Elsevier

Discourse, Context & Media

Volume 1, Issue 4, December 2012, Pages 151-159
Discourse, Context & Media

Categories, norms and inferences: Generating entertainment in a daytime talk show

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcm.2012.06.004Get rights and content

Abstract

This paper examines the way the host of a UK daytime television talk show, The Jeremy Kyle Show, generates entertainment through framing guests' stories using membership categories and category-based moral evaluations. The analysis draws upon Membership Categorisation Analysis, and in particular Sacks's (1995) discussion of categorial inferencing and category norms, to examine the way the host overlays individuals with membership categories and category-based actions. Moreover, this category work then provides for subsequent normative reasoning and moral judgements to be made for the overhearing audience. In summary the analysis demonstrates the way the show operates through making individuals and their actions morally accountable for the overhearing audience through routine categorisation work and related norms of behavior.

Highlights

► Develops upon Sacks's category work to examine how a TV talk show host generates entertainment. ► Develops upon pure category reasoning relating to social norms and normatively inferred behavior. ► Highlights how individuals are made subject to public evaluation and moral judgement.

Introduction

This paper uses the approach of Membership Categorisation Analysis (Sacks, 1995) to examine the way guests and their stories on a daytime talk show are framed and made accountable through moral and normative ordering. In particular how the host frames individuals and events through categories, devices and predicates when introducing the guests that are then used as recurring resources over the course of the story. The category work carried out in the introduction sequence operates through invoking normative membership devices through which guests and their actions are made accountable through category-based moral evaluations. Central to this analysis of the host's work in the Jeremy Kyle Show is Sacks's work on storytelling and pure category reasoning where story characters are made subject to pure category reasoning both in terms of how they would behave towards one another but also, through normative moral reasoning, how they should behave towards one another (Sacks, 1995 vol. 1, Lecture 14 Fall 1964–Spring 1965, Lecture 9 Fall 1965).

The Jeremy Kyle Show is what may be termed a ‘trash’ TV show (Haarman, 2001) that is based around guests in conflict with one another. The show involves onstage displays of verbal and sometimes physical confrontation and, for this particular show, the resolution of the conflict through a truth telling engine such as a lie detector or paternity test. As with many confrontation based TV shows the stories on the Jeremy Kyle Show routinely involve infidelity, feuding or other accusations that lead to onstage arguments and confrontation (Lorenzo-Dus, 2009, Livingstone and Lunt, 1994). Indeed for many of the shows in this genre the spectacle of live onstage argument between the guests is presented as part of the audience appeal (Tolson, 2001, Myers, 2001, Hutchby, 2001, Hutchby, 2006, Lunt and Stenner, 2005). However, while these shows may be known for their confrontations—and this is certainly how many of the programs are promoted—the shows themselves are not simply a constant stream of arguments. Rather the shows usually involve guests relating stories or narratives of events and actions that may then provide the vehicle for conflict onstage.

As Tolson (2001) points out, narrative plays an essential part in talk shows, with ‘therapy’ talk shows working to present the guests and the events as something that could happen to you, as something ‘ordinary’ (Thornborrow, 2001). However, while ‘being ordinary’ (Sacks, 1995) works to engender empathy between the guest and the audience in some talks shows, in the confrontation talk show the guests and their stories are often presented as being extraordinary, freakish even. The spectacle of these types of shows trade on both the physical and verbal confrontation as well as the out of the ordinary relationships of the guests. Thus, in shows such as Jerry Springer both the verbal and physical confrontation and the bizarre relationships between the guests are the prominent features of the show. In the Jerry Springer show, then, there is little attempt to explore the personal issues in depth, or provide a resolution, while onstage. Rather, it is only in the final section of the program, through Springer's piece to camera, where the confrontations are morally reframed (Haarman, 2001, Sacks, 1972, Lunt and Stenner, 2005). As (Gregori-Signes, 2002. p. 157) suggests, in this kind of confrontational talk show the hosts' work may be to frame the guests within overarching theatrical categories of villains, victims and heroes and through these dramatic categories the spectacle of confrontation can be viewed as pantomime or melodrama. However, in the Jeremy Kyle Show, which also trade on extraordinary situations and confrontations, moral evaluations are routinely produced by the host throughout the show and occasioned by some aspect of the unfolding story, rather than being confined to particular segments. Moreover, the occasioned moral evaluative work of the host relies upon the guests being recognizable to the audience as particular types of people as and when evaluations are invoked. Thus, although the events and characters may well be extraordinary in their actions towards one another, it is important that the audience understand the guests within the frame of mundane social categories and category relationships that are then amenable to routine moral accountability by the host and the audience.

Section snippets

Data and approach

The data for this paper is drawn from a selection of recordings of the Jeremy Kyle Show (http://www.jeremykyleshow.co.uk/, and available through YouTube). The Jeremy Kyle Show is a UK television talk show broadcast Monday to Friday mornings on the ITV network. The show lasts for an hour and has been broadcast since 2005. The premise of the Jeremy Kyle Show is usually a dispute between parties that is aired on the show and which is then solved by some ‘truth’ finding activity. This may involve a

Inferential reasoning for morally ordered actions

The final extract discussed below focuses on how the host builds a categorial frame using a membership device (family), which then allows him to invoke normative moral behaviors by which to contrast the guests actions. Previous to this part of the show, in which Lee is introduced and addressed by the host, Len has initially spoken about the events with Kyle onstage. During this next phase of the introduction Lee and Kyle collaboratively build the story further around the breakdown of the

Conclusion

Drawing on Sacks's work on pure category reasoning and category-based inferencing the above discussion has focused on the way the host of a daytime TV show employs categorial work to present the guests and their stories within morally accountable frameworks for the overhearing audience. At the heart of the analysis was a focus on the initial introduction sequences where the host introduces the guests and collaboratively tells their story. Within this storytelling sequence the host is seen to

Transcript Notation:Transcription

Transcription conventions are based on Gail Jefferson's notation (as presented in Atkinson and Heritage (1984)). The principal notion is as follows:

    [ ]

    Square brackets mark the start and the end of overlapping speech.

    ↑↓

    Vertical arrows precede marked pitch movement.

    Underlining

    Signals speaker's emphasis.

    CAPITALS

    Mark speech that is obviously louder than surrounding speech.

    °I know it,°

    Degree signs enclose obviously quieter speech.

    (0.8)

    Numbers in round brackets measure pauses longer than 0.2 seconds.

Acknowledgments

I would like to extend my thanks to Ed Reynolds for this help and insights on various drafts of the paper, as well as his transcription skills. Also various versions of the thoughts in this paper have benefited from being aired at Ross Priory Broadcast Talk seminars the Transcript Analysis Group in Brisbane. Thanks also to the anonymous reviewers for their insights and comments that have helped clarify and strengthen the paper.

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