McIlvenny2011

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McIlvenny2011
BibType ARTICLE
Key McIlvenny2011
Author(s) Paul McIlvenny
Title Video interventions in “everyday life”: semiotic and spatial practices of embedded video as a therapeutic tool in reality TV parenting programmes
Editor(s)
Tag(s) EMCA, Keywords: embedded video, reality TV, parenting, media therapeutics, mediated space, recall, instruction, professional vision
Publisher
Year 2011
Language
City
Month
Journal Social Semiotics
Volume 21
Number 2
Pages 259–288
URL Link
DOI 10.1080/10350330.2011.548648
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

Video technologies have made their way into many domains of social life; for example, as a useful tool for therapeutic purposes. Reality TV parenting programmes, such as Supernanny, Little Angels, and The House of Tiny Tearaways, all use embedded video as a prominent element, not only of the audiovisual spectacle of reality television but also of the therapy, counselling, coaching and instruction intrinsic to these programmes. The main uses of embedded video can be categorised into the following genres: live video observation/monitoring; live video relay and instruction from one space to another; and video-prompted recall. Using a multimodal conversation analytical approach, excerpts from these programmes are analysed to investigate several key phenomena: mediated space and video practice; use of embedded video to localise, spatialise and visualise talk and action that is distant in time and/or space; the translating, stretching and cutting of experience in and through video technologies; and the display and embodied mediation of professional vision. The use of video technology enables the professional to do a number of important therapeutic or counselling tasks; for example, to give timely advice and instruction to a parent in the midst of a troublesome situation involving their child(ren) or to use playback of video recordings of past conduct to prompt reflection and a perspective shift by the parent(s). These have to be managed both temporally and spatially, as sequentially organised settings in which semiotic space is designed to channel interaction and experience, and interactional space is governed from a distance through the semiotic representations afforded by the video technology.

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