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aA groundbreaking book, highly original in concept and
persuasive in its execution. Johnson elegantly rewrites the history
of American television with an eye to its geographical
imaginary.a
--Anna McCarthy, New York University
"Network chieftains, advertising executives, and primetime
performers generally fly over the heartland with barely a glance,
but itas never far from their thoughts, or ours. In this remarkable
analysis of American television, Victoria Johnson cogently explains
why Middle America matters: on the screen, in the home, and in
public life."
--Michael Curtin, author of "Playing to the Worldas Biggest
Audience"
The Midwest of popular imagination is a aHeartlanda
characterized by traditional cultural values and mass market
dispositions. Whether cast positively -- as authentic, pastoral,
populist, hardworking, and all-American -- or negatively -- as
backward, narrowminded, unsophisticated, conservative, and
out-of-touch -- the myth of the Heartland endures.
Heartland TV examines the centrality of this myth to
televisionas promotion and development, programming and marketing
appeals, and public debates over the mediumas and its audienceas
cultural worth. Victoria E. Johnson investigates how the asquarea
image of the heartland has been ritually recuperated on prime time
television, from "The Lawrence Welk Show" in the 1950s, to
documentary specials in the 1960s, to "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
in the 1970s, to "Ellen" in the 1990s. She also examines news
specials on the Oklahoma City bombing to reveal how that city has
been inscribed as the epitome of a timeless, pastoral heartland,
and concludes with ananalysis of network branding practices and
appeals to an imagined ared statea audience.
Johnson argues that non-white, queer, and urban culture is
consistently erased from depictions of the Midwest in order to
reinforce its areassuringa image as white and straight. Through
analyses of policy, industry discourse, and case studies of
specific shows, Heartland TV exposes the cultural function of the
Midwest as a site of national transference and disavowal with
regard to race, sexuality, and citizenship ideals.
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