Lecturing on reality television
At a symposium on the “guilty pleasures” of reality television, organized by Studium Generale Universiteit Utrecht and student association Alcmaeon on 2 April 2008, Jaap Kooijman presented a historical overview of the genres that eventually led to the reality television formats we know today. Rather than perceiving programs such as Big Brother and Idols merely as signs of contemporary culture, implying that current times are more “superficial” and “shallow” than before, Kooijman follows the historical traces of reality television back to television genres such as candid camera, news, talk shows, crime shows, documentary, and more. Other speakers at the conference included social psychologist Wilco van Dijk and Bart Spring in ‘t Veld, the first winner of the very first Big Brother, broadcast in the Netherlands in 1999.
tags Big Brother, Reality television, Studium Generale, Symposium posted in Lecture