Instructor: Anne Berke ([email protected]) TTh 1-4:15
Room TBD
Office Hours: By Appointment Course Description
This combination lecture-seminar course will focus on the form of the television situation comedy in America, from its origins in the mid-1940s, to the present. As a class, we will
mobilize historical, textual, and theoretical methodologies to examine the sitcom; particular attention will be paid to how the sitcom presents, upholds or critiques gender roles, the family unit, race relations, and class tensions in America. We will also consider how the sitcom can mask its ideological agenda through formal or generic convention, or, alternatively, how certain shows foreground their generic or industrial identities as sitcoms, television shows, and network products. Throughout the course, we will ask and re-ask if the sitcom truly is, as David Marc writes, “a genre of comic mitigation” (Marc 203).
The only required textbook is Marc’s Comic Visions: Television and American Culture (1997). Comic Visions will be available through the Yale Bookstore, though it can also be purchased online, new or used. All other readings will be available in PDF format on a Classes v2 site.
There will be no required evening screenings or screenings held outside of class. Requirements
Midterm Paper (30% of final grade): This paper will be a 4-5 page essay (1000-1250 words) on The Cosby Show. The prompts to choose from will be distributed a few weeks in advance of the due date, which will be at the beginning of class in Session 6 (Thursday, July 25).
Final paper (40%): This paper will be a 8-10 page essay (2000-2500 words) on a subject of your choice, to be cleared with me at least one week in advance of the deadline. It is due the final day of class, Thursday, August 8.
Class participation (30%): Participation is very important and includes more than attendance. I expect you to read in advance of the session and to bring those readings to class. Optional texts are not required reading but will be posted on the v2 site; typically these are interesting essays and chapters that I will use to support my lecture. Possibly these optional readings will be useful when you are formulating your final paper topic.
This participation grade will also include one 1-2 page review of a television sitcom episode, due Tuesday, July 16. You will receive feedback on this paper, but no letter grade, as this paper counts toward participation. Though the review assignment will require you to be more opinionated and less academic than in the midterm and final papers, I hope this will
provide a relaxed entry into writing about television. It will also give me a chance to give you tips and strategies for your writing before the first paper is due.
*** Remember that participation in class does not only mean speaking in discussion but also listening and responding directly to your peers. Opportunities for mini-presentations on
contemporary topics and issues in television and the sitcom (e.g. syndication, the Nielsen ratings, pilot season) will be offered throughout the class. Planned presentations may be a good idea for those who are less comfortable speaking spontaneously in class; an online forum will also be set up on the Classes v2 site, so that all students can “test” out thoughts, ideas, and questions outside of a seminar setting.
Policies
● An unexcused late paper must be submitted electronically and will be docked 1/6 of a grade (B to B-, A- to B+) for each 1/2 day it is late. Unfortunately, due to the condensed nature of the summer course, extensions are not allowed.
● Academic honesty is of utmost importance, which is why we will review citation procedures when preparing for the first paper.
● I encourage students with disabilities, learning or otherwise, to meet with me or the Summer Session office to ensure that all students’ needs are met.
... Session 1: July 9 (Tues)
What is the Sitcom? / Origins of American Television Optional Readings:
David Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 1 (pp. 1-40)
David Marc, “Origins of the Genre: In Search of the Radio Sitcom” (pp. 15-24) in The Sitcom Reader
Jason Mittell, “A Cultural Approach to Television Genre Theory,” Cinema Journal 40.3 (Spring, 2001), pp. 3-24.
Screenings:
In-class Clips:
The TV Set [film], The Donna Reed Show,
from Your Show of Shows (“The Hickenloopers” sketch) Session 2: July 11 (Thurs)
Race and Class in 1950s Television Readings:
Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 2 (pp. 41-69)
Bob Pondillo, “Racial Discourse and Censorship on NBC-TV,” Journal of Popular Film and Television 33.2 (2005), pp. 102-114.
Screenings:
Amos ‘n’ Andy, The Honeymooners
In-Class Clips:
Father Knows Best; The Goldbergs
Session 3: July 16 (Tues)
Home, Work, Performance: The Family Sitcom in the 1950s and ‘60s Due: Short Sitcom Review
Readings: Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 3 (pp. 70-99)
Alexander Doty, “The Cabinet of Lucy Ricardo: Lucille Ball’s Star Image,” Cinema Journal 29.4 (Summer, 1990), 3-22.
Optional: Lynn Spigel, “The People in the Theater Next Door,” in Make Room for TV: Television and the Family Ideal in Postwar America
Screenings:
Session 4: July 18 (Thurs)
The Magi-Sitcom and “Deep Escapism” Readings:
Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 4 (pp. 100-129)
Susan J. Douglas, “Genies and Witches” from Where the Girls Are (pp. 123-138)
Optional: Lynn Spigel, “From Domestic Space to Outer Space: The 1960s Fantastic Family Sitcom” from Welcome to the Dreamhouse: Popular Media and Postwar Suburbs (pp. 107-140)
Screenings:
Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie
Session 5: July 23 (Tues)
Counter-culture, Nostalgia and War Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 5 (pp. 130-171); Optional: Chapter 6
Josh Ozersky, “‘The Church of What’s Happening Now’: The Great Shift, 1970-1972,” from
Archie Bunker’s America: TV in an Era of Change, 1968-1978 (pp. 60-83) Optional: Mike Budd and Clay Steinman, “M*A*S*H Mystified: Capitalization, Dematerialization, Idealization,” Cultural Critique 10 (Autumn, 1988), pp. 59-75.
Screenings:
M*A*S*H, All in the Family
In-class Clips:
The Jeffersons; Happy Days
Session 6: July 25 (Thurs)
Trip to the Paley Center! Details to follow... Due: Midterm Paper
Section 7: July 30 (Tues)
Mary Tyler Moore as Feminist Foremother: Tracing Women's Liberation on Television
Bonnie J. Dow, “1970s Lifestyle Feminism, the Single Woman, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show” from Prime-Time Feminism (pp. 24-58)
Julie Bettie, “Class Dismissed?” Roseanne and the Changing Face of Working-Class Iconography,” Social Text 45 (Winter, 1995), pp. 125-149.
Optional: Sharon Marie Ross, “Talking Sex: Comparison Shopping through Female Conversation in HBO’S Sex and the City” in The Sitcom Reader (pp. 111-122)
Screenings:
Mary Tyler Moore, Roseanne
In-class Clip:
Sex and the City, The Golden Girls
Session 8: August 1 (Thurs)
Posing an Alternative to the Nuclear Unit: What Makes a Family?
Michelle Hilmes, “Where Everybody Knows Your Name: Cheers and the Mediation of Culture” in Critiquingthe Sitcom (pp. 213-223)
Denis M. Provencher, “Sealed with a Kiss: Heteronormative Narrative Strategies in NBC’s Will and Grace” in The Sitcom Reader (pp. 177-189)
“I’ll Be There For You” (interviews with Friends cast and creative team), from Top of the Rock: Inside the Rise and Fall of Must See TV (pp. 175-194)
Screenings:
Friends, Cheers
In-class Clip:
Session 9: August 6 (Tues)
Industrial reflexivity, the meta-narrative and the Postmodern Condition in the ‘90s and ‘00s
Matthew Henry, “The Triumph of Popular Culture: Situation Comedy, Postmodernism, and The Simpsons” in Critiquing the Sitcom (pp. 262-273)
Josh Gillon, “Why 30 Rock Is Not Funny (It’s Metafunny),” Philosophy and Literature 35 (2011), pp. 320-337.
Optional: Marc, Comic Visions, Chapter 7
Screenings:
Simpsons, 30 Rock
In-class Clip:
Arrested Development
Session 10: August 8 (Thurs)
The Comedian's Comedy in the ‘90s and ‘00s Due: Final Paper
Joanne Morreale, “Sitcoms Say Goodbye: The Cultural Spectacle of Seinfeld’s Last Episode” from Critiquing the Sitcom (pp. 274-285)
Adam Wilson, “Louis C.K. and the Rise of the ‘Laptop Loners,’” LA Review of Books (reprinted on salon.com as “Did ‘Louie’ kill the Sitcom?”)
Screenings:
Seinfeld, Louie
In-class Clip:
Curb Your Enthusiasm
