FMST 037. Gender and Genre on Television

This course will explore genre in American television from the 1950s to today through the lens of gender and sexuality. Students will learn about genre theory and media specific historical, aesthetic, economic conventions of television genres. We will discuss how macro and micro genres intersect with gender in target and niche audience composition and viewing habits and practices. How ideas and social rituals of leisure and labor figure into generic representations of gender and sexuality and vice versa. How race, class and gender form intersectionalities explored, exploited and expanded differently by televisual flow than in our current convergence era of streamed content. Each week students are responsible for screening at least two assigned episodes and blogging on one episode of a classic TV show they commit to for the semester. One analytical paper. Every student has to give one presentation analyzing selected clips in the context of critical scholarly articles. Midterm and Final exams.
Humanities.
1 credit.
Eligible for GSST
Spring 2025. Simon.
Catalog chapter: Film and Media Studies
Department website: https://www.swarthmore.edu/film-media-studies

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