MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

Television criticism has long been viewed as the more casual, less rigorous cousin to film criticism. The cinematic medium is twice as old, bolstered by a more expansive history of popular and scholarly analysis. Until the beginning of the 21st century, the culture at large viewed much of television as escapist frivolity. But TV has since shaken off the stigma of inferiority, with easier access to “cinematic” production tools and a viewing audience capable of consuming shows in high definition and via streaming services.

These shifts in the medium have prompted and coincided with accompanying shifts in the industry of television criticism itself. There’s more TV shows to cover than ever before, but some shows attract more press attention than others. In a constricted media landscape, critics have to contend with Internet traffic demands just as they once ran up against space constraints in print. The forms in which readers consume criticism have evolved as well — audio and video tools are as valuable to the modern television critic as a word processor. And readers have different priorities in a time of unprecedented entertainment industry expansion, forcing critics to recommend and curate as much as they analyze and contemplate.

My presentation will examine the evolution of television coverage at the New York Times, the nation’s most venerated newspaper and a key player in the evolution of cultural trends. I’ll diagnose the current state of criticism at the paper, trace the developments that led to this point and illustrate the evolution of the form. By examining a single contributor, I will illustrate the larger trends that all outlets and critics now face in evolving their discipline.