Uploaded by Original1001BG on 17th August 2011
People are hardwired to seek out interactions, to
communicate with others in as many ways as possible. We are social beings. In
the technological era of the 21st century this comes easy, with
television, phones and the internet. Technology has opened up new avenues of
communication. Social networking and sharing sites as well as text messaging
and e-mail are all new ways people can interact with each other. Each of these
devices for communicating has their own codes and forms that shape our
interactions. To understand these devices and the codes that shape them it is
important to study the micro interactions that occur. Although social
networking is a good place to study digital and text based interactions, this
essay will look at a more structured interaction, the television interview, by
examining the micro interactions between the host, the guest and the audience
as well as the scripts and codes that govern T.V. interviews. This essay will
look at one interview in particular where these scripts are broken, an
interview between Christine O’Donnell (guest) and Piers Morgan (host).
The interview between Piers Morgan and Christine O’Donnell
is an interesting study as the guest, Christine, leaves the interview and set
on air before the interview is finished. This breaks social and moral codes and
scripts that govern how a T.V. interview should go. Throughout the essay this
interview will be broken down and the micro interactions will be examined as
well as the impact these interactions have on the guest and host as well as the
audience.
The video begins with Piers Morgan asking about Christine
O’Donnell’s views on gay marriage and whether she supports it. This question immediately
opens up a controversial issue in this current society. The question about gay
marriage is a hotly debated topic in many T.V. shows particularly interviews
and it is usually ‘handled with care’ by the guests who offer their opinion.
Christine is unwilling during this interview to discuss her views as she is
religious and fears her opinion may be seen as controversial or biased. She
attempts to deflect the question and show her discomfort with the topic of gay marriage
by stated that Peirs is “borderline being a bit rude” [0:00–0:06]. With this
sentence Christine alerts Peirs that he is ‘pushing’ the question and should
change topic. By her use of phrasing she attempts to save face by not directly
stating that she doesn’t want to discuss that topic.
[0:07-0:24]
Christine: I obviously want to talk about the
issue I choose to talk about in the book. Um…
Peirs: Do you answer that question in the
book?
Christine: I talk about my religious beliefs,
yeah. I absolutely do.
Piers: Do you talk about gay marriage in the
book?
Christine: What relevance is that right now?...
In
this part Christine tries to move the conversation away from this topic and
back to her newly released book, trying to direct the interview. Peirs
continues to focus on the topic of gay marriage. This part of the conversation
shows an imbalance in the power that each person has in the interview and the
expectations that the audience holds about how interviews should function. T.V.
interviews follow a script generated by the expectations of the audience, this
isn’t a physical script rather it is a set of obligations that both the host
and guest have to uphold this expectation. Goffman (1967), discussed how when
these obligations aren’t met then the audiences’ expectations lower. He
discussed how obligation and expectation are linked in this way. In the
interview the audience have the expectation that Peirs will respect his guest
and maintain a positive relationship them. The audience also expect that
Christine as the guest should be willing to answer the host’s questions to
maintain the positive flow of conversation. Both Peirs and Christine are
obligated to act out these expectations.
[1:30-1:50]
Peirs: Why are you being so weird about
this?
Christine: I am not being weird about this
Peirs, um..
…
Christine: …I am not being weird, your being a
little rude!.
Peirs: I am baffled as to why you think I’m
being, I think I being rather charming and respectful.
At
this period in the interview the relationship between host and guest has taken
on a negative connotation. This is reflected in the ‘face threatening’ statements
used by both Peirs (“why are you being weird about this”) and Christine (“your
being a little rude”). In normal conversations these statements would generally
not be threatening to a person as it does little damage to a person’s social
self. The fact that there is an audience changes this as it now becomes a
public statement against that person which damages their social self (Ross,
2007.) Peirs then ‘talks himself up’ as a humorous attempt to save face and maintain
his social self, this is less to Christine and more to the audience as a way of
rebuilding their view of him.
[2:00-2:12]
Christine: Well don’t you think as a host, um,
if this is what I say I want to talk about, that’s what we should address?
Peirs:
Well, uh,
not really, No. You’re a politician.
In
this final stage of the interview Christine subtly insults Peirs’ ability as a
host, explaining in her opinion what how he should act, the statement is made
as a question to damper its impact on the audience expectations. Peirs rebuttals
with the line “you’re a politician” inferring multiple negative connotations.
At this time Christine is also looking of screen signalling her desire to end
the interview. This is met by a stage hand coming to remove the lapelle microphone.
Peirs asks “where are you going?” as a means to point out that her behaviour is
not appropriate for an interview setting.
At
this point Christine is no longer playing her role as T.V. interview guest.
This can be viewed as showing her backstage self (Goffman, 1971.) this
threatens her ‘face’ and in turn damages her social self. Due to the fact that
television has a large audience there is a requirement that the host and guest
need to put on a front stage self. This is similar to acting due to the fact
that both host and guest must depict themselves as the audience expects them to
be, as mention earlier. Front stage performances for television interviews
require teamwork from those involved, this is a way of building and protecting each
other’s face (social view of themselves), maintaining the audiences
expectations and also maintaining the moral codes of an interview.
Weider
(1974) explained moral codes as a set of unspoken rules within an ‘in-group’
these codes are shaped and created by the groups conduct and in turn the codes
inform and maintain a certain conduct. The unspoken rules of a T.V. interview
are largely shaped by the audience in a similar way to the actors obligations
to the audience referred to earlier, but it also involves the people and the
show itself. In explanation; an interview is structured in a ‘question-response’
format, with the host leading the conversation. The behaviour of the host and
guest may vary largely depending on what format the interview is, if it is a
more light-hearted, comedic show then the interview has more leeway when it
comes to banter and even insults. If it is a serious news interview on the
other hand it is more strictly structured.
[2:34-2:40]
Christine: …yeah, not to endure a rude talk show
host, but to talk to you about my book…
[3:08-4:12]
Peirs:
…It’s a
good book, it’s called trouble maker, we now know why it’s called troublemaker…
This
interview is a more serious interview so Christine’s departure was unexpected
and broke the moral codes of the interview, this resulted in Christine
suffering social death, but it could also be argued that Peirs, the host also
suffered social death in the process for not maintaining his interview. This is
reinforced by one last more direct insult from both people, causing even
greater loss of face.
Uploaded by monkeynews000 on 18th May 2009
This
Second clip is a good comparison as it is a comedic game show setting in which
one of the guests walk off after the host insults him. Due to the genre and
setting of this second clip, there is more leeway for insults without loss of
face. But when the guest, Preston, walks out both he and the host, Simon Amstell,
lose face. It is interesting to note that in this clip there is one of the
other guests steps in to save face for the host, removing any negative view of
the host through the use of humour. Due to the more light-natured genre there
is no social death for the host and show continues without too much issue.
By
studying the micro interactions in society it creates a better understanding of
how people communicate at a deeper level. This interview went wrong and ended abruptly
due to both the host and guest not upholding the expectations of the audience,
this resulted in the loss of face for both people and their social death. The
moral codes that govern how an interview should happen, were also violated
which was detrimental to the functioning of the show. And finally, the teamwork
and frontstage performance of both Peirs and Christine were damaged when they
began to insult each other. This all combined and lead to what is commonly known
as the T.V. walk-off. Many other T.V. walk-offs (which can be found on YouTube)
show similar faults in the micro interactions which underlie our everyday
interactions.
References:
Goffman, E. 1967.
Interaction Ritual: essays on face-to-face behaviour. Garden City, N.Y.:
Doubleday. 301.11/32
Goffman, E. 1971. The
Presentation of self in Everyday life. Harmondsworth: Penguin. 301.113/3
Ross, D. 2007.
“Backstage with the Knowledge Boys and Girls: Goffman and Distributed Agency in
an Organic Online Community.” Organization Studies vol. 28, no. 03: pp.
307–325.
Wieder, D. L. 1974.
“Telling the Code.” Pp. 144-172 in Ethnomethodology, edited by Roy Turner.
Harmondsworth: Penguin.
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