Title: Dreams in American television narratives : from Dallas to Buffy /
Authors: Burkhead, Cynthia
Year: 2013
Subjects: Dreams on television.; Television programs United States History
Abstract: Dreams in Television Narratives is the first comprehensive analysis of one of American television's most frequently utilized tropes, the dream. From its beginning, television has been a storytelling medium. Whether delivered to a live audience or played out on a sound stage, narratives and those who write them have always been the crux of the television program. While film can claim a long history of scholarly inquiry into the connection between film and dreams, no comprehensive research exists on the subject of television dreams. Locating its primary function as narrative, the author uses examples from American sitcoms and dramatic programs, analyzing the narrative functions of dreams using, as its frame, Carl Jung's narrative stages of the dream: exposition, development, culmination, and conclusion. While television dreams are analyzed throughout, case studies of the television programs The Sopranos and Buffy the Vampire Slayer are included to show in detail how dreams function throughout a television series. Includes a compendium of over 1000 television episodes that include dreams, a valuable tool for any television scholar or enthusiast.
Contents: Introduction -- Film dreams and television dreams -- Dreaming in black and white -- Exposition: introducing the narrative -- Development: advancing the narrative -- Crisis: building to narrative climax -- Lysis: ending the narrative -- Television critiques its dreams -- Part II. Case study: Buffy the vampire slayer -- Case study: The Sopranos -- Case study: Lost -- Case study: Awake.