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1. Anthropologists have emphasized an "instrumental" sense of the concept of culture. Culture as a way of life or mode of adaptation is differentiated from "expressive" or "symbolic" culture, partly to distinguish an anthropological meaning from the common notion of culture as refinement. The rigid distinction between culture as instrumental and culture as expressive has been a limiting or blocking one (Williams 1976).
The term "popular culture" is particularly problematic since it connotes "culture" as referring to art, refinement, taste, entertainment. I will generally use the phrases mediated culture, or mediated expressive culture, but on occasion make use of the phrase "popular culture."
2. I will use the term "soaps" or "soap" in place of "soap opera" on occasion. A more formal label for the programming--"daytime television serial"--can be found at times in the literature, but I generally avoided using the term since it is unwieldy.
3. Studies of production have traditionally focused on news. American research includes Breed (1965), Tuchman (1969; 1979), Epstein (1973), Gans (1979). American research on nonfictional communicators includes Cantor (1971) and Faulkner (1971). One brief study of the nonfiction production process for prime-time television is by Espinosa (1982).
English studies of news include Schlesinger (1978) and Tracey (1978). An important case study of English documentary production is by Elliott (1972).
4. A recent book by Cantor and Pingree (1983) does have a brief chapter on soap production. MacDonald (1978) discussed the radio soap production process insightfully. Most of the academic literature on soaps focuses on "content" and "effects." An excellent bibliography on soaps by Patricia Tegler is included in Cassata and Skill (1983).
5. Sociovidistics refers to the study of visual communication as a sociocultural process (Chalfen 1974). Much of the theorizing on visual communication has emphasized "textual" analysis, often from the perspectives of art or psychology. Sociovidistics relates the study of visual communication to the study of social and cultural process.
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6. Peacock. an anthropologist. identifies a number of areas of study or disciplines concerned with the relationships between symbolic forms or consciousness and social structure. It is a subject "wide enough to include studies of myth, ritual, and totemism; analyses of the relations between language and modes of classifying or perceiving; theories of the communicative process; psychoanalytic dissection of fantasies and dreams; works in comparative religion, sociology of knowledge, and the politics of ideology; the philosophy of symbols rooted in the writings of Cassirer; the pioneer efforts of such anthropologists as Benedict, Mead and Kroeber to abstract themes and plots from culture; sociologically oriented writings in literary and art criticism; and studies in folklore, ethnomusicology, and archaeology. The topic is broad enough to cut across conventional disciplines within anthropology and to unite concerns of both the humanities and the social sciences, but it is specific enough to define a certain focus for study, research, and contemplation (if not explanation) of the history and condition of man" (Peacock 1975:vii). I would add the sociology of organizations and occupations to the list.
7. La Guardia (1977) provides a brief history of Guiding Light, an excerpt from an early program and a summary of recent story. Cantor and Pingree (1983) cite a study of Guiding Light based in part upon scripts Irna Phillips donated to the Wisconsin Historical Society, University of Wisconsin -Madison, Madison, Wisconsin. Irna Phillips originated the show and wrote many of the scripts for both radio and television. The Museum of Broadcasting in New York City has a radio program on tape as well as a kinescope of an early television program. Both are available to the public. Readers who would like to consult summaries of the very recent programming should read The Soap Opera Digest.
8. The intensity of the drive to improve ratings led to scheduling and program cancellations during the time of the study and shortly afterward.
9. Ratings are used to determine the costs of commercials and profits of networks and program makers. Demographics are important since sponsors want to reach specific audience members. For soaps, sponsors want to reach women 18-49. For a brief discussion of ratings and audience studies, see Cantor 1980:75-77. Additional information on ratings and demographics of soap operas can be found in Cantor and Pingree (1983).
10. The pressures toward using younger characters/storylines are reflected in Harding LeMay's account of his experiences writing Another World for Procter and Gamble. "Procter and Gamble executives summoned the headwaiters of their
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six soap operas to a demonstration of graphs, slides, and other documentation which bolstered their demands that we follow the trend established by nighttime television. It was explained with explicit crassness, that high ratings among viewers over forty have little commercial value since middle-aged people purchase fewer tubes of toothpaste, bottles of shampoo, and jars of deodorant than do younger people. Consequently, future stories were to be aimed at a wider market through characters more easily identified with their under thirty contemporaries" (LeMay 1981:200-01).
11. While soaps routinely deal with highly dramatic conflicts and problems, there are some topics that are generally avoided. A story, which might be watched by many people, is viewed as "upsetting" to the audience if it does not pull the ratings at peak moments.
12. Writers of a particular soap will "burn out" after several months but are then rehired to write another soap soon after they have been fired.
13. A soap related industry was developing over the two years covered by the research. Performers made appearances in shopping malls; coffee cups and tee-shirts with program names on them were commercially available; soap performers regularly appeared on television talk and game shows.
14. Dan Schiller suggested the linkage between fiction and nonfiction as they draw from or contribute to "reality trends."
15. The major concern in many situations is that costs be kept down. Reshooting and reediting can be very costly.
16. Many roles are important, and, to the extent that they are carried out well, they are invisible.
17. Beginning performers earn between $400-$500, underfives about $185, "stars" about $6,500 for an hour's performance. Some star performers earn between $200,000 and $500,000 per year (Brown 1982b:106).
18. In a personal communication, Richard Chalfen noted that the strategy is the same in anthropology--if the people in Hong Kong will never see the program, the "natives" will never read the ethnographic account.
19. Before the reliance on the organ, live musical accompaniment consisting of violin, cello, and piano was used according to one knowledgeable informant.
20. Soaps are generally not syndicated for domestic consumption, although they are seen abroad. Guiding Light, for example, is aired in Italy. A study of audience reception of the program would be illuminating, particularly as an exploration of the emergence of an "international" capitalist media culture.
21. A new half-hour soap Loving
was introduced in mid-1983 on ABC.