Jae-Hwan Jung, [RealityTV/CathyComeHome]

How does Hill define reality TV? Describe his definitions in the context of a contemporary Reality TV show.

Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents outwardly unscripted real-life situations. It is different from documentary television. Documentary television focus on drama and personal conflict but reality television much focus on simply educating viewers. Hill (2005) says that “The category of reality TV is commonly used to describe a range of popular factual programming. There are a variety of styles and techniques associated with reality TV.” Hill (2005) also mentions that “Reality TV is associated with anything and everything from people to pet, from birth to death.” For example, there are number of reality TV shows in Korean. For now, reality TV is the most popular and major genre in Korean. They use jungle, babysit, virtual marriage, travelling, football, baseball and etc. to make reality TV. There is no limitation. Hill (2005) describes that it is hard to define reality TV. “Many competing definitions of what has come to be the reality genre but, no one defines reality programming. Reality genre is made of a number of distinctive and historically based television genres, such as lifestyle, or documentary. These television genres have merged with each other to create a number of hybrid genres that we now call reality TV, or popular factual television.” (Hill, 2005)

According to Hill (2005), reality TV has been constantly changing over past decade. I will talk this through a film called Cathy Come Home in 1966. I never know this film before. In my idea, the film was shocking at that time. It is not for fun or high rating film. The film tells me about something I do not know. The film is teaching something and, give message to audience. I found difference between old show and these days show in sound. Cathy Come Home does not use any sound effects. Technical problem can be one of the reason or some other reasons. Recent TV show put many sound effects to focus on the show.

Hill (2005) says that “As the genre continues to develop, perhaps it is only a matter of time before the television industry, scholars and audiences begin to include other types of factual television within the category of ‘reality’.” I agree with his mention. There are hundreds of TV shows in this world. All producers are looking for different and fun format. They will find, mix, combine themes to make audience to watch their shows.

Reference

Hill, A. (2005) The reality genre. In A. Hill, Reality TV: Audiences and Popular FactualTelevision. (pp. 14 – 40). Oxon: Routledge.