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Teen Television: Essays on Programming and Fandom PDF

261 Pages·2008·15.697 MB·English
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Teen Television Teen Television Essays on Programming and Fandom Edited by SHARON MARIE ROSS and LOUISA ELLEN STEIN McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Jefferson, North Carolina, and London LIBRARYOFCONGRESSCATALOGUING-IN-PUBLICATIONDATA Teen television : essays on programming and fandom / edited by Sharon Marie Ross and Louisa Ellen Stein. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7864-3589-0 softcover : 50# alkaline paper ¡. Television programs for youth—United States. 2. Television and teenagers—United States. I. Ross, Sharon Marie. II. Stein, Louisa Ellen. PN¡992.8.Y68T44 2008 302.23'450835—dc22 2008002818 British Library cataloguing data are available ©2008 Sharon Marie Ross and Louisa Ellen Stein. All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. On the cover: from top, Kristen Bell as Veronica Mars in Veronica Mars, 2005-2006 (UPN/Photofest); Teen watching TV ©2008 Shut- terstock; Alexa Vega as Vanessa in Odd Girl Out, 2005 (Lifetime/ Photofest) Manufactured in the United States of America McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Box 6¡¡, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640 www.mcfarlandpub.com For Tom and Ben, who have more or less willingly watched hours upon hours of teen television—and even proclaimed to enjoy it. Contents PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 INTRODUCTION: WATCHING TEEN TV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3 !! Part I—The Industrial Context of Teen TV. . . . . . . . 27 1. TV Teen Club: Teen TV as Safe Harbor Jeff Martin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 2. Teen Television and the WB Television Network Valerie Wee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 3. Defining Teen Culture: The N Network Sharon Marie Ross. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 4. Rocking Prime Time: Gender, the WB, and Teen Culture Ben Aslinger. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 !! Part II—Teens on TV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 5. “Normal is the watchword”: Exiling Cultural Anxieties and Redefining Desire from the Margins Caralyn Bolte. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 6. Riding the Third Wave: The Multiple Feminisms of Gilmore Girls Francesca Gamber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  114 7. “That girl of yours—she’s pretty hardboiled, huh?”: Detecting Feminism in Veronica Mars Andrea Braithwaite. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132 vii viii Contents 8. The Portrait of an Artist as a Young Fan: Consumption and Queer Inspiration in Six Feet Under Barbara Brickman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  150 9. “They stole me”: The O.C., Masculinity, and the Strategies of Teen TV Sue Turnbull. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  170 !! Part III—Cultures of Reception . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185 10. Fashion Sleuths and Aerie Girls: Veronica Mars’ Fan Forums and Network Strategies of Fan Address Jennifer Gillan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  185 11. The Adventures of a Repressed Farm Boy and the Billionaire Who Loves Him: Queer Spectatorship in Smallville Fandom Melanie E.S. Kohnen. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  207 12. Pushing at the Margins: Teenage Angst in Teen TV and Audience Response Louisa Ellen Stein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  224 CONTRIBUTORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245 INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249 Preface Teen TV—be it on the now defunct WB and UPN, or the newly evolving CW or the N—offers a crucial space for the negotiation of political, social, and cultural issues. The images and narratives of adolescence found in Teen TV are relevant to a wide range of viewers. From The Many Loves of Dobie Gillisto Buffyand Veronica Mars, television featuring the lives and experiences of teens not only touch on coming of age issues, but also on questions of self, identity, gender, race, and community. Teens and older viewers, male and female, engage with these representations—at times sporadically and at times as dedicated fans who use these programs as a touchstone for their own senses of self and society. This collection of essays looks closely at the diverse industrial con- texts, representations, and forms of engagement that make up the world of Teen TV. The title of our introduction, “Watching Teen TV,” refer- ences not only the images of teens that fill our screens each day and night, but also the scholarly import of studying this realm of cultural produc- tion and reception. Because of Teen TV’s seeming newness and link with consumerist culture, academia has not studied these programs consistently. Teen TV offers a rich yet overlooked resource for understanding the dynamics of our contemporary popular culture, and for understanding the complexities of popular culture’s history. Vital cultural narratives and cultural shifts play out in the spaces of Teen TV programming and reception. The concept for this book evolved from the editors’ and con- tributors’ conviction that Teen TV programs call for close academic as well as popular attention. Thus, drawing from a breadth of methodolog- ical approaches, this book offers close case studies and larger industrial and cultural frameworks for studying the complex arena of Teen TV. It is our hope that this book opens the door to further investigation of the ever-evolving, rich cultural world of televised adolescence. We would like to thank our contributors, whose enthusiasm and 1

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