Watching Television with Friends: Tween Girls' Inclusion Of

WATCHING TELEVISION WITH FRIENDS: TWEEN GIRLS’ INCLUSION OF TELEVISUAL MATERIAL IN FRIENDSHIP by CYNTHIA MICHIELLE MAURER A dissertation submitted to the Graduate School-Camden Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in Childhood Studies written under the direction of Daniel Thomas Cook and approved by ______________________________ Daniel T. Cook ______________________________ Anna Beresin ______________________________ Todd Wolfson Camden, New Jersey May 2016 ABSTRACT Watching Television with Friends: Tween Girls’ Inclusion of Televisual Material in Friendship By CYNTHIA MICHIELLE MAURER Dissertation Director: Daniel Thomas Cook This qualitative work examines the role of tween live-action television shows in the friendships of four tween girls, providing insight into the use of televisual material in peer interactions. Over the course of one year and with the use of a video camera, I recorded, observed, hung out and watched television with the girls in the informal setting of a friend’s house. I found that friendship informs and filters understandings and use of tween television in daily conversations with friends. Using Erving Goffman’s theory of facework as a starting point, I introduce a new theoretical framework called friendship work to locate, examine, and understand how friendship is enacted on a granular level. Friendship work considers how an individual positions herself for her own needs before acknowledging the needs of her friends, and is concerned with both emotive effort and social impact. Through group television viewings, participation in television themed games, and the creation of webisodes, the girls strengthen, maintain, and diminish previously established bonds. I show how characters, narratives, and shows create a shared televisual lexicon the girls use to challenge and support each other, (re)aligning with and separating from friends to fulfill individual wants. I found that before television ii could be discussed, the girls negotiated their social relationships, and once established, conversation about televisual material is filtered through their friendships. iii Acknowledgements Over the past six and a half years my family has supported me unconditionally. Without asking why I needed to get my doctorate, they’ve helped me move across the country and back again just to pursue the dream I’ve held since I was six years old. John and Michielle Maurer, you are, by far, the best parents a daughter could ask for and thanks for all of the Reese’s. Russell Kuebler, you were the best grandfather I had. This one’s for you. To my committee members, Dan Cook, Anna Beresin, and Todd Wolfson. Your support, suggestions, guidance, and insights proved invaluable for this work. Thank you for believing in this project and me, and pushing me to re-think tween television culture and play. I am indebted to Stephen Bernardini who talked me through all the blocks, answered the endless texts and calls with patience, and reminded me what the end goal was. Without you, this really wouldn’t have happened. I am grateful for Vibiana Cvetkovic who probably read this dissertation more than anyone aside from me. Your editorial eye and gentle nudging helped this piece move away from words on a page to a story to be shared. Thank you, Leigh-Ann Brown, for being the final inspiration to completing this. To Sarah Stone, my original accountability partner, I appreciate the bribes of high-end make up, coffee, and television to get my data analyzed and written up. Two groups got me through the final year of writing and preserved my sanity in my move back to California. Thank you, SoA (^^^), for all the memes, encouragements, iv and reminders of life outside academia. And thank you, IW, for keeping me grounded and present. Most importantly, I am forever thankful to Brittany White, Sylvia Clark, and Tiffany Parker for letting me into your lives, spending time with me, and answering all my questions. Finally, Ashley Taylor, thank you for the chats about Zoey 101 and iCarly and lending me your group of friends. You have been the inspiration for this project. “In 5, 4, 3, 2…” (Freddie, iCarly.) v Table of Contents iIntroduce 1 Chapter One – Watching Television and Doing Childhood Studies 25 Chapter Two – The Role of Friendships in Television Viewing & Hanging Out 52 Chapter Three – Television Is Just Like… 86 Chapter Four – Televisual Play 127 iConclude 163 Appendix A 177 Appendix B 178 Bibliography 181 Curriculum Vitae 191 vi 1 iIntroduce1 The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Lao Tzu You have the right to be seen, heard, and respected as a citizen of the world… You have the right to your opinions and feelings even if others don't agree with them. Nickelodeon’s Declaration of Kids’ Rights Understandings about television continue to shift as interest has moved from audience demographic studies to in-depth examinations of the incorporation of television into people’s lives. “Research needs to move away from thinking about ‘effects’ and isolated demographic features of audiences. It needs to locate television in culture as something that is part of people’s usual everyday way of going about the business of fitting in, having a bit of fun, understanding the way that the world and the people in it work” (Griffiths and Machin 2003:159). Griffiths and Machin and others (cf. Fiske 2010) recognize the much-needed movement in television scholarship from examining (oftentimes, quantitatively) effects of viewing to exploring the incorporation of television into cultural understanding. From discussions with viewers about individual experiences of television watching, including engagement with narratives and characters in a recently shifting medium, a larger picture emerges of the role of television in people’s daily lives. The child audience has been and continues to be of interest to reformers and scholars alike in this realm. Despite the ubiquity of digital mobile devices in the lives of children and families, television remains the somewhat surprising favored technological medium 1 The use of “i” prior to chapter header is a nod to Nickelodeon’s iCarly, which heavily influenced the design of this project. 2 for children between eight and eleven years old (Rideout, Foehr, Roberts 2010; Common Sense Media 2011). Children, like adults, do not watch television in disconnected and isolated settings. Instead, children integrate working knowledge from other aspects of their lives into their viewing experience, including especially insights from relationships with peers and family alike. Relationship and friendship formation has been a recent interest in the field of childhood studies and psychology. Much of the literature examines social norms and social standings in clique-like groups at school. Conversely, little research has examined the maintenance of friendships, specifically in non-structured locations, such as at home. There is a large timeframe to consider for how children interact with peers and friends outside of school, as the school day lasts about seven hours. Combining the need to understand how children interpret television created for them, and the role of television in tweens’ everyday relationships, this project explores how a long-standing group of tween girl friends discuss, interpret, and use live-action tween shows in their friendship. I highlight the ways in which the girls interact with each other, specifically addressing the ways that television figures into the mediating, strengthening and diminishing of their friendships, both during viewing and post-viewing while engaging in a variety of television-centered activities. The girls’ friendships – both individual and as a group – inform their understanding of tween television shows and aspects of these show and of their viewing of these show informs their friendships. I argue that during television viewing, in the company of friends, and after watching together, the girls enact friendship in various ways informing their understandings of and concerns about shows they watch, concluding that conversations surrounding shows, both 3 informal interactions during viewing, and semi-formal ones pre- and post-viewing, are influenced by the strong bonds of friendship. Brief History of Children’s Television Children’s television, according to Lynn Spigel (2001), was introduced in the early 1950s. Beloved and successful radio serials were moved to the new visual medium, and “hosted” cartoon shows were introduced. Spigel argues that children’s television shows during this era were filled with liminal characters: individuals who were not quite children and not quite adults, which held appeal for children. It was these types of shows, often cartoons, which shaped early children’s television. Simultaneously, research during the early years of children’s television was concerned primarily on viewing habits and choices children made regarding television shows (Luke 1990). Children’s television shows during this time had a limited shelf life, low production value, and were often locally produced (Spigel 1998). In the 1960s, children’s television comprised primarily of animation, which proved to be more cost effective; while shows were more time consuming to produce, they could be used for longer periods of time, extending their value. During this time, research on the child and television focused primarily on the psychological and physical effects of viewing, such as the effects

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