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Television Aesthetics

Sarah Cardwell

‘Television aesthetics’ is a relatively recent innovation in the broader field of tele-

vision studies. When I began teaching my television aesthetics course in 2000 I
struggled to compile a recommended reading list. It seemed that very few scholars
were interested in tackling the medium from a primarily aesthetic approach.
Preparing and planning this now-established course for the academic year 2005–6,
I find there is far greater scope. Without overt collaboration, an increasing number
of voices have contributed to the proliferation of work that fits broadly within tele-
vision aesthetics. Unsurprisingly, these voices do not sing in unison; they offer very
different arguments in response to key questions. However, there is some agree-
ment about the questions to be asked, and one can pinpoint sufficient commonal-
ities of vocabulary, concerns and methodology to support the view that the field is
becoming established as a stand-alone area of television studies.1 Some of the
commonalities exhibited include:
a) The use of vocabulary that is unusual and distinctive within television studies.
Within television aesthetics, one regularly encounters words previously
shunned by television scholars, such as: evaluation, judgement, criteria,
achievements, accomplishments, discrimination, art and, of course, aesthetics.
b) As this lexicon implies, more frequent and explicit evaluation of programmes,
and a more vocal debate about what ‘good’ television is.
c) An asserted recognition that the field needs more textual criticism and a
stronger understanding of what ‘close textual analysis’ means, where the latter
is understood to focus on thematic, formal and stylistic elements rather than
simply on content or ‘representation.’
d) A movement away from approaches that ‘use’ television to study something else
(for example, society, ideology, gender politics) and towards a recognition of
television as a medium of expression first and foremost, and of programmes as
specific artworks.
e) An interest in conceptual and philosophical questions that arise from attention
to specific television texts.
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Television Aesthetics 73

I have previously offered a broad definition of television aesthetics as a way of

studying television that draws upon ‘a generalised understanding of the key foci of
philosophical aesthetics: the criticism and evaluation of art, and the raising and
tackling of questions that arise from our engagement with works of art.2 This is a
rather catch-all description, but the deliberate use of vocabulary drawn from
philosophical aesthetics, rather than media or cultural studies, implies connections
with an alternative tradition and its accompanying priorities and emphases.
What does this mean in practice? The methodology I have proposed moves
from a close analysis and critique of thematic, formal and stylistic qualities present in
a particular televisual sequence. . . to explore some of the questions that arise from the
peculiarities of a single work. [The aim is] to capture something of the individuality
and distinctiveness of the programme, evaluate its achievements and also address the
more ‘theoretical’ questions that the programme raises.3

It is important to note that the ‘theoretical’ questions referred to arise secondarily,

from the critical analysis of artworks rather than preceding that critical analysis;
that is, the aim is not to ‘apply’ a theory to a text, using the text as case study, but
to examine and explore the text in itself, and to investigate what broader questions
arise from that process of examination and exploration. Moreover, on reflection, I
would term these questions ‘conceptual’ and ‘philosophical’ rather than ‘theoret-
ical,’ in order to distinguish them from the far-reaching theories that dominate
media and cultural studies. (I proffer some elucidation of this later.)

Close textual analysis

Other scholars have similarly proposed a methodology that moves from close
textual analysis outwards. Jason Jacobs, in his 2001 seminal article ‘Issues of Judge-
ment and Value in Television Studies,’ draws on Stanley Cavell, to argue that one
can only determine the possibilities of a medium by looking at instances of works
within it:
As with the analysis of all art, understanding that involvement [our involvement with
specific texts] requires above all concentrated study: minimally, the close observation
of texts in order to support the claims and judgement we may wish to make about
them. Criticism is a way of articulating why television programmes matter to us and
the nature of that significance. Only in this way can we develop meaningful criteria for
specific instances of television that may then be applied more generally.4

Opponents of this kind of focused approach to television programmes express

familiar fears that close textual analysis is nothing more than dry formalism – and
indeed this is a risk when it is undertaken as an exercise of analytical skills rather
than an exploration of our own engagement with a text. Yet as Jacobs notes, propo-
nents of television aesthetics, far from proposing the possibility of an objective
deconstruction of texts, aim to revalue our initial, powerful connection with
programmes – or as he puts it ‘why television programmes matter to us and the
nature of that significance.’5 Perhaps then one should place even before attention
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74 Critical Studies in Television 1/1

to the details of texts, a sincere and fulfilling engagement with them. A programme
that inspires powerful responses in us gives rise to the need to understand it more
fully and to understand why it has affected us thus. This need is met by a sustained
and committed investigation of the programme’s aesthetic qualities. The need and
the meeting of it should be intertwined in our critical writing.
While making our motivation for textual analysis explicit has historically been
uncommon within television studies, philosophical aesthetics has long understood
its importance. Colin Lyas, an aesthetician whose work on interpretation and eval-
uation can be valuable when considering television,6 underlines the importance of
encouraging students to apprehend and appreciate a work fully before analysing it.
Otherwise, they are ‘reduced to mumbling about the publicly observable aspects of
a work with no idea how these relate to the value of that with which they are
confronted, and no idea, even, wherein that value may reside.’7 Employing the
example of the analysis of poetry, Lyas observes that ‘the place to start is with the
attempt to grasp such things as the expressive quality of the poem: Is it mawkish,
glib, ironic, witty, sad? If sad, is the quality of the expression of the sadness, for
example, too excessive or too commonplace?’ One may then move from this initial
apprehension to an observation of how formal and stylistic details, ‘the rhyme
scheme, the stress pattern, the vowel sounds, the alliterations contribute to the
achievement of that effect.’8 Scholars of television aesthetics would recognise these
tenets of good criticism, which moves beyond the competent, descriptive observa-
tion of textual details, towards a personal and powerful response to a programme
and consequent detailed analysis.

Evaluation
David Thorburn, in his article ‘Television as an Aesthetic Medium,’ argues for the
‘crucial enterprise’ of ‘evaluative criticism aiming to disclose the thematic and
formal excellence of particular programs.’9 He thus neatly discloses that television
aesthetics is concerned not only with interpretation but also with that rather
more contentious matter: evaluation – and with the connection between the two.
Charlotte Brunsdon’s 1990 groundbreaking work on quality television threw down
the gauntlet with a powerful argument that ‘most academics involved in television
studies are using qualitative criteria, however expressed or repressed, and that the
constitution of the criteria involved should be the subject of explicit debate.’10 It was
only towards the end of the twentieth century that a handful of fellow television
scholars took up her challenge, and argued for greater reflection upon evaluation
in both scholarship and teaching.11
Christine Geraghty is one of those who consider that ‘television studies
would, I think, benefit from academics being more explicit about the evaluative
judgements that we inevitably make.’12 Importantly, Geraghty adds that ‘while
recognizing the social dimensions of any discussion of evaluation, I want to argue
the importance of a textual dimension to this question.’13 Thus evaluation is
understood as inextricably linked to (arising from) interpretation, something she
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Television Aesthetics 75

underscores when she asks for ‘an approach that emphasizes analytic description
and evaluative discussion across a range of programmes.’14
While to any outside observer this may seem uncontentious, it is the case within
television studies that, historically, programmes have been evaluated more often
on the basis of their representations and effects, their ideological and social impli-
cations, rather than their artistic achievements. Yet developing a more compre-
hensive and astute awareness of television programmes’ aesthetic qualities, and a
greater willingness to make critical discriminations, is vital. As Thorburn notes, a
scholar must understand the ‘literary or aesthetic dimensions’ of a programme ‘for
the basic work of historical and cultural interpretation;’15 he demonstrates how one
particular scholar ‘radically misreads these texts [1960s American spy series]
because he does not grant sufficient weight to their aesthetic qualities,’ especially
their tone and atmosphere.16
Furthermore, Geraghty foresees wider consequences if evaluation continues to
be sidelined within television studies: ‘in much teaching of television in higher
education questions of aesthetics are being neglected in ways that can only be
detrimental to future programming and audiences.’17 Television is one of the
primary sources of artworks in Western societies today, and television aesthetics
opens up to the television audience valuable skills of discrimination and evalua-
tion that are ultimately empowering. To avoid critical judgement, to deny it to our
students, is to deny them an essential critical education; it finally ‘impoverishes the
capacity of human beings to perceive the value-qualities of works and so deprives
them of sources of joy.’18
One of the most common objections mounted against increasing the role of
evaluation within television studies is that it will lead to a narrow ‘canon’ of ‘good
television,’ eliminating too many programmes as unworthy of study. Within tele-
vision aesthetics, this understandable and legitimate concern is recognised as an
important focus for ongoing debate; views on the matter are diverse. Brunsdon and
Geraghty maintain that programmes usually considered ‘popular’ or ‘mass’ televi-
sion need not be excluded from analysis: both have undertaken extensive work on
soap operas, for example. Importantly, though, they argue that discriminations can
be made within such genres – both between quality and non-quality television, and
between good and not-so-good television. They argue then for a pluralistic, but not
relativistic, approach.
Others offer different perspectives. Robin Nelson, in his analytical account of the
difficulties of critical judgement within contemporary television studies, tenta-
tively suggests a basis for future evaluation which recognises diversity but also
prioritises ‘common meaningfulness.’19 John Caughie goes further, defending his
decision to delineate a category of ‘serious drama,’ which both delimits the genre
in question and then makes further discriminations within it, maintaining the
capacity of some programmes over others for sustained analysis.20 Jacobs recog-
nises the ‘different aspirations of different kinds of television,’21 and notes that we
may regard any programme as a ‘pleasant casual distraction’ but that some
instances of television elicit ‘strong engagement, intense viewer proximity and
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76 Critical Studies in Television 1/1

concentrated attention,’ and ‘many will be able to withstand the kinds of critical
pressure that we normally apply to other artworks.’22 He thus cautiously implies
that some programmes are likely to reward sustained analysis better than others;
some are richer, more complex and more enduring.
Television aesthetics does not assume any particular hierarchy of texts or agreed
canon, but it does address questions of value, critical judgement and the selection
of criteria for evaluation. There is a healthy diversity of perspectives on evaluative
criticism within television aesthetics (as a forthcoming special issue of the Journal
of British Cinema and Television, ‘Good Television?’ will reveal).23

Television as an art
Despite their differences, these writers share a belief that some television is worthy
of sustained scrutiny and critical attention for its aesthetic qualities. And this view
has become increasingly popular.24 This is a marked shift in the way in which
television is regarded. Thorburn asserted the validity of an aesthetic approach to
television back in 1987, arguing that such an approach recognises that television
programmes are comparable with other arts, sharing with them ‘representational
or artistic’ and often ‘fictive or imaginative’ qualities.25 Yet it is only since the late
1990s that a significant number of scholars have expressed similar views. Jacobs
puts it concisely when he describes television as ‘a medium for artistic expression.’26
The implication of this view is that one of the main roles of the television scholar
is to explore and assess the artistic accomplishments exhibited in various
programmes. For too long, television has been considered primarily in terms of
its communicative, not artistic, functions. Television aesthetics recognises that
television is an art, and examines it accordingly.
Of course, television is a distinctive art. It has a specific history, and particular
and unique forms. Recognising these specificities is by no means incompatible
with recognising its identity (and status) as an art form alongside others. Indeed,
the exploration of medium-specific traits is the final area of television aesthetics
that I wish to outline here.

Theorising: Conceptual and philosophical questions

At the start of this article, I mentioned those ‘conceptual’ or ‘philosophical’ ques-
tions that are raised by our critical engagement with television texts. If one is
engaged in the close, evaluative study of ER (Constant Productions/ Amblin Enter-
tainment/NBC, 1994– ), for example, then one is likely to be drawn to consider the
importance of genre and episodic structure to the programme. These are concerns
that arise from the aesthetic qualities of the text itself (rather than the pre-existing
preoccupations of the scholar).27
These two issues (genre and episodic structure) are often addressed within tele-
vision aesthetics, arising as they do fairly frequently from the object of study.28
Notably, television aesthetics scholars are usually concerned to reveal how their
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Television Aesthetics 77

theorising enhances our understanding of the programmes themselves. Taking

genre as an example, Jacobs proposes that the most appropriate technique for
dealing with generic programmes such as ER is to undertake detailed analysis of
the text in question, and compare it with other members of the same genre in order
to evaluate it in relation to its peers. Geraghty offers a similar view, arguing that it
is vital that we categorise a programme correctly, in generic terms, in order to offer
a fair evaluation.29 The expression of such a motivation is similarly present in my
work on television adaptations.30
Geraghty extends this perspective when she entreats us to reconsider common-
place evaluative hierarchies within television studies, such as that which places
realism above melodrama.31 This is not an unfamiliar plea in itself. But what makes
her request distinctive within this field is that she asks that we do so, not on the
basis of ideological criteria, but with respect to formal and stylistic specificities –
through sustained analysis of, for example, visual organisation, performances,
writing and dialogue, stylistic innovation and so on.32 It is in this emphasis on
aesthetic features, rather than broad theoretical perspectives that treat
programmes as ‘case studies,’ that television aesthetics finds its specific voice. Time
after time, theorising – the asking and addressing of conceptual questions – is
dependent upon and returns to the programmes themselves and our concentrated
engagement with them.
Finally, television aesthetics includes an attention to philosophical matters such
as the question of what values or criteria should be employed in criticism. In this,
it comes closer to philosophical aesthetics as defined by Monroe Beardsley: ‘We
shall think of aesthetics as a distinctive philosophical inquiry: it is concerned with
the nature and basis of criticism – in the broad sense of the term – just as criticism
itself is concerned with works of art.’33 Nikos Metallinos, in his book Television
Aesthetics, primarily advocates an empirical research methodology. But he also
notes that

the analysis and examination of an art form leads to the establishment of the appro-
priate value judgments or criteria that evaluate the art form – criticism. However,
when art critics question the value judgments pertaining to an art form and engage in
discussions regarding taste, harmony, unity, and balance, they further progress beyond
criticism, to a higher level of scholarly activity that Beardsley (1958) called ‘philosophy
of criticism, or metacriticism.’34

Metallinos considers that if one begins with the study of the arts, and then engages
in the study of criticism, the result is the establishment of the field of aesthetics,
which sustains strong connections between its constituent parts. Applied to televi-
sion, if one begins with the study of television art, as outlined above, and then
adds a reflective consideration of criticism (metacriticism), one ends up with the
field of television aesthetics. Crucial to this enterprise is the kind of work being
undertaken by television scholars such as those cited in this article. In addition,
further development is needed to take advantage of potentially useful work in
philosophical aesthetics. Aestheticians such as Noël Carroll have already shown
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78 Critical Studies in Television 1/1

that philosophical perspectives can contribute greatly to our understanding of

mass media, yet television scholars rarely cite his work.35 Moreover, the medium of
television problematises and challenges many long-held perspectives in aesthetics,
and allows us to re-examine these and revitalise familiar debates.36 There is great
untapped potential here for those who are willing to recognise the benefits that an
aesthetic approach might bring to the study of television.

Rediscovering television
Above all, television aesthetics refigures our potential relationship to the
programmes we know and love. Thorburn entreats us to consider television
programmes as art, not just as artefacts. He acknowledges that such a view is diffi-
cult to sustain because so many programmes ‘are partial achievements, arresting
and powerful intermittently, but lapsing into incoherence or easy stereotypes or
mechanical formulas of plot and character.’37 Nevertheless, he feels that the notion
of television programmes as artworks is potentially transformative. Thorburn
concludes: ‘Insisting on this distinction between art and artifact, I am clinging, I
recognize, to an outmoded humanism, which wants still to believe that there is a
significant difference between art and entertainment, art having value for us not
only as a cultural artifact but also intrinsically, because it is beautiful and wise.’38
Thorburn’s comments echo Diané Collinson on aesthetic experience: ‘aesthetic
experience at its highest and best is arresting, intense and utterly engrossing:
. . .when fully achieved it seizes one’s whole mind or imagination and conveys
whatever it does convey so vividly that the result is delight and knowledge.’39 If we
do not believe that television may sometimes offer such experiences, then perhaps
we ought not to spend our time examining its aesthetic qualities. If on the other
hand we do believe that such experiences are possible, however sporadically, then
surely the most appropriate response is to approach television programmes mind-
fully as expressive works of art, replete with significant aesthetic properties?

Notes
1 Although I have previously classified my own work as ‘television aesthetics,’ this article
goes one step further in bringing some of the work of other scholars under that
umbrella. Some of those scholars have used the term ‘television aesthetics’ themselves;
others might, of course, object to their inclusion within this nascent field. To clarify, I
do not mean to imply that those mentioned herein work only within the field of televi-
sion aesthetics, and I am aware that a synoptic overview such as is offered here risks
understating the scope of their work and/or misrepresenting their persuasions.
However, I am confident in observing trends and continuities in terms of vocabulary,
concerns and methodology; I have also sought to cite others’ work that I find most
sympathetic or complementary to my own approach, and most useful on my television
aesthetics course (though I have not included every source, such as John Corner’s excel-
lent overview of television studies; Corner, Critical Ideas in Television Studies, Oxford
University Press, 1999).
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Television Aesthetics 79

2 Sarah Cardwell, ‘“Television Aesthetics” and Close Analysis: Style and Mood in Perfect
Strangers (Stephen Poliakoff, 2001),’ in Douglas Pye and John Gibbs, eds, Style and
Meaning, Manchester University Press, 2005, p. 180.
3 Ibid.
4 Jason Jacobs,‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ International Journal
of Cultural Studies, 4:4, December 2001, 431.
5 Ibid.
6 Lyas did not intend that his work be applied to television, but I have found it valuable
both in teaching and in my critical work such as my latest book on Andrew Davies;
Sarah Cardwell, Andrew Davies, Manchester University Press, 2005.
7 Colin Lyas, ‘The Evaluation of Art,’ in Oswald Hanfling, ed., Philosophical Aesthetics: An
Introduction, Blackwell Publishers, 1992, 361.
8 Ibid.
9 David Thorburn, ‘Television as an Aesthetic Medium,’ Critical Studies in Mass Commu-
nication, 4:2, June 1987, 163.
10 Charlotte Brunsdon,‘Television: Aesthetics and Audiences,’ in Patricia Mellencamp, ed.,
Logics of Television: Essays in Cultural Criticism, Indiana University Press, 1990, p. 69.
11 Brunsdon also proposed a valuable distinction between quality and good television, which
encouraged further work on ‘quality television’ (see for example Simon Frith, ‘The Black
Box: The Value of Television and the Future of Television Research,’ Screen, 41:1, Spring
2000, and a forthcoming edited collection from I.B. Tauris on defining contemporary
quality television, edited by Janet McCabe and Kim Akass, which follows their conference
on ‘Quality American Television,’ held at Trinity College, Dublin in April 2004).
12 Christine Geraghty, ‘Aesthetics and Quality in Popular Television Drama,’ International
Journal of Cultural Studies, 6, 2003, 40.
13 Ibid., 26.
14 Ibid., 41–42.
15 David Thorburn, ‘Television as an Aesthetic Medium,’ p. 163.
16 Ibid., p. 164.
17 Geraghty, ‘Aesthetics and Quality in Popular Television Drama,’ p. 26.
18 Lyas, ‘The Evaluation of Art,’ p. 361.
19 Robin Nelson, TV Drama in Transition, Macmillan, 1997, p. 228.
20 John Caughie, Television Drama: Realism, Modernism and British Culture, Oxford
University Press, 2000.
21 Jacobs, ‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ p. 430.
22 Ibid., p. 431; Jacobs notes that at this time such programmes are likely to be dramas and
documentaries, although the viewer may choose to watch other programmes with this
level of concentrated attention.
23 Issue 6 of the Journal of British Cinema and Television, forthcoming in 2006, is co-edited
by Steven Peacock and myself.
24 Jacobs suggests that this recent interest in close analysis might be in response to recent
trends within the medium itself: ‘The continued sense that the television text is mostly
inferior to the film text and cannot withstand concentrated critical pressure because it
lacks ‘symbolic density,’ rich mise-en-scène, and the promotion of identification as a
means of securing audience proximity, has to be revised in the light of contemporary
television’; Jacobs, ‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ p. 433. I would
add that this shift in emphasis is just as likely to be indicative of the changing interests
of scholars as of changes in the programmes they study.
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25 Thorburn, ‘Television as an Aesthetic Medium,’ p. 162.

26 Jacobs, ‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ p. 427.
27 I refer implicitly here to Jacobs’ exploration of ER, which he followed with a book-length
study of medical dramas, as Jacobs’ work exemplifies how television aesthetics is differ-
entiated by its focus on aesthetic qualities. Contrast this with an approach that utilises
ER as a case study for representations of race and gender, or for postmodernist theories.
Here, the study arises from an engagement with the programme first and foremost;
theorising follows. See, Jacobs,‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ pp.
427–447; and Jason Jacobs, Body Trauma TV: The New Hospital Dramas, bfi Publishing,
2003.
28 Scholars who have dealt with the issue of episodic structure (referring here simply to
the existence of a series of individual episodes) include John Ellis and, more recently,
Jacobs. The latter, drawing upon the Romantic conception of the Fragment, postulates
that episodes may be regarded as fragments – both formally complete in themselves and
yet forming part of larger content or whole. He then reveals how this might illuminate
the episodic structure of ER. See, Ellis, Visible Fictions: Cinema, Television, Video, Rout-
ledge, 1982; and Jacobs, ‘Issues of Judgement and Value in Television Studies,’ pp.
427–447.
29 Geraghty states her desire to think ‘more broadly’ about aesthetics, so that television is
not regarded as utterly distinct from other arts but is instead considered in relation to,
for example, film; simultaneously, she wishes to think ‘more narrowly about the object
we are trying to analyse,’ by considering different programmes in relation to their
particular generic categories (for example, drama): Geraghty, ‘Aesthetics and Quality in
Popular Television Drama,’ p. 29.
30 Sarah Cardwell, Adaptation Revisited: Television and the Classic Novel, Manchester
University Press, 2002.
31 Geraghty, ‘Aesthetics and Quality in Popular Television Drama,’ pp. 32–33.
32 Ibid., pp. 33–35.
33 Monroe Beardsley, Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism, Harcourt Brace,
1958, 6.
34 Nikos Metallinos, Television Aesthetics: Perceptual, Cognitive and Compositional Bases,
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc, 1996, p. 4.
35 See, for example, Noël Carroll, A Philosophy of Mass Art, Oxford University Press, 1998.
36 For example, episodic structure seems to challenge that familiar criterion of value,
coherence. Yet we need not abandon such a criterion peremptorily; instead, we might
consider how it might be reworked and reshaped – such as in Jacobs’ notion of the frag-
ment.
37 Thorburn, ‘Television as an Aesthetic Medium,’ p. 170.
38 Ibid., p. 169.
39 Diané Collinson, ‘Aesthetics Experience,’ in Hanfling, ed., Philosophical Aesthetics, p.
115.