living rooms, it is a window into other people’s worlds, the world of the characters.
According to Lynn Spigel, television was a "window to the world" through its way of isolating people from the world. She writes, "the ideology of privacy was not experienced simply as a retreat from the public sphere; instead it also gave people a sense of belonging to the community," implying that it drew people further away from cities and communities than anything else before it, and consequently made them feel closer to each other because of its artificial closing of the gap that television itself created.
Television will always fulfill its role as a "window to the world," otherwise it would have become an obsolete appliance. Although this window is still present, that is not to say it is still as prominent as in the mid 20th century. In today's age we have handheld devices; tablets, smart phones, cameras, laptops - and communications within these peripherals - all of which show us a window to the world far greater than television has yet to offer. If anything, television is becoming a component of these devices. More and more is it becoming an internet-integrated service, where if you miss a show you can watch it the next day on the network's website, or if not there, it'll be streaming for free on an illegal website. While television is still a window to the world, it seems as though the world is becoming too small to see much more.
In “Installing the Television Set” Spigel discusses how television was able to bring the public world into the private home and how this was important for the time period. Between 1948 and 1955 an increasing number of people moved from an urban atmosphere to the suburbs as it became cheaper to become a private homeowner than to rent an apartment. This disconnected people from a more public life in the city and so the television was seen as “a form of going places without the expenditure of movement.” Often it was seen as a way of “bringing the world to people’s doorsteps” in a way that had never been possible before and gave them the ability to participate and observe cultural events without venturing to more urban areas where more cultural events take place. While newsreels and radio were able to provide audiences with content from across the globe, never before had the American people been able to get such a full view of the world from their own homes.
While television today still functions in this sense, the Internet can be seen as an even larger force in interacting with the world from home. While television gives viewers the ability to travel without even leaving their living room they are passive viewers. In contrast, Internet users are active and given the ability to interact with other parts of the world. If television is a window to the world than the Internet can be seen as functioning as more of a door.
Throughout “Installing the Television Set”, Spigel describes many ways in which television was promoted as a “window on the world” in not only referencing content, but in relation to décor and a means to isolation. Spigel provides an historical context by referencing the mass exodus of middle-class white families from the city to suburban areas in which they were isolated from the goings on of the world. Television providers targeted this separation by marketing TV as a means to overcome such separations. Content was produced that was perceived as relatable yet exotic enough to warrant the attention of the average American sitting at home after work. For example The Burns and Allen Show in which they acted as a regular American married couple that happened to be comedic actors. The concept of a window into their world was emphasized through the set consisting of open walls and windows to shoot through as well as to have backdrops of their simple Hollywood setting. Additionally, magazines and articles would emphasize framing the television in home décor in the exact way that they organized a home around a window. I believe that a similar concept is seen in the production of television content today. Entire networks are dedicated to travel and adventure content. More interesting is the newfound prevalence of “reality” programming and its popularity. Reality shows have taken the voyeuristic quality of viewing the world through a window to a whole new level as the sole purpose is presented as an opportunity to simple observe the actions of strangers in odd situations. Adding more to the casual claims of “through the window” are the less rigidly structured styles of reality programming in which they use permanent surveillance type cameras, handheld and single camera set ups. I think that the goal today of many producers may be to portray televison as a “window on the world”, however as content becomes more ridiculous, spectacular, and sometimes just plain bad, it cheapens the content and makes the advertising ploys of “windows” to obvious for a modern crowd to buy.
Television was considered a "window to the world" in the late 1940s/early 1950s because it provided just that: a way of seeing things all around the world that one normally couldn't see. This is particularly apparent in variety shows, where numerous talent acts and sketches and songs would be performed for the audience, bringing viewers entertainment that they normally would only see if they happened to live in the same region as the act, or were lucky enough to be near a big city where that act might tour. Musicians and gymnasts, from the east coast could be broadcast to viewers in the midwest, allowing them to experience these bits of culture that would normally be unattainable for them. Interesting stories and people from around the world could be presented as well...the television set provided an almost magical link between the viewer and the camera.
Today we experience this more than ever before, thanks to high speed global communication and smaller, lighter cameras. TV shows such as Man vs Wild allow viewers to see what it might be like to survive in the remote wilderness of Australia, for example. Shows on the National Geographic channel might show viewers an obscure festival in Spain. TV enables, moreso than ever before, the consumption of the global culture and entertainment from anywhere a viewer might be.
In the compelling chapter, Installing the Television Set, Lynn Spiegel illuminates how television served as a “window to the world” during the period of 1948-1955 as this groundbreaking outlet of information transformed the fabric of domestic life in the the United States. Following World War II, there was an unprecedented migration of Americans from the cities to the suburbs, resulting in a new sense of isolationism and privacy. However, the emergence of television curtailed this growing sense of isolationism as it became the fundamental medium that linked Americans from all over the country. Spiegel analyzes how television became a “new form of social cohesion which allowed people to be alone and together at the same time.” Essentially, television exploded because it brought the events of the outside world to people’s doorsteps as they were now able to sit in their living room and imagine that they were somewhere far far away. Spiegel calls this feeling “hyper-realism,” and describes how the image of television was a “Global village.” For the first time people were connected to wider social fabric, while at the same time keeping their privacy and distance from the outside world.
Although I do believe that television remains crucial in connecting and informing the population in contemporary America, it does not have the same power that it controlled at the midpoint of the twentieth century. Advances in technology have obliterated the stranglehold that television once had on entertainment in society. Today there are a plethora of media outlets, most notably the internet and cellular phones, which serve the same function as television.
Spigel argues that television is a "window on the world" in that it brings some social and physical aspects previously only found in the outside world into the viewer's own home. In midcentury ladies' home magazines and architectural monthlies, the the screen has implications as a literal window. Women were supposed to design around it, opening up their hallways and living rooms into spacious caverns so that, even while doing housework, they could watch their soaps. Almost like prying on neighbors even just being outside, the television screen opened up a new public realm for even the farthest reaches of America-- the suburbs, women, the bored and repressed. With its ability to depict faraway places and decadent lifestyles, television was like a vacation away from the real world. The screen dressed America up as it should be, and masqueraded as a realistic window on the world. It gave a panoramic view of a perfectly-recorded scene, an ideal view, the best seat in the house in the comfort of your own house. According to Spigel, television was a window on the world because the viewer could see everything as a silent nonparticipant watching from the sidelines.
ReplyDeleteI don't necessarily think television is exactly how Spigel describes it today. Mainly her concept of the screen being a source of embarrassment and anxiety, and a family's tendency to keep it locked away when not in use, definitely seems outdated. In my own home (and I'm sure many others), the television is the center of the living room, with chairs and couches arranged in the best possible angle so those pesky afternoon rays don't hit the screen and cause an ugly glare. Spigel goes into the design of midcentury living rooms and their incorporation of TVs, but not a trace of the stigma of having a television remains today. People love to brag about their big-screens, and take every opportunity to put them on display for their neighbors. That being said, I do still think television offers a metaphorical window on the world, showing us a privileged panoramic view of a scene. It's even more relevant with shows like Breaking Bad or Mad Men, in which every shot is planned to give the best view and portray a certain emotion. In my opinion, television will always have the quality of being designed and spectatorship will always be built around watching something new and informative (a view on another world), and it's only the opinions on the window itself that have changed over time.
Technology has long been thought of as a way for everyday citizens to bring that, which is far away, closer. Spigel quotes Leo Marx who said, “The dream of eradicating distances was a central trope of America’s early discourse on technology.” According to Spigel, this idea of technology began after the Civil War when transportation technology had advanced enough to bring us the train, and later cars, airplanes and so on. As technology improved it moved from the outside world to inside the home. When the 19th century ended, technology had developed enough to become an essential part of our homes. It brought us the telegraph, telephone, radio, and eventually the television. All of these technologies were used to bring conversations, ideas, and other issues from the outside world into the home. A television in your home meant that you had access to discussions and images of other people, places, and things, all from the comfort of your own home. If you could not afford to travel to another world, you could catch a program about it on the television. News about other parts of the worlds was able to travel via cables to your home whether you lived in the city, country, or suburbs. You might even be able to learn about city life from the comfort of your country house. The placement of the television in the home directly reflected this. Housewives were encouraged to place their television in settings, which would help to produce the feeling of traveling. It was suggested that television be placed alongside panoramic window views or perhaps next to globes and colorful maps. With this placement you were encouraged to think about the television as a tool to transport you to other parts of the world. Television served as an instrument to educate viewers about worlds or situations outside their own. Television provided them with a view of the world that they might otherwise have been unable to get. Television helped to give individuals a “window on the world” from within the privacy of their own homes.
ReplyDeleteI believe that television can be just as powerful of a tool for learning about the world today, though I think that it has an overall less important part in the quest. The Internet has taken over some of television’s previous abilities. Instead of waiting for a program to appear on the television, individuals can search the Internet for pictures, news stories, even videos about other locations. Although television cannot guess what you might be interested in learning about, it might produce a story about something you had not previously considered. If we are willing to let it, television still has the power to bring new ideas and places into our homes. To this day, television still occupies an important part in our homes. We continue to place them in dominant locations and center certain rooms around the placement of them. Often we still look to television to provide with us information about places both close to and far away from us. Although there are other possible sources, I believe that television still provides individuals with a glimpse of other worlds.
Throughout Lynn Spigel’s paper, she applies the idea of television to being like a “window on the world” to many different aspects of modern life. Much like a true window, the television invited images from the outside world into the American home. Although the physical television’s power over the interior design and decoration of homes is quite interesting, I think Spigel’s discussion of the social changes it brought about is far more interesting.
ReplyDeleteSome of the issues that developed in homes after the introduction of television are ever present. One that particularly stuck out to me was a quote from TV Guide: “[Before TV] a girl thought of her boyfriend or husband as her prince charming [...] now [...] she thinks of her man as a prime idiot.” Although this clearly was an issue before the advent of television (when women could perhaps turn to cinema and literature for an escape), these Hollywood casanova-types so to say were much more pervasive. Essentially, they were in the home whenever a woman wanted them to be, all with the click of a few buttons. This is not at all different from today’s world, except this type of entertainment is even more “on demand” than before the invention of DVRs, online streaming, etc. I think there are plenty of people today who dream of having romantic lives and partners as interesting as the ones characters on shows like Entourage and Friends (amongst many, many others) experience. However, television of the 21st century also plays its own devil’s advocate in this respect. Various reality TV shows (i.e. Millionaire Matchmaker, The Bachelor/ette) are constantly reminding viewers how difficult it is to find a quality romantic partner.
Though I realize this wasn’t the focus of Spigel’s piece, I think it’s a good part to focus on in reflection of television’s changing role. While it remains a “window on the world,” it has ceased to produce solely retouched images of the outside world, and has begun to broadcast true realities as well.
There are many ways to think of television being a "window on the world". First, there is the most obvious answer that television can bring images of far off and exotic places into the comfort of the American home. Although this was a time when travel was becoming easier (with trains, planes and automobiles (heh)) this was also the time period where the concept of convenience was becoming extremely popular. The post-war economic boom allowed for more items to be sold rather than made at home and advancements in technologies like washers and dryers made housework much easier (although still quite a chore). The television's ability to help the viewer travel to these exotic places without ever having to leave their living room would have fit in quite well with the demand for convenience and instant gratification that was growing at the time.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to being able to offer the sights of the world to the viewer without them having to leave their homes, television also acted on as a window to the idealized world that most middle-class Americans were striving for. The television showed happy families in lovely and comfortable homes living the American Dream, and in doing so it offers a view into what many Americans saw as the ideal way of living. Building off this, looking at the television showing these images as a window implies a certain closeness or achievability in these images, as though the viewer is not far away from living this idealized life, it’s so close they can see it through the window.
I think that we can still see television as a window on the world. The TV still offers images of places that not everyone is able to visit and therefore still bridges the gap between the viewer and the outside world. And many of today’s TV shows offer an idealized view on how we live our lives (I’m looking at reality TV in particular). However the television’s influence has certainly dwindled in recent years, with the emergence of the internet—where you can not only see these new and exotic lands but learn anything you want about these new and exotic lands—TV, and especially TV sets, have been becoming less and less important.
In her piece, Spigel talks about how postwar America’s move to the suburbs caused a kind of falling out with the public life associated with an urban atmosphere. She says, “they secured a position of meaning in the public sphere through their new found social identities as private landowners.” This is very much the start of how television was seen as a “window on the world.” Because homeowners were seemingly isolated, television acted as a way to view the world from the inside. The article goes on to explain that TV was a “form of ‘going places’ without even the expenditure of movement.” Spigel compares television’s rapid growth with that of the train in the post-Civil War years, and later with the telephone and radio; these new technological advancements allowed people to ‘conquer space.’ She talks about how family-based sitcoms perpetuated this idea by having grand landscape pictures in the windows of the set and how the characters were often sent traveling to scenic destinations.
ReplyDeleteToday, the world is much more accessible in terms of traveling and seeing. But I do, however, think that television can act, in ways, as a “window on the world.” Much of television today is portrayed as reality, that real people are portrayed in real events. And while I think most everyone knows the scripted nature of these shows, they still act as something different than the comforts of your own home. Even scripted dramas can work in these ways because they depict lives and events not about the viewers own family. In many ways, the “window on the world’ idea of the 40s and 50s was about this very concept: making something inaccessible accessible.
According to Spigel, Television was figured as a “Window to the world” in that it is a form of ‘going places’ without even moving. Television is literally brining the world to people’s doorsteps. During this time period advertisers marketed the television using illusions of the outside world to promote the ideology of the “window to the world.” It was a ‘global’ village in a box. An example of this would be the Goldbergs. This is one of those shows where you can physically see the “window to the world.” Before each episode Mrs. Goldberg would lean out her window, talk directly to the camera and tell all the viewers who the sponsor was. Afterword she would turn her back and start the episode. Because of the direct acknowledgment of the camera by Mrs. Goldberg the audience feels welcome into her home as the episode starts. They are welcomed into the world of the Goldbergs through the television.
ReplyDeleteThere then came a point where people wanted to hide their television because they were afraid the TV’s were watching them. It also brought viewers a view of the world that the human eye could never see, Television was an ‘electronic eye.’ So this “window to the world” allowed for many different views of places and things.
I think that television fulfills a different role today. Though we still get many shows that are similar to the Goldbergs, television is mainly something that people go to as a source of entertainment rather than seeing what the world is like today. If people want to find more information about what is going on in the world or see what it looks like, many of us will turn to the internet. The internet provides a vast amount of information on subjects that is readily available to our fingertips. I believe that with today’s technologies the “window of the world” would be recognized as the internet because it is more accessible to people’s wants and needs than television.
There are many ways that television can act as a “window to the world.” In Lynn Spigel’s article, she discusses the migration of people from urban areas to the surrounding suburbs in the late forties and early fifties. This movement isolated families from the general hustle and bustle of city life, and created a new kind of culture that depended on information transmitted through the television. The television was thought of as a way to connect with other worlds, through common advertisements that told people what was hot to buy, to television shows that feature families going on scenic vacations. The television gave those families isolated in the suburbs a chance to understand what was going on beyond the four walls of their home and bring the public life of culture into the private home.
ReplyDeleteEven today, we use television as a way to expand beyond our own horizons. We can transmit almost any kind of television show from around the world, giving us exposure to all cultures and even bringing a sense of comfort to those who have to relocate. Those on the east coast know what’s happening with those on the west coast. The concept of news on television, especially global news, allows those who have never traveled out of the state to know the political tensions on the other side of the world. Although we are moving toward more niche programming, this niche programming now doesn’t necessarily have to be produced, directed, or even about the people similar to you in your life.
Televisions purpose as “a window on the world” was meant to bring other aspects of life not often seen into the home. People typically kept at home (meaning women and children) didn’t have too much experience with life outside of their towns and communities. Television let them experience life on the coasts, life in a busy metropolis. After returning from the war, men moved their families to the suburbs to begin pursuing the American Dream, which meant fresh air and a big yard at the time. Life in the cities was foreign to them, but they could watch the television and see what it was like to live in a city. They could see a different life without ever leaving their homes.
ReplyDeleteI think television is still fulfilling a similar role today, allowing those who watch it to venture into places beyond our reach. However, instead of merely going to the city, television takes us into places normal people never really see (prison in Orange Is The New Black) or a different time (The Borgias) or even into fantasy realms (Once Upon A Time). People now can travel much more easily, but television still connects people to another world, one they can never truly visit. Though people can now go out and see the places television originally took them, they still watch it, going to more fantastic places than ever.
In the period of 1948-1955 America was in a mass consumer economy with migration from the cities to uniform suburban life. WIth the move to the suburbs and transformation to a more standard "American" way of life, television offered families a "window to the world" or in other words allowed families to connect with far parts of the world in the comfort of their living room. It was presented in advertisements as a literal window or centerpiece in the home that women were to design around and often was presented next to large windows and images from around the world or objects like a globe. This idea that TV was a "window to the world" meant it provided images that were representative of the world around. Whether a viewer wanted to watch a news or informative program with images from some far away country or if a viewer wanted entertainment, the program was considered to be a close substitute for actually being present in the place. Sitcoms even began to represent the American suburban life.
ReplyDeleteI think today the role of television has changed. In the period between 1948 and 1955 there were limited options for programming and television had a greater role in shaping perceptions of the world. With so many options for programming, today television often reinforces the viewers already established ideals and is more of an escape or form of entertainment rather than a view into the world. I think news programming still tries to fulfill the role of bringing the world into the living room as stories are often portrayed throughout the globe and stories can come out of a local location or a far off land.
Spigel describes the television as a device that established connections between people as well as the public and private spheres. As the idea of open floor plans and the blurring of the line between interior space and the outside world became popularized, the addition of the television in many homes offered another opportunity to bring the rest of the world into one’s home. Television acted as a “window on the world” for many families by offering a view that was not accessible from the other windows in the home: a view of far off, glamorous places and of “typical” families in their own homes (carefully designed sets, more accurately). While it was not, and still is not, socially acceptable to peer through neighbors’ windows, a similar act was made possible by the television screen; the lives of others were put on display for owners of TVs to see. Furthermore, people were allowed to catch a glimpse of exciting places such as Hollywood or New York by looking through the windows of the homes they saw on television.
ReplyDeleteThis sort of observation that was popular in the early days of television has, in some ways, become amplified today. Viewers can now tune in to a show featuring a real family or collection of people, not actors (although this is sometimes debatable) go about their daily lives. The variety of reality TV shows on air today suggest that Americans are just as, if not more interested in watching another world through the “window” offered by a television. Audiences can be a fly on the wall in a real family’s home and are riveted as the drama unfolds. The TV set itself does not seem to hold the same meaning as it once did because, for example, it has become commonplace in many homes today so people are often less conscious of its presence in their homes when it is not in use. Additionally, it is playing a less important role in the access of TV shows as the Internet is providing a greater opportunity to watch them on other devices. Yet, the idea behind it still stands: audiences turn to TV shows to provide a representation of the rest of the world.
Thirty years ago I think one may have been able to still argue that there was a certain level of resistance to allowing the “window to the world” to invade ones home. That was still a time when people didn’t have a TV in every room, and computers were just coming into existance. Now the argument is invalid. Today, it’s almost weird for people to not have atleast one, and more often multiple TVs in their homes. I find it interesting that there is this fascination with being able to use TV to view the lives of others, but people are so fearful of being viewed themselves. Today, I don’t think there is much consideration given to this idea of being viewed through the television. Instead we have transferred this fear this with computers and webcams and such.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree also with Bridget’s point that the implication that TV has changed the way we look at our husbands and boyfriends is not necessarily looking at the grand picture. History has seen a change in male/female dynamics that has nothing to do with television. It has to more to do with the fact that over the past century, women have become more independent, more outspoken, and now possess an equality with their male counterparts in the home and workplace that was not present in the early days of television. This in itself affects the way relationships are perceived and what qualities a woman might look for in her husband or boyfriend. So while TV certainly has the capacity to influence our view of the world, we also have to consider other outside factors as well.
In Lynn Spigel's piece "Installing The TV," she provides us with a clear historical picture of post-war times and how certain economic factors related to the need for television-- specifically as a "window on the world"-- during this period. After WWII, Spigel notes that the suburban housing boom made it cheaper for young couples to purchase a pre-made house rather than an apartment in the city (5). Women's magazines at the time knew how to cater to the desires of these women. They provided them with ideas for a continuous floor plan and sliding doors to magnify a room's size; however, TV was able to take this notion further. The TV industry during this post-war period was able to complement the new housing utopia. While the husband was out working, the wife would take care of the house and the children. But what could she do while keeping house to entertain herself? Use the TV as an escape. Magazines even helped solidify this notion by suggesting to place the set near windows or globes in order to promote "the image of the television as a 'global village'" (9). Spigel continues by exploring how TV sitcoms profited on the homemaking woman's dream to see outside of her private sphere: sitcoms were often situated in TV homes with illusions of outside spaces, and some shows even featured their starlets escaping the home to a far distant land (10).
ReplyDeleteI would argue that TV fulfills a similar role as a "window on the world" in our media-centered lives. Advertising, reality TV shows, and our favorite dramas often feature characters going off to explore a new and exciting place-- an Old Spice rep rides a horse down a luxurious beach, the Jersey Shore cast spends a season in Italy... They are all going places and doing things that we wish that we could be doing. We live vicariously through these images and stories on our TV, and television still has a lasting impact, similar to this post-war period, on our lives.
Spigel argues that television became a “window to the world” in the way it brought the possibilities of travel, and the various cultures of the country and world into the living room of the common American family, without the price of a plane ticket or the hassle of traveling. In the late 40’s and 1950’s, the common American family was transforming due to the Baby Boom and the suburbanization of families who chose to move out of the city and into more rural areas. With this move, the American people had to find a way to bring the outside world into their own lives instead of going out to find it themselves. This is where television came in. Through sitcoms, they were now able to see seemingly common American families who lived in the very city that was once their home. It would seem as if they never left. The television offered a distraction to the somewhat boring and monotonous lifestyle that surrounded suburbia.
ReplyDeleteThe new life with television began to shape the way every home would begin to look like. Instead of travelling to the theater, the homes began to be “theatricalized”, as televisions began to become a substitution for going out to the theater. Spigel suggests that the theatricalization of the home was positive for the man of the household, but negative for the common housewife who was stuck inside with the television all day. As television became a “window to the world”, the need to go outside the house lessened, and the housewife’s idea of a night on the town became to crumble. The husband’s idea of date night became sitting at home watching television, while the wife still wanted to go out.
According to Spigel, one way that television served as a "window on the world" during the period of 1948-1955 was its ability to show viewers far away places. As Spigel describes, one aspect of technology is the ability to "eradicate distances", and for the television this is certainly true. The television allows viewers to see places and things that normally they would not be able to see, and one factor that could prevent them from experiencing these places in the real world is distance.
ReplyDeleteAnother example Spigel uses to describe television as a "window on the world" is the idea of blurring the lines between the inside world and the outside world, or the natural world and the home. One example of this affecting television is the scenic backgrounds used in numerous television shows, which frequently depicted natural and/or exotic spaces and made them more accessible to viewers by bringing them in to the private domain. Furthermore, Spigel discusses how various television shows depicted homes with large picture windows to better see the outside space. One effect of this was allowing less affluent audiences the ability to feel as if they are experiencing these exotic outside spaces along with the characters.
I feel that television does fulfill a similar role in today's society, even though with increasing technology and globalization it is easier than ever to travel or to learn about different places through the internet, books and magazines as well as television. As someone who has never been out of the country, some of the shows I enjoy watching most are those set in different countries, whether they are reality shows or scripted. Also, the prevalence of reality shows with stars who often have exaggerated personalities and lead extravagant or interesting lives gives many viewers the chance to see into a world that normally they could not, and some viewers may wish that they could be a part of the world they see on television.
I think the way that television was seen as a "window to the world" is in the sense that it was a source of showing the world to viewers at home. Spigel explains that there were many ad's that showed the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben as backdrops, and these far away fantasies were even present in sitcoms. The television was a way that ordinary families could look at different places around the world, and experience things that they could never see if it wasn't for their television set.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, a different way to look at is is that the realism of the American family could be seen through television. At the same time that luxury was portrayed, the comfortable living environment that the common American experienced was also seen in television. This is another example of how the window to [the average american's] world was seen because of television.
Spigel explains this realism could be used as an advertising advantage. in an example of I Love Lucy, "the sponsor's product literally served as the stage of representation for the narrative." This helps to show that real-life products were used in advertisements in fantasy television shows, which strengthens Spigel's point that television is "a window to the world". This helps prove that the differences between reality and television are hard to decipher.
In her essay, Spigel spends a lot of time talking about the large post war migration to the suburbs and its effect on the American people. Basically there was this feeling of separation and isolation and television was a way to shrink the world. It was able to bring these far away places into the living room. This among other aspects was her basis for arguing that television was a window on the world.
ReplyDeleteFor the most part I can agree with what she said. In particular I found advertising’s role to be most interesting. Though television today does not seem to have the same family uniting qualities, I think the message still makes its way through. A majority of the popular programs depict seemingly real-life people and for the viewers it can act as a type of escape. At least for me while the show is on the rest of the world seems to vanish. I become engrossed and I feel like I am actually there. While it is not a window on the world in the sense that we are traveling to exotic locations while sitting in our living rooms, it is a window into other people’s worlds, the world of the characters.
According to Lynn Spigel, television was a "window to the world" through its way of isolating people from the world. She writes, "the ideology of privacy was not experienced simply as a retreat from the public sphere; instead it also gave people a sense of belonging to the community," implying that it drew people further away from cities and communities than anything else before it, and consequently made them feel closer to each other because of its artificial closing of the gap that television itself created.
ReplyDeleteTelevision will always fulfill its role as a "window to the world," otherwise it would have become an obsolete appliance. Although this window is still present, that is not to say it is still as prominent as in the mid 20th century. In today's age we have handheld devices; tablets, smart phones, cameras, laptops - and communications within these peripherals - all of which show us a window to the world far greater than television has yet to offer. If anything, television is becoming a component of these devices. More and more is it becoming an internet-integrated service, where if you miss a show you can watch it the next day on the network's website, or if not there, it'll be streaming for free on an illegal website. While television is still a window to the world, it seems as though the world is becoming too small to see much more.
In “Installing the Television Set” Spigel discusses how television was able to bring the public world into the private home and how this was important for the time period. Between 1948 and 1955 an increasing number of people moved from an urban atmosphere to the suburbs as it became cheaper to become a private homeowner than to rent an apartment. This disconnected people from a more public life in the city and so the television was seen as “a form of going places without the expenditure of movement.” Often it was seen as a way of “bringing the world to people’s doorsteps” in a way that had never been possible before and gave them the ability to participate and observe cultural events without venturing to more urban areas where more cultural events take place. While newsreels and radio were able to provide audiences with content from across the globe, never before had the American people been able to get such a full view of the world from their own homes.
ReplyDeleteWhile television today still functions in this sense, the Internet can be seen as an even larger force in interacting with the world from home. While television gives viewers the ability to travel without even leaving their living room they are passive viewers. In contrast, Internet users are active and given the ability to interact with other parts of the world. If television is a window to the world than the Internet can be seen as functioning as more of a door.
Throughout “Installing the Television Set”, Spigel describes many ways in which television was promoted as a “window on the world” in not only referencing content, but in relation to décor and a means to isolation. Spigel provides an historical context by referencing the mass exodus of middle-class white families from the city to suburban areas in which they were isolated from the goings on of the world. Television providers targeted this separation by marketing TV as a means to overcome such separations. Content was produced that was perceived as relatable yet exotic enough to warrant the attention of the average American sitting at home after work. For example The Burns and Allen Show in which they acted as a regular American married couple that happened to be comedic actors. The concept of a window into their world was emphasized through the set consisting of open walls and windows to shoot through as well as to have backdrops of their simple Hollywood setting. Additionally, magazines and articles would emphasize framing the television in home décor in the exact way that they organized a home around a window.
ReplyDeleteI believe that a similar concept is seen in the production of television content today. Entire networks are dedicated to travel and adventure content. More interesting is the newfound prevalence of “reality” programming and its popularity. Reality shows have taken the voyeuristic quality of viewing the world through a window to a whole new level as the sole purpose is presented as an opportunity to simple observe the actions of strangers in odd situations. Adding more to the casual claims of “through the window” are the less rigidly structured styles of reality programming in which they use permanent surveillance type cameras, handheld and single camera set ups. I think that the goal today of many producers may be to portray televison as a “window on the world”, however as content becomes more ridiculous, spectacular, and sometimes just plain bad, it cheapens the content and makes the advertising ploys of “windows” to obvious for a modern crowd to buy.
Television was considered a "window to the world" in the late 1940s/early 1950s because it provided just that: a way of seeing things all around the world that one normally couldn't see. This is particularly apparent in variety shows, where numerous talent acts and sketches and songs would be performed for the audience, bringing viewers entertainment that they normally would only see if they happened to live in the same region as the act, or were lucky enough to be near a big city where that act might tour. Musicians and gymnasts, from the east coast could be broadcast to viewers in the midwest, allowing them to experience these bits of culture that would normally be unattainable for them. Interesting stories and people from around the world could be presented as well...the television set provided an almost magical link between the viewer and the camera.
ReplyDeleteToday we experience this more than ever before, thanks to high speed global communication and smaller, lighter cameras. TV shows such as Man vs Wild allow viewers to see what it might be like to survive in the remote wilderness of Australia, for example. Shows on the National Geographic channel might show viewers an obscure festival in Spain. TV enables, moreso than ever before, the consumption of the global culture and entertainment from anywhere a viewer might be.
In the compelling chapter, Installing the Television Set, Lynn Spiegel illuminates how television served as a “window to the world” during the period of 1948-1955 as this groundbreaking outlet of information transformed the fabric of domestic life in the the United States. Following World War II, there was an unprecedented migration of Americans from the cities to the suburbs, resulting in a new sense of isolationism and privacy. However, the emergence of television curtailed this growing sense of isolationism as it became the fundamental medium that linked Americans from all over the country. Spiegel analyzes how television became a “new form of social cohesion which allowed people to be alone and together at the same time.” Essentially, television exploded because it brought the events of the outside world to people’s doorsteps as they were now able to sit in their living room and imagine that they were somewhere far far away. Spiegel calls this feeling “hyper-realism,” and describes how the image of television was a “Global village.” For the first time people were connected to wider social fabric, while at the same time keeping their privacy and distance from the outside world.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I do believe that television remains crucial in connecting and informing the population in contemporary America, it does not have the same power that it controlled at the midpoint of the twentieth century. Advances in technology have obliterated the stranglehold that television once had on entertainment in society. Today there are a plethora of media outlets, most notably the internet and cellular phones, which serve the same function as television.