Television/Death
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Edinburgh University Press
Published:30th Apr '24
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Television/Death intertwines the study of death, dying and bereavement on television with discussion of the ways that television (and the TV archive) provides access to the dead. Section One explores the representation of death and dying on television, in historical and contemporary television documentaries. It looks at the early history of this genre as well as contemporary documentaries about a range of death and dying experiences, from home deaths to hospice care and assisted dying. Section Two focuses on dramas of grief and bereavement and discusses how contemporary complex serial television drama and comedy, from family melodramas to the ghost serial to afterlife dramadies, present emotionally realist representations of experiences of grief, bereavement and death-related trauma and explore questions like ‘What happens to us after we die?’ Finally, Section Three proposes that television has been overlooked in critical analyses of how recorded media ‘brings back the dead’. It argues that television is the ultimate posthumous medium and looks at how the dead return via incorporation into new television programmes or through projects to bring television out of the archive.
Television, Helen Wheatley argues cogently and persuasively, is much possessed of death. Her book is a dazzlingly wide-ranging study of the dying, the dead and the afterlife in documentaries and dramas. Exploring questions of television and intimacy, ethics, community and, crucially, the archive, this is a rich, engaging, essential volume. -- Professor John Wyver, University of Westminster
"In Television/Death, Helen Wheatley pursues the topic of television and death in many different and unexpected ways. In the process she sheds light on issues and ideas that are at once illuminating and compelling. This includes the ways in which television’s representations of death, and the television archive, serve as a source of memory, grief, and even trauma. She handles these issues with distinctive sensitivity and insight. This is a wholly original study from a scholar whose critical eye and theoretical mind consistently open the field to new ideas, and this book is no exception." -- Professor Mimi White, Northwestern University
Television/Death leaves open the space for scholars of television or death to further explore their interrelation and makes a compelling case for what such work brings to both fields. -- Katie Crosson * Critical Studies in Television *
ISBN: 9781474451727
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
304 pages