Gray and Lotz (2012), Television Studies

This book aims to concretize the television studies perspective. Other scholars have been using this perspective, and many even call themselves television studies scholars.  For Gray and Lotz (2012), though, the television studies perspective remains nebulous, primarily because it has yet to be cohesively defined.

Gray and Lotz (2012) book begins by tracing the historical trajectory of television studies. They attribute much of television studies' history to early social science approaches, now more often associated with a media effects perspective. Namely, Gray and Lotz (2012) argue that the social science perspective helped to legitimize the study of television as an important and meaningful medium. More obviously, Gray and Lotz (2012) attribute much of television studies development to cultural studies scholars. Cultural studies contributed things like a focus on historical, social, and economic context, an emphasis on the cyclical nature of television production, and a self-reflexive scholarly position.

Gray and Lotz (2012) divide television studies into four areas: programs, audiences, industries, and contexts. They note that research projects employing a television studies approach should consider at least two of these areas.

Gray and Lotz (2012) use the "programs" section to discuss television texts. They note that the study of programs is borrowed both from social science perspectives (including things like quantitative content analysis) and from humanities approaches like literary and semiotics studies.  Studies of programs usually involve more than a single television episode, and can even incorporate elements like the advertisements and promos that are interspersed in a television program's commercial breaks.

The "audiences" element of television studies originates from cultural studies' argument that audiences are not "cultural dupes." Drawing from scholars like Hall (1980) and Radway (1990?), the audience perspective Gray and Lotz (2012) describe emphasizes the television audiences' ability to read texts actively in a variety of ways.

Gray and Lotz (2012) use the term "industries" to describe studies of television production. This area is one of the more contentious aspects of television studies, as it includes some disagreement between the political economy approach and cultural studies perspectives. Political economists have accused cultural studies scholars of being too optimistic about audience activity and ignoring the power that industries have to determine how programming is shaped. On the other hand, cultural studies scholars have accused political economists of taking a deterministic perspective in which the industry determines audiences' use and understanding of texts. Gray and Lotz (2012) note that both of these perspectives are somewhat oversimplified. They suggest that the Critical Media Industry Studies (CMIS) approach proposed by Havens, Lotz, and Tinic (2012?) offers a more appropriate perspective for television studies, since it encourages scholars to place examinations of production processes in conversation with the resultant texts.

Finally, Gray and Lotz (2012) note that their "contexts" area is a wide umbrella that often unites their other three areas of study.  This area represents the importance of analyzing social, ideological, economic, and political climates that surround the production and consumption of television programs. Considerations under this umbrella include things like discussions of the historical period surrounding a particular program, examinations of television technology and the way in impacts the viewing experience, or even the influence of intertextual elements like promo clips and marketing materials on a viewers' reading of a television text.

Throughout the text, Gray and Lotz (2012) emphasize the importance of including at least two of these elements in conversation with one another. For Gray and Lotz (2012) a television studies perspective should be cognizant of the cycle of television production and consumption.