Contemporary British Soap Operas Report (Assessment)

Soap operas are what people resort to when having free time as their unobtrusive, unreal and sometimes amusing topics help forget about personal problems for at least an hour. What happens is a mere switching to the problem of a fictional person resulting in forgetting one’s own misfortunes. It is impossible to deny that the soap opera has probably been the most popular genre on British television (Dominic Strinati 2000). Soap operas are enjoyed by a number of people of different ages and occupations each of them finding something interesting particularly for him or her. According to Jonathan Bignell (1997), soap opera is a fictional genre based on a continuing narrative of a group of individual characters. It is difficult to say whether the soap operas are useful or whether they, on the contrary, distort people’s perception of reality as once a person starts watching it on a regular basis it is not easy to stop following the continuously unfolding events as the time passes and some people, especially those who are older, live in the world of soap operas and find all answers to their questions in them. The ‘trivialisation of public affairs, the usurpation of public discourse by soap opera, the apparent breakdown of mechanisms for forming a public will and making it effective’ (Graeme Turner, 2004) is the least what the soap operas are very often charged with. The first soap operas used to concentrate more on family and community issues since this was basically what they were meant for – the entertainment of families by means of presenting the ordinary situations from a slightly different perspective: ”We try to keep everything as simple as possible and direct it at the ordinary things that occur in every household and within every neighbourhood” (quoted by Robert Clyde Allen, 1995). However, the contemporary British soap operas seem to have stopped paying attention to the issues of family and community that is why there emerges a necessity to find out why the subject of concentration was changed and what they centre at in the modern world.

What has to be found out first of all is the reason of changing the initial orientation of the British soap operas. It is not a secret that America influences not only other countries’ economy by saturating the markets with the goods of its own production but media of each country as well profoundly affecting music industry and television in the first ranks. Not only British but French, German and other European television has been affected by America, at this soap operas have particularly changed in the meaning they used to convey initially, thus, in their original subject of concentration taking after “the American formula, focusing less on community issues and more on illicit sex and romance” (Tamar Liebes & Sonia Livingstone, 1998). The influence of the America’s formula does not end with simple redirection of the European soap operas. What else has been traced is that the European audience finds American soap operas more alluring thus dooming the soap operas produced by their own country to failure and making American soap operas predominant.

Discussing the changes in British soap operas would be more convenient by means of a separate example, namely “Coronation Street”. It is necessary to mention that typically, when presenting the stories of women, British operas concentrate on the motherhood “with various mother figures at hand daily” (Tamar Liebes & Sonia Livingstone, 1998) whereas American soap operas present women as independent identities ready to fight for their rights, which is a typical American representation of a woman. The influence of American formula is felt in “Coronation Street” since it, like American soap operas concentrates on the complexity of relations between young people who are constantly getting married or divorced, planning weddings and suffer because of the plans ruined by a third party who once has been in love with the fiancée and things like this. The British soap opera lost its primary character initially presenting people with good intentions and giving their life as an example for the others and this can be traced in “Coronation Street”: “In the modern world of capitalism and materialism, it tells us that the good old values of hard work and loyalty to friends are lost” (Tamar Liebes & Sonia Livingstone, 1998). The influence of the American formula is especially vividly felt on the depiction of women in “Coronation Street”: “there are a number of older single women who are active and independent” (Tamar Liebes & Sonia Livingstone, 1998). It is under the influence of American feminism that women started to be represented as independent and career-oriented rather than family-oriented.

In conclusion, British soap operas have indeed changed their central orientation which happened under the influence of American formula of soap operas aimed at the depiction of complexity of relations between young people and filled with ideas of feminism. Taking into consideration everything mentioned above it can be stated that British soap operas have taken after this formula mostly due to the fact that the modern audience evaluated this formula as an appropriate one and is satisfied with its influence on the soap operas of their native country.

References

1. Allan, Robert C., (1995) To be continued- soap operas around the world. London: Routledge.
2. Bignell, J., (1997) Media Semiotics: An introduction. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
3. Liebes, T. and Livingstone, S., (1998) ‘European Soap Operas: The Diversification of a Genre’, European Journal of Communication. 13: 147-180.
4. Strinati, D., (2000) An Introduction to Studying Popular Culture. London: Routledge.
5. Turner, G., (2004) Understanding Celebrity. London: Sage