Learning on ScreenWhat’s Good On TV?
What’s Good On TV?: Understanding Ethics Through Television by Jamie Carlin Watson and Robert Arp (Wiley-Blackwell, 2011). 320 pages. ISBN: 978-1405194754 (paperback), £19.99; ISBN: 978-1405194761 (hardback), £55.
About the Author: Dr Chris Willmott is Senior Lecturer in Biochemistry at the University of Leicester and has a special interest in bioethics teaching. He is the author of the BioethicsBytes blog: bioethicsbytes.wordpress.com, which recommends clips for teaching about bioethics. He has also contributed chapters to two books on Doctor Who and philosophy.
E-mail: cjrw2@le.ac.uk
I was very excited when I received a flyer from the publisher advertising the release of this new book. As someone who makes regular use of TV and film clips in teaching ethics with bioscience students I was interested to see what fresh insights the authors had provided.
What’s Good on TV? has three principal sections: The nature of moral value, ethical theory and practical ethics (the authors call the sections ‘Series’, but I will stick with the conventional terminology to avoid confusion with actual series being discussed). Within each section there are several chapters (aka ‘Episodes’, naming which I will eschew for the same reason given above). Each chapter includes a synopsis of at least one classic ethical text on the theme under discussion, one or two case studies based around a particular TV episode and some study questions.
Philosophy and popular culture: The early years of the 21st Century have seen significant usage of popular culture, including television programmes, as vehicles for the general public to engage with different aspects of philosophy. Since 2000, Open Court publishers have produced a successful series of Popular Culture and Philosophy books which now runs to nearly 70 titles. Wiley themselves have entered the fray with over 35 books in their Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture series. Robert Arp, one of the authors of the present title, has contributed chapters to many of the books in both series, as well as editing South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today and co-editing Batman and Philosophy: The Dark Knight of the Soul. As these examples demonstrate, such books are targeted at the general reader interested to know how their favourite TV series, film, rock band – or even the Atkins diet – can offer insights into philosophy.
The first thing to establish, therefore, is that What’s Good on TV? is not one of those books. This is very definitely an ethics textbook rather than an introductory guide for a TV enthusiast wanting to dip her toe into the world of ethics and philosophy. There are three target audiences identified in the Preface: students of popular culture, media, philosophy and similar courses; their instructors; and general readers interested in ethics. The book has received a positive review, from a student perspective, published in the Times Higher Education magazine (http://tinyurl.com/THEstudentreview). What did I make of it from an educator’s viewpoint?
I am in full agreement with the authors’ central premise that popular culture references, such as those delivered via TV series, are more efficient tools than traditional textbook examples for explaining philosophical concepts to contemporary students. To this end, they use television programmes in three distinct ways in this book. As noted above, there is at least one detailed Case Study in each Chapter. Additionally, several programmes are used as illustrations within the main text of the book. Finally, each chapter concludes with a list of other potential TV episodes where similar themes are considered.
