TV Socialism

AnikÓ Imre is Associate Professor and Chair of Critical Studies in the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. She is the author of Identity Games: Globalization and the Transformation of Media Cultures in the New Europe.

"... [Imre] has composed an engaging and path-breaking study offering further insight into the multiplicity of phenomena long obscured behind the notion of totalitarianism." - David Sockol (H-Socialisms, H-Net Reviews) "AnikÓ Imre has written a field-transforming book, with implications that reach far beyond television studies."- Christine E. Evans (European Journal of Cultural Studies) "...TV Socialism has as much to offer scholars of post-socialism as scholars of state socialism itself. Imre’s insightful analyses of often-trivialized popular television genres offer novel perspectives on key themes in post-socialist media studies such as nostalgia and nationalism." - Catherine Baker (Feminist Media Studies) "Pathbreaking and powerfully informative." - Olga Mesropova (Russian Review) "TV Socialism is a very fine and well written piece of research, definitely worth a read for everyone attracted by Eastern European popular culture. It offers a wonderful and always entertaining journey into the realm of socialist television, and by doing so, a journey into an audio-visual world of the past. It is a must read for anyone who is doing research in the field of television history, socialist history, not to forget those intrigued by insights into everyday socialist life." - Stefan Zimmermann (Europe Now) "A long overdue transnational inquiry of the multiple continuities of television and socialism in Central and Eastern Europe. . . . Imre masterfully delineates contemporary Eastern European anxieties about nationalism, economy, memory, and historiography since the fall of the Iron Curtain." - Sebastian Heiduschke (German Studies Review) “The main strength of TV Socialism lies in the analysis of programs themselves; it is here that Imre develops some of her most original and intriguing arguments, which will no doubt continue to shape debates on socialist television and its place in global television history for some time to come.” - Sabina Mihelj (Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly)

• Acknowledgments  viiIntroduction. Why Do We Need to Talk about Socialism and TV?  1Part I. Genres of Realism and Reality1. From Socialist Realism to Emotional Realism  272. Tele-education  403. Crime Appeal  664. The Great Socialist Game (Show)  835. Postsocialist Ethno-Racial Reality TV  108Part II. Genres of History6. The Historical Adventure Drama  1337. Postsocialist Nostalgia and European Historical Drama  1558. Commercials as Time-Space Machines  173Part III. Genres of Fiction9. Women and TV  18710. Socialist Soaps  199Part IV. Genres of Humor11. Socialist Comedy  22712. (Post)socialist Political Satire  242Afterword. Afterward  257Notes  261Bibliography  299Index  311