week11

How does Hill define reality TV?


Hill defined the reality TV in three dimensions; television industry, scholars, and audiences. He states that the television industry is “flexible in its categorization of reality TV”, because popular factual programming can fit lots of traditional categories. However, he mentions that television industry pushed reality TV to create new hybrid formats. I think the Television industry tends to classify these popular factual programs due to the benefits these programs generated.

Hill also argues the TV scholars define reality TV tends to under the “realty genre” and include a variety of television genres, but it can be in danger of genre overload. Hill (2005) points that the audience classifying reality TV according to fact criteria, because they want to see what is actually happening. Their definition in relation to reality is connected with their individual understanding of the performance.

Within these discussions we can see that, reality TV seems to attract viewers, because reality TV creates a reality atmosphere for viewers. However, although the non-professional actors, unscripted dialogues, surveillance footage bring us the factual feeling, the cameras are the eyes of the producers to decide how to capture their valuable on-site scenarios.

Hill, A. (2005) The reality genre. In A. Hill, Reality TV: Audiences and Popular Factual Television. (pp. 14 – 40). Oxon: Routledge.