Reality TV in the Middle East

Jesse Walker | May 18, 2010

Henry Jenkins has published a fascinating interview (part one, part two) with Marwan Kraidy, author of Reality Television and Arab Politics, about the ways "reality television has been a key vehicle through which the Arab world has been negotiating a range of social, cultural, political, economic, and technological changes." An excerpt:

Reality television crystallized a festering Arab malaise exacerbated by the Iraq War, Abu Ghrayb, the Danish Cartoons, the plight of the Palestinians, and an existential crisis whose scope is truly all-encompassing -- ideological, social, political, economic, religious, etc. Clearly, reality television did not trigger all the above on its own, but the intense controversy it created, because it was public, transnational, and involved many sectors of society, gave many Arabs a language and a platform to voice their anger, fears and aspirations. Reality television's claim to represent the real fomented the polemic by compelling many social groups to advance multiple Arab realities. Some said: "This (young men and women living together for four months and competing for viewers' text-messaged votes) is not our reality. It is a reality imposed by the West." This prompted other Arabs to say: "In fact, some aspects of our reality are much more similar to the social interactions we see on reality shows than the reality that you--conservatives speaking in the name of religion--are in fact trying to impose on all of us."

Related reading in Reason: Charles Paul Freund's classic articles on Arab music videos and the power of pop vulgarity.

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PIRS|5.18.10 @ 7:00PM|#

I never could stand "reality television" at least of the forms in the United States and Airstrip One.

Max|5.18.10 @ 7:10PM|#

Could you put Nick Gillespie in a black leather burka? He's getting a little old for that cool guy look.

|5.18.10 @ 7:21PM|#

And I always thought you were a rubber fetishist Max.

¢|5.18.10 @ 7:18PM|#

Will the festering malaise I bought this weekend crystallize if I don't use it soon? It doesn't have a date on it.

pantsfan|5.18.10 @ 7:43PM|#

I'm getting Muslim marriage pages.
See, I don't care what she looks like. Just put her in a Burqa and do it for the Prophet.

|5.18.10 @ 7:53PM|#

I absolutely hate reality shows!

Lu
www.web-anonymity.cz.tc

ziggy|5.18.10 @ 8:14PM|#

Rand Paul won the Kentucky primary... Not a perfect candidate off course but much better than any rank&file; republican... hopefully he can get a seat in the senate...

|5.18.10 @ 9:32PM|#

It is a reality imposed by the West.

That's right, we imposed this upon them by force, or, er, threat of force, or something.

This is a pathological fear of freedom.

Citizen Nothing|5.18.10 @ 11:53PM|#

So, anyone want to predict a plus/minus on how long comments on this thread will be allowed to remain up?

affenkopf|5.19.10 @ 1:19AM|#

What happened in the Mohammed thread? When I last read it about 10 hours ago there was nothing out of the ordinary there.

|5.19.10 @ 1:25AM|#

Even if there was some shit beyond the pale on that thread, they should have left the existing comments up and just disallowed further commenting. I never got to see any of it.

affenkopf|5.19.10 @ 5:11AM|#

Agree, now I'm just curious what was posted there. Has to be at least slightly amusing for reason to delete it.

|5.19.10 @ 8:38AM|#

We are have all your comments.

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