Charlotte Brunsdon

In Television Cities Charlotte Brunsdon traces television's representations of metropolitan spaces to show how they reflect the medium's history and evolution, thereby challenging the prevalent assumptions about television as quintessentially suburban. Brunsdon shows how the BBC's presentation of 1960s Paris in the detective series Maigret signals British culture's engagement with twentieth-century modernity and continental Europe, while various portrayals of London-ranging from Dickens adaptations to the 1950s nostalgia of Call the Midwife-demonstrate Britain's complicated transition from Victorian metropole to postcolonial social democracy. Finally, an analysis of The Wire’s acclaimed examination of Baltimore, marks the profound shifts in the ways television is now made and consumed. Illuminating the myriad factors that make television cities, Brunsdon complicates our understanding of how television shapes perceptions of urban spaces, both familiar and unknown.

In Television Cities Charlotte Brunsdon traces television's representations of metropolitan spaces to show how they reflect the medium's history and evolution, thereby challenging the prevalent assumptions about television as quintessentially suburban. Brunsdon shows how the BBC's presentation of 1960s Paris in the detective series Maigret signals British culture's engagement with twentieth-century modernity and continental Europe, while various portrayals of London-ranging from Dickens adaptations to the 1950s nostalgia of Call the Midwife-demonstrate Britain's complicated transition from Victorian metropole to postcolonial social democracy. Finally, an analysis of The Wire’s acclaimed examination of Baltimore, marks the profound shifts in the ways television is now made and consumed. Illuminating the myriad factors that make television cities, Brunsdon complicates our understanding of how television shapes perceptions of urban spaces, both familiar and unknown.

This book brings together for the first time David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon's classic texts, Everyday Television: Nationwide and The Nationwide Audience. Originally published in 1978 and 1980 these two research projects combine innovative textual readings and audience analysis of the BBC's current affairs programme Nationwide. In a specially written introduction the authors trace the history of the original Nationwide project and clarify the origins of the two books.

The first edition of this book immediately became a defining text for feminist television criticism, with an influence extending across television, media and screen studies – and the second edition will be similarly agenda-setting. Completely revised and updated throughout, it takes into account the changes in the television industry, the academic field of television studies and the culture and politics of feminist movements.With fifteen of the eighteen extracts being new to the second edition, the readings offer a detailed analysis of a wide range of case studies, topics and approaches, including genres, audiences, performers and programmes such as 'Sex and the City', ‘Prime Suspect’, Oprah and Buffy.With a new introduction to the volume tracing developments in the field and introductions to each thematic section, the editors engage in a series of debates surrounding the main issues of feminist television scholarship. They explore how television represents feminism and consider how critics themselves have created feminism and post-feminism as historical categories and political identities. Readings consider women who are engaged in various aspects of television production on both sides of the camera and examine how television targets and imagines its female audience, as well as how women respond to and use television in their everyday lives. Feminist Television Criticism is inspiring reading for film, media, cultural and gender studies students.Contributors: Ien Ang, Jane Arthurs , Sarah Banet-Weiser ,Karen Boyle, Marsha F. Cassidy, Geok-lian Chua ,Bonnie J. Dow, Joanne Hollows, Deborah Jermyn , Annette Kuhn, Elizabeth MacLachlan, Purnima Mankekar, Tania Modleski, Laurie Ouellette, Yeidy M. Rivero, Lee Ann Roripaugh, Beretta E. Smith-Shomade, Kimberly Springer, Ksenija Vidmar-Horvat, Susan J. Wolfe.

Charlotte Brunsdon's illuminating study explores the variety of cinematic 'Londons' that appear in films made since 1945. Brunsdon traces the familiar ways that film-makers establish that a film is set in London, by use of recognisable landmarks and the city's shorthand iconography of red buses and black taxis, as well as the ways in which these icons are avoided. She looks at London weather – fog and rain – and everyday locations like the pub and the housing estate, while also examining the recurring patterns of representation associated with films set in the East and West Ends of London, from Spring in Park Lane (1948) to Mona Lisa (1986), and from Night and the City (1950) to From Hell (2001). Brunsdon provides a detailed analysis of a selection of films, exploring their contribution to the cinematic geography of London, and showing the ways in which feature films have responded to, and created, changing views of the city. She traces London's transformation from imperial capital to global city through the different ways in which the local is imagined in films ranging from Ealing comedies to Pressure (1974), as well as through the shifting imagery of the River Thames and the Docks. She addresses the role of cinematic genres such as horror and film noir in the constitution of the cinematic city, as well as the recurrence of figures such as the cockney, the gangster and the housewife. Challenging the view that London is not a particularly cinematic city, Brunsdon demonstrates that many London-set films offer their own meditation on the complex relationships between the cinema and the city.

The Feminist, the Housewife, and the Soap Opera traces the history of the feminist engagement with soap opera using a wide range of sources from programme publicity to interviews with key soap opera scholars. The book reveals that feminist scholarship on soap opera was a significant site of which the identity 'feminist intellectual' was produced in dialogue with her imagined other, the soap opera watching housewife. The book integrates personal autobiographical accounts within a broader history which traces both the move from 'women's liberation' to 'Feminism', and the acceptance of soap opera as a serious object of study.

The Feminist, the Housewife, and the Soap Opera traces the history of the feminist engagement with soap opera using a wide range of sources from programme publicity to interviews with key soap opera scholars. The book reveals that feminist scholarship on soap opera was a significant site of which the identity 'feminist intellectual' was produced in dialogue with her imagined other, the soap opera watching housewife. The book integrates personal autobiographical accounts within a broader history which traces both the move from 'women's liberation' to 'Feminism', and the acceptance of soap opera as a serious object of study.

This book brings together for the first time David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon's classic texts, Everyday Television: Nationwide and The Nationwide Audience. Originally published in 1978 and 1980 these two research projects combine innovative textual readings and audience analysis of the BBC's current affairs programme Nationwide. In a specially written introduction the authors trace the history of the original Nationwide project and clarify the origins of the two books.

Charlotte Brundson's key writings on film and television are bought together with new introductions which contextualise and update the arguments. The focus is on the tastes and pleasures of the female consumer as she is produced by popular film and television.

Charlotte Brundson's key writings on film and television are bought together with new introductions which contextualise and update the arguments. The focus is on the tastes and pleasures of the female consumer as she is produced by popular film and television.