Author Archives: tekken152

Ever since we started taking a look at Davide Simon’s The Corner and then continuing into our study of The Wire there has been an irksome itch at the back of my mind, something I didn’t really have the vocabulary to express (as evidenced by my several failed attempts in class). Our discussion in class last Monday and its focus on “authenticity,” though, helped me to come to a more solidified realization of what I find problematic about Simon and his work. During last week’s discussion, I couldn’t help but be bothered by theidea that in order for The Wire to be successful, Simon had to establish authority through exaggerating the notion that the depictions of Black urban life in Baltimoe were “authentic” either to himself or those which he attempts to represent. It was pointed out in class that, fundamentally, Simon had the ingeniuity and will to successfully pitch a show to HBO that highlights systemic problemacies like no other show preceding it. While there’s no doubt in my mind that Simon deserves repect for this accomplishent, I take issue with the implied notion that Simon stepped up to the plate to humanize the Black urban experience when those who truthfully lived the experience would not. Let us not forget that the systemic oppressions depicted in The Wire and to a degree in The Corner are in fact real. Although Simon’s interviews and demeanor often belie blue collar roots he, in actuality, had a comfortable middle-class upbringing in the ‘burbs. Both his race and his class have given Simon the privledged opportunities which enabled him to eventually create The Wire.

While I agree with Simon’s politics and especially appreciate his more humanized depictions of poor urban communities, it does not excuse the fact that his appropriation of Black/working-class “authenticity” as a means of generating both cultural and real capital benefiting himself. Furthermore, his “authentic” cultural and linguistic representations of Blacks continue the trend of commodifying Blackness for capitalist gain.

I am not dismissing the positive step forward that The Wire‘s more humanizing and nuanced representations provide. However, I also don’t agree that Simon’s positive intentions/end-game justify the means.

After watching a few episodes of The Wire by David Simon I couldn’t help but easily draw parallels between the more recent series and Simon’s earlier work with Homicide: Life on the Street. One of the most notable similarities is the insertion of hard-nosed and masculine female detectives in both series. Both Det. Shakima Greggs of The Wire and Det. Kay Howard in Homicide bear a striking resemblance–both are lone women in their departments, embody masculine gender roles and treated as “one of the guys” by their comrades.

However, it seems that in the time between Homicide and The Wire Simon’s characterization has progressed, or at least evolved. As opposed to Howard, Greggs’s character is openly lesbian and we are allowed to see into her domestic sphere. Greggs is also a Black American, adding another interesting element to her character; giving her particular stake in the work she does with regards to violence and drug-related crime. Given the historical tradition of encoding homosexual characters and rarely blatantly marking them as such, when watching Homicide I often wondered if Det. Howard was meant to be a lesbian character. While I can only still speculate, her character was reportedly popular among LGBT audience members. Regardless of whether or not the character of Shakima Greggs was a purposeful leap forward, I am very pleased to see not just a Black lesbian woman represented on the show, but I also like that the show goes a step further in into her personal interactions with her partner and shows their lives as ordinary rather than exotic or sensationalized.

After watching the first three episodes of The Corner I was surprised at the uniqueness of the series, the focus of which is the lives of Black individuals as seen through the eyes of members of Black characters themselves. This deviation from depicting underprivileged Black communities only in how they relate to a local police department or more privledged individuals was refreshing. The documentary style, seemingly being enacted by a Black male narrator, also served to add to the feeling that the episodes were coming from a view more authentic to Black experience.

However, the series was not in fact developed by a Black creator nor was the book on which it is based (David Simon’s The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood). Although the topic and characters of the book were in fact researched by David Simon therefore making his work “non-fiction” I believe the novel-like style of the text serves to make it not just more palatable to the reader, but may also serve to convolute the subjective views or judgments of the author as truth rather than opinion. Similarly, the TV series masquerades in much the same way and even goes one step further in adding the Black documenter/narrator. Depending on the development of the narrative and the conclusions (if any) which the series hopes to present for the viewer, this more authoritative voice may serve to be problematic in later episodes.

Last week in class I off-handedly asked my discussion group whether or not they had cable or satellite television access for most of their lives. My motivation for doing so was this: In my two years of taking Media Studies courses here at the Claremont Colleges, I’ve grown accustomed to being relatively lost when in-class discussions veer onto side tangents (as they inevitably do) and more “well-read” students begin referencing critically acclaimed television programs that aren’t apart of the syllabus. As an individual who grew up in a very rural part of Kentucky that is too far flung from the city to warrant cable access and (even though satellite was a viable option) had a father who felt there’s no cultural currency one could get from watching Nikelodeon that you couldn’t just as easily pull from cow tipping, I lack a basic knowledge of the television texts that are most often discussed in my Media Studies courses. Since coming to Claremont, my politics have made me hypersensitive to class and cultural centricities within the academic setting–or more bluntly–it bothers me when it’s assumed that all students have had access to an experience or piece of information which is, in actuality, only accessible by upper middle-class individuals.

Christopher Anderson’s “Producing an Aristocracy of Culture in American Television” once again irritated this barb in my side. Anderson’s work explicitly points out how the HBO dramas and other “high-brow” television programs of similar “aesthetic dispositions” dominate what is considered to be worthy of artistic consideration (and I would argue study here in the intercollegiate Media Studies department) while only being watched by a minute percentage of all television audiences.

“Premium cable networks offer a form of television for the age of the gated community, in which a homeowner’s association and restrictive convenants provide an exclusive experience but also enforce particular standards of taste.”

“Of one fact we can be certain: even at the height of its cultural impact and critical acclaim, HBO has ever surpassed 29 million subscribers in a country with nearly 110 million TV households.”

“The HBO publicity machine…has created the impression that HBO’s original programming–in spite of its relatively small audience–has played a disproportionately major role in American culture…”

While  its fairly obvious why programs such as the Sopranos have been given so much consideration in our curricula: there are stark aesthetic distinctions between it and network-funded programs, arguable making the HBO drama more worthy of artistic consideration. If a student is attempting to become a screen writer his/herself, study of sophisticated programs is likely the best course of study. However, for a student like myself who is much more interested in the sociological side of Media Studies, or how media shapes the world we live in, creates trends and affects populations, constantly explicating programs which haven’t been viewed by the overwhelming majority of Americans (myself included) is fairly tedious and, on the worst days, somewhat alienating.

After reading Michael Newman’s article “From Beats to Arcs:  Toward a Poetics of Television Narrative” I was left with the feeling that his text was little more than a thinly veiled attempt to justify the market-function narrative design of television through proving that corporate constraints actually push writers to create more gratifying shows for viewers and that audiences are more satisfied because of it. Or as Newman himself puts it, “…I contend that within this industrial context network television flourishes artistically, that it rewards its audience and its advertisers at the same time.” He goes on to state that TV doesn’t have the high-brow intentions of challenging its audiences, rather, “mass art strives for accessibility and ease of comprehension”–i.e. gratification.

I felt like Newman’s entire premise was a cop-out. Yes, audiences do get enjoyment out of their programming and advertisers certainly make profits, but that still doesn’t address the fundamental truth that the narrative structure of TV programs are built to sell people things. I believe television viewers accept that the medium has to make its bread somehow and therefore this will effect the very structure of the genre. However, I reject the idea that certain constraints actually make for a more satisfying experience–I don’t squirm with glee every time a plot element or character trait is recapped in one clever way or another.  Likewise, while I think writer’s creativity may flourish despite constraints and that ever-evolving corporate demands certainly push them to find creative ways to deliver quality story lines, I’m not sold on the idea that the industrial nature of TV produces better programming. I find it hard to believe that if television was restructured to feature commercials only between each program, that shows would retain many of the same nuances that come as a result of constantly having to pause for a word from the sponsors.