University of Groningen What's Wife Swap Got to Do With

View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by University of Groningen University of Groningen What's Wife Swap got to do with it? Graham, Todd DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.3413.0088 IMPORTANT NOTE: You are advised to consult the publisher's version (publisher's PDF) if you wish to cite from it. Please check the document version below. Document Version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Publication date: 2009 Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database Citation for published version (APA): Graham, T. (2009). What's Wife Swap got to do with it? Talking politics in the net-based public sphere. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.1.3413.0088 Copyright Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Downloaded from the University of Groningen/UMCG research database (Pure): http://www.rug.nl/research/portal. For technical reasons the number of authors shown on this cover page is limited to 10 maximum. Download date: 12-11-2019 What’s Wife Swap got to do with it? Copyright © T.S. Graham 2009 What’s Wife Swap got to do with it? Talking politics in the net-based public sphere ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT Ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. D.C. van den Boom ten overstaan van een door het college voor promoties ingestelde commissie, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel op donderdag 1 oktober 2009, te 10:00 uur door Todd Steven Graham, geboren te Newburgh, New York, Verenigde Staten van Amerika PROMOTIECOMMISSIE: Promotor: Prof. dr. K.L.K. Brants Co-promotor: Dr. N.W. Jankowski Overige leden: Prof. dr. S. Coleman Prof. dr. K. Schönbach Dr. M. van Selm Prof. dr. C.H. de Vreese Prof. dr. E.A. van Zoonen Faculteit der Maatschappij- en Gedragswetenschappen Contents Acknowledgements 1 Introduction 1 1.1 What’s Wife Swap got to do with it? · 1 – 1.2 Background: Net-based public sphere research · 2 – 1.3 Research aims, questions, and relevance · 3 – 1.4 Organization of the study · 5. 2 The normative conditions of the public sphere 7 2.1 Introduction · 7 – 2.2 The public sphere and its conditions · 8 – 2.3 Deliberative democracy: From vote-centric to talk-centric · 11 – 2.4 What is deliberation? · 12 – 2.5 Beyond institutional and formal notions of deliberation · 13 – 2.6 The normative conditions of the process of deliberation · 16 – 2.7 Conclusion · 20. 3 Online deliberation and the public sphere 21 3.1 Introduction · 21 – 3.2 The process of achieving mutual understanding · 22 – 3.3 Structural and dispositional fairness · 30 – 3.4 Expressives · 35 – 3.5 Conclusion · 38. 4 Research design & methodology 41 4.1 Introduction · 41 – 4.2 The research design · 41 – 4.3 Data collection procedures: Sampling, archiving, and organizing · 45 – 4.4 Identifying, describ- ing, and assessing political talk · 48 – 4.5 Limitations · 64. 5 Talking politics online: The Guardian Talkboard 67 5.1 Introduction · 67 – 5.2 Identifying political talk · 67 – 5.3 The communicative practices of political talk · 69 – 5.4 The use of expressives · 79 – 5.5 Assessing political talk: The normative analysis · 84 – 5.6 Beyond the normative conditions of deliberation · 88 – 5.7 Conclusion · 90. 6 Talking politics online: The Big Brother Fan Forum 93 6.1 Introduction · 93 – 6.2 Identifying political talk · 93 – 6.3 The communicative practices of political talk · 97 – 6.4 The use of expressives · 106 – 6.5 Assessing political talk: The normative analysis · 111 – 6.6 Beyond the normative conditions of deliberation · 114 – 6.7 Conclusion · 116. 7 Talking politics online: The Wife Swap Forum 119 7.1 Introduction · 119 – 7.2 Identifying political talk · 119 – 7.3 The communicative practices of political talk · 123 – 7.4 The use of expressives · 132 – 7.5 Assessing political talk: The normative analysis · 135 – 7.6 Beyond the normative conditions of deliberation · 139 – 7.7 Conclusion · 141. 8 Conclusion 143 8.1 Introduction · 143 – 8.2 Summary of the study · 143 – 8.3 Assessing political talk: The normative analysis · 149 – 8.4 Beyond the normative conditions of deliberation · 157 – 8.5 The topics and triggers of political talk · 161 – 8.6 Reflection, implications, and recommendations · 164 – 8.7 What’s Wife Swap got to do with it? · 168. Bibliography 169 Appendices 179 Nederlandse samenvatting 197 Acknowledgements It has been a long journey over these past years as a PhD student at ASCoR, and there have been many people who have aided me along the way, from giving feedback to providing moral support. I want to take this time and thank everyone who has helped me during this journey. In particular, I like to begin by thanking my promoter Kees Brants for all his feedback, support, and advice over the years. I have learned a great deal from Kees and working with him has been both a pleasure and an honor. At the beginning of this journey, while searching for that particular path, I re- ceived inspiring feedback and advice from a variety of people. I would like to particularly thank Stephen Coleman and the E-Democracy group from the 2004 OII Summer Doctoral Program for all their inspiring advice. I want to also thank my co- promoter Nick Jankowski along with the PhD club for all their valuable feedback during this journey. Many thanks to Bob van der Lippe, Elmar Jansen, and Johannes von Engelhardt for their statistical guidance along with Mustafa Avdic for his help in designing the cover of this dissertation. I have been lucky during this journey to be surrounded by a great group of of- ficemates and friends. They not only made sure that I remained sane but also enjoyed the process: Diana, Eleftheria, Floris, Jens, Koos, Mario, Mervi, and Valerie. Espe- cially, I want to thank Linda Duits for all her help, support, and advice over the years. Finally, I am especially grateful to both Auli Harju and Marnix van Eck for all their support during the past year without which I would have never finished this journey, this dissertation. Amsterdam, August 2009 Chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 What’s Wife Swap got to do with it? One evening before dinner, a few friends and I sat and watched television. As I flipped through the channels, one of my friends shouted out, “Leave that on. I like that show.” At the time, I had no idea what show she was referring to, and as such, I sat there patiently waiting to see what we were about to watch. As the introduction of the television series began, I thought to myself, “Please, not another one of those reality television shows”. Sure enough, it was exactly that, a series called Wife Swap. Wife Swap, originally broadcasted in 2003 by Channel 4 (UK), is an award winning reality television series, which focuses on the lives of families. The twist to the show is that for two weeks the mothers of two families swap places and take over the role of the other. Given the contrast in the families selected, the show presents a lively form of entertainment from the screams of anger to the laughter of joy. However, entertainment was not the only thing that Wife Swap provided that evening amongst friends. It also, and unexpectedly, provided a communicative space that fostered political discussion. During the first commercial break, we began discussing the behaviors of the two families. By the end of the show, these particular behaviors ignited and fueled a variety of discussions on parenting practices specifically and the role and importance of parenting for society in general. In short, Wife Swap, in addition to entertaining us, provided a communicative space whereby the issues of parenting and the modern- day family within a democratic society were discussed among friends during the course of a couple hours. Before the show began, I had a somewhat negative impression of what reality shows were, of the kind of people who watched them, and of what they offered their fans, audiences. In terms of what they offered society, these impressions were magnified further. Stealing a line from the title of the best-selling book by critic Neil Postman (1985), my thought at the time was, “Yes, we are amusing ourselves to death.” However, after watching the show and participating in the communicative space that it provoked, I began to question my initial impressions on the role of such a show specifically, and on reality television and popular forms of entertainment in general. 1 Chapter 1 Shortly after, I began exploring and sampling the various online entertainment- and fan-based discussion forums, such as Wife Swap and Big Brother, in search of similar political discussions. During an initial investigation, I came across numerous discussion forums and communities tied to reality TV series. While examining these sites, I was initially overwhelmed by the sheer number of postings they offered. At the time, for example, Channel 4’s Big Brother discussion forum hosted over 9,000 messages posted during several days alone.1 Although a majority of what I read was not political by any stretch of the word, there still were a substantial number of times when the conversations turned political.

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