Robin Nelson
TV Drama in Transition
Macmillan Press 1997
ISBN 0 333 67754 4 220 pp.
A$34.95 (pb)
Uploaded 16 April 1999

Robin Nelson’s book TV in Transition: Forms, Values, and Cultural Change examines changing trends in dramatic narrative television in both the United Kingdom and United States over the last two decades. Nine chapters and a coda alternate between theory (chapters 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9) and its application to both British and American shows (chapters 2, 4, 6, 8, and the coda). As a native of the UK, Nelson emphasizes British shows and the BBC, but also discusses American shows which are, or were, widely seen. Throughout the book, Nelson is very self-conscious of his methodology and assumptions, frequently pointing out assumptions made in the work of others. He considers the cultural, social, and political/economic aspects of television production during the period examined and even manages to touch on some of the technical aspects as well. And finally, Nelson also recognizes “that matters of aesthetics are bound to those of not only politics but those of ethics as well” and he is not afraid to discuss questions of value and distinctions of worth, noting some of the contradictions and flaws inherent in relativist thinking.

The first few chapters look at shows with multiple, interwoven narrative threads, what Nelson calls “flexi-narratives” and the different demands they make on viewers. He also examines what he calls “flexiad drama”, the prominent style of television shows involving rapid cutting, sound bites, feel-good imagery, and surface glossiness of television commercials or music video. These forms, he argues, have become dominant in television production, and reflect a change to a more postmodern sensibility with a new affective order, with sound and visuals designed for a shorter attention span. After detailing how the style of TV drama has become nearly indistinguishable from that of advertisements, he describes the underlying shift to a more image-centered, hedonistic consumer culture which values “short-term aesthetic pleasure over reflective intellectual change”, and examines the changes in politics and culture at large which he sees as the cause of the shift. Postmodernism is invoked throughout, but not uncritically (although some generalization occurs in the discussion of audience reception). This gradually leads, in a later chapter, to distinctions between mimesis and referentiality, and based on these, the suggestion of a continuum of different types of “realism” and the functions of each. With minor alterations, much of the arguments presented here could usefully be applied to other media as well. Chapter seven, on various forms of pleasure, was ironically the least enjoyable read, fragmented as it was with over fifty quotes and references throughout, appearing like the very sound bites mentioned earlier. Although one might admire his scholarship, it does get a bit choppy in places. A summary, however, does appear at the end of the chapter.

Chapter nine, the last of the theory chapters, is the book’s best, and opens out into a wider philosophical arena. Here Nelson finally takes up the subject of worth and evaluation. As he states much earlier in the introduction, “To avoid, refuse even, to engage in value debate – as many contemporary observers do in the name of respecting difference – is at worst, a self-deceiving evasion. We live our values: they are made in all our discursive practices, not merely in intellectual debate.” While calling for more awareness of the values inherent in critical positions, he includes some keen observations regarding value in postmodern culture: “One of the greatest ironies of the postmodern is its intense preoccupation with subtle distinctions of status in such matters as leisure footwear – not only in the relative worth of Reebok or Nike, but in the merits of of fewer or more air bubbles in the sole – at a time when it is apparently not allowable to question the value of such a preoccupation in the first place.” Nelson questions the omission of the discussion of values in contemporary discourse, and goes on to establish a basis for evaluation for television programs. He suggests goals for media and TV drama in particular, in a practical and well-supported manner. Although by no means the first to point out the shortcomings of postmodern and relativist thought, Nelson neatly ties these ideas to the changing forms of television drama, without simplifying his position to an either/or stance, and without evading the subject of evaluation.

Overall the book is an interesting read, and provides a good picture of British and American TV drama in the 1980s and 90s. Even if the reader is unfamiliar with the television shows discussed, the five theory chapters are enough to set forth the arguments being made, and they often reach beyond TV drama and into other areas of culture and society. Nelson convincingly links changes in TV drama’s narrative forms with postmodernism, though not without caveats, and raises some interesting questions in the process.

Dr. Mark Wolf