Baring our souls : TV talk shows and the religion of recovery / Kathleen S. Lowney.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lowney, Kathleen S.

Series:

Social problems and social issues

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Radio talk shows--Social aspects--United States.

Radio talk shows.

Television talk shows--Social aspects--United States.

Television talk shows.

Social aspects.

United States.

Recovery movement.

Physical Description:

xii, 159 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

New York : Aldine de Gruyter, [1999]

Summary:

This volume is among the first to examine systematically what talk show hosts and guests are saying about social problems, social deviance, and their solutions. Contesting the widely-expressed claim that "talk shows are the new den of iniquity," Lowney argues that these shows offer a "new kind of American civil religion," combining the trappings of an earlier evangelism with media images based on the Recovery Movement claim that each person is fundamentally flawed and in need of healing.

Unique in its approach to a popular phenomenon, Baring Our Souls is essential supplementary reading not only for courses in cultural studies, sociology of religion, and social problems, but for journalism, communication, and mass media studies as well.

Contents:

1 New Wine, Old Wineskins: Talk Shows as a Genre 1

Nervousness, Shame, and Critics: What People Are Saying about TV Talk Shows 3

Yes Virginia, there Is Morality on Daytime Talk Shows: Explaining the Present by Looking to the Past 7

Secular Fun: The Circus as Entertainment 9

Turning Away from Sin: Religious Revivals as Opportunities for Conversion 12

Come Watch with Me Under the Electronic Tent: TV Talk Shows as Circus and Revival 15

What Kind of Morality is the Religion of Recovery? 19

Outline of the Book 21

2 Telling Tales: Testifying to Trials and Tribulations 27

Preparations: Back Stage at Talk Shows 28

Opening Frames 32

Staging 36

Talk Shows and Social Problems Work: Producing People 39

3 Breaking with the Past: The Moment of Conversion 61

Words of Change: Conversion Discourse 64

Conversion Roles: Seekers and Victimizers 70

Conversion Roles: Experts and Ex-es 80

4 Recovery Rules: The Beliefs of Recovery Religion 89

Freedom to be Me: Valuation of Self Over Society 94

Family: The Ties That Bind 97

Emotional Scars Run Deep 102

Healing Takes Help 105

Hooked On Being Hooked 106

5 From Whence Cometh "Salvation"? The Roots of Recovery Religion 111

The First Root: Medicine, Religion, and the Right to Define Deviance 113

The Second Root: "Medicine-Lite"

The Growth of Alcoholics Anonymous, New Practitioners and the Emergence of Codependency 120

The Third Root: Turning Inward, Albeit in Many Forms 128

Recovery Sells 133

6 Morality for Whom? Problems with Recovery Religion as Moral Code and Public Discourse 139

Of the Self, For the Self and By the Self: The Absence of Real Community in The Recovery Movement 143

Help Yourself But Not Others 145.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 151-156) and index.

ISBN:

0202305937

0202305945

OCLC:

41628204