How British Soap Operas Attract Large Audiences
British soap operas used a variety of strategies and operations to
attract a large audience. These strategies clearly work as proven by
viewing figures for the three most popular soaps; Eastenders,
Coronation Street and Emmerdale command viewing audiences of over ten
million on a regular basis. Also soaps have proven to be the most
consistent in terms of high audience figures over the years, making
them indispensable to the institutions which create them.
One strategy used by institutions and producers of a soap, is to place
them at a peak viewing time to maximise audience figures. Also the
timing of the program means that it has the highest exposure to a
possible audience. The major soaps aimed at an adult audience of
around 18-60, are screened during the mid-evening. These soaps will
also be aimed at family audience, once again to maximise the figures.
The timing will mean that the working members of the family/ parents
will be home in time to watch. It also means that an entire family
that eats together will be able to watch the soap together. Other
soaps such as Hollyoaks and Neighbours will screened at different
times due to their range in target audience. Daytime soaps are
arranged for those such as the unemployed or house parents who do not
work. There are also those who use the daytime soaps for a sense of
belonging, a substitute family and social life for the lonely. The
timing will make sure that some people will organise their day around
the program they intend to watch. As the soap will have one or a
maximum of two set times during the week, regular viewers can make
sure that they can watch the soap, and arrange other parts of their
free time around it.
Soaps will use current events as a major point for viewing. Events
such as teenage pregnancy, death of a friend or family member, or
domestic violence for example, will be used to relate to the audience.
In turn the audience themselves can use the storylines and characters
The show I chose, for my target audience analysis, is called Law and Order SVU. Law and Order appears every Wednesday at nine o’clock on NBC. Law and Order: SVU has been around for 19 seasons, it is produced by Dick Wolf. The show takes place in New York City, and it is about a unit of police officers that investigate sexually-based offenses.
American Dad! Season 3: Episode 12 – at the beginning of the episode (1:04-1:11), Roger, a character on the show, responds to Coffee pal’s recent incentive – the new Pumpkin Amaretto Cream! He eagerly embraces the exciting new flavor, and adds it to his coffee.
Phillip Bell talks about the rise of Australian ‘soaps’ in his article, for example Neighbours which began in 1985, he talks about how the show deals with ‘Australian’ issues. (Bell Phillip, ‘Television’), this isn’t necessarily true. In fact many of the storylines in Neighbours are taken from American soaps like Day of our lives or Bold And The Beautiful. Our screens are increasingly filled with disturbing storylines which continually push the boundaries of human depravity.
Real-life television shows of police officers, such as COPS and LAPD: Life on the Beat, offer viewers an intimate, up-close look at life as seen through the eyes of determined police officers who patrol our streets. Television cameras capture actual footage of police officials working to expose and fight drugs, gangs, prostitution, and murder as well as other criminal injustices. As people watch the episodes, they cheer for the "good guys" and detest the "bad guys", hoping the police will eventually apprehend the criminals. Society wants to see the criminals arrested because people feel powerless and scared in a world overflowing with violence. Consequently, real-life television shows appeal to viewers by playing on their anxieties while giving them a sense of hope that the police can make America a safer place.
Have you ever been watching a TV show and find yourself relating it to your life in some way? You might relate it to some problem that is going on in your life or some issue going on around your society. All of the sudden, I found myself thinking sociologically one day when I was watching the TV series Grey’s Anatomy. Almost seven series in, I started to realize similarities between Grey’s Anatomy and topics we have been learning about in class. I noticed ideas and concepts that related to sociology. From norms and agents to theories and structures, the series Grey’s Anatomy is a great analysis of sociology.
What makes these shows so popular? They bring out a certain attribute of a person and focus on it. The public loves this and cannot get enough of it. One attribute is competitiveness, in which people are competing for a prize. Situations can get intense an emotions flare, much to the love of the viewer. However, the attribute that started it all is love. People love it when they see two people fall in love, and the ratings for these shows prove it. People also love to see drama and conflict, and what better element than love. An amorous relationship is a perfect example of the drama and conflict/resolution that viewers want to see. Using this attribute goes all the way back to 1965 when ABC aired The Dating Game, a surprise hit at the time. The concept was as simple as it can get. A woman would ask three men questions from behind a wall. The men would answer. The girl picks one to go on a date with. The show was simple, yet loved by many.
Relationship Between Soap Operas and Reality TV Dating Shows Tania Modleski’s “The Search for Tomorrow in Today’s Soap Operas” proposes that the unique appeal and function of soap opera lies in (a) the viewer’s ability to inhabit the text’s prescribed spectatorial position of ‘the good mother’, and (b) using the archetypal ‘villainess’ to displace one’s own repressed anger and powerlessness. It can be argued, using Modleski’s analytical perspectives on the interpellated spectatorial positions of soap operas, that a new genre of television programs (namely the reality dating shows) function in a similar way. An examination of Modleski’s thesis renders these statements more likely. Modleski argues that soap operas are essential in understanding women’s role in culture.
Whenever we think of reality television shows we think of Kim Kardashian and her latest boyfriend or the endless drama between the women in The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. To remark that women will constantly go from boyfriend to boyfriend or constantly insult and slander other women, which one may radically argue as a concept ingrained into reality; is rather severely stretching it? Could what we see in these “reality” shows morph our sense of what is normal? Why would reality shows be so dramatic if they were trying to emulate reality? If reality shows are so unrealistically dramatic, then why are people are trying to meet the unrealistic standards on the show? We heard frightening stories of women becoming anorexic or even suicidal
Since the premiere of the television drama Prison Break, the show was instantly popular, and continues to be popular 9 years after the first episode aired. It gained a significant fan base from the opening episode all the way to the final one. Not until recently did I see the first episode of this show and I instantly became an avid fan. After watching a couple of episodes I started to wonder, what made this show so popular, and why has it continued to be popular almost a decade after the first episode aired? I realized that from just looking at why I enjoyed the show, I could figure out why others also did. After giving some thought, I came to the conclusion that society loves Prison Break for a couple of reasons: they end every episode with a cliff hanger, everyone loves to try to figure out a mystery, and lastly society connects with series that show how strong a family bond can be.
English fashion model Georgia Jagger has made the bold statement that “Reality TV rots people 's brains”. This seems to be a common opinion among many people. Which leads one to wonder why these reality programs are still created year after year despite all of the constant criticism. The reality T.V. show that continue to reel in audiences on a weekly basis seem to be those which have to do with finding love. These types of shows can, and are often, altered to keep the genre from going stale, but essentially they all serve the same purpose. Dating shows aim to match up complete stranger in an attempt of finding “true love”. Although most shows recycle the same program with slight differences, their audience does not seem to go down. The reason
11 Ellen Seiter and Mary Jeanne Wilson, “Soap Opera Survival Tactics”, in Thinking Outside the Box: A Contemporary Television Genre Reader (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 138.
What we and our children are watching on TV has become a concern to many. Some feel like there should be something to help decide what they think is appropriate and what is not. So in today's world TV ratings are a must. TV ratings might just be one of the best ways to control what is coming into our homes. With TV ratings we won't have to research every show that our children want to see. We only have to look in the corner of the TV to see what the program might contain, and then if we don't approve we can tell that child that he or she must change the channel. This could be a way of controlling the violence, language, sex, ect., that our children are seeing and hearing. But we have to realize that there are people out there who make a living off of TV and that this might not be the best solution for these people.
Reality Television is found interesting because of its distinctive attributes. Every different reality television show appeals to different viewers because of what it is about. One may watch a show to see a difficult family lifestyle, others because of the actors wealth, and lastly for something one may say they do not want but do; drama. Reality shows show a variety of social classes, different genres have different social classes. Dramas show people of high classes, Sitcoms tend to show middle class, and daytime television has working class people. These reality television shows use these techniques to bring in audiences and viewers.
Hill, Annette. Reality TV : Audiences And Popular Factual Television. London: Routledge, 2005. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 10 Apr. 2014.
Television has become one of the major entertainment providers in our modern life. It sits in the living room of about almost every home in the world and it is the one thing that most people like to come home to after a long day of work or school. Not only does it give us something to laugh or get scared at but it also provides us with valuable information about what is happening around our local community and around different places in the world. But, as good as this sounds, Television may be affecting us without even realizing it. Being one of the major distractors in today 's society, it gets us attached to its content in which a lot of people spend a lot of their time watching. Being thus, watching too