Professor of Religious and Ethical Studies Steven A. Benko is the editor of a recently published book that explores ethical concepts through popular television shows.
Living better through television: contemporary television and moral identity formation addresses the moral meanings that audiences can take from the television shows of the last 20 years. The book contains essays on The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Justified, Lucifer, Hannibal, and others.
In his research and teaching, Benko is more interested in exploring moral identity formation and sees television storytelling as a locus for identity formation.
“Becoming a person is the same as becoming a person with moral preferences and a sense of right and wrong, right and wrong,” Benko said. “Television tells stories about who we are. Television is a place where cultural conversations take place. From questions about gender, race, friendship, romance, marriage, family dynamics, employment, law, police, health, everything, television is a place where important national and cultural conversations take place. If you put that together – television tells stories that help the audience understand who they are, and these stories are relevant to what is happening right now – television becomes a natural place to think about ethics.”
Benko is proud of the range of programs included in the book, and hopes that readers will see that there is “serious intent on the part of the writers, directors, and actors to create meaningful art.” Shows featured range from award-winning dramas to more escapist shows based on comics and graphic novels.
“When you talk about The wire Y The sopranos, you’re talking about the best television shows ever produced. There is no question that these are high art capable of provoking serious reflection and moral debate,” Benko said. “But there are essays on The Unicorn, LuciferY The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and what these essays show is that there is so much effort to create a meaningful and moral universe in these shows. The question that each of the essays asks, some implicitly, some explicitly, is why is it important to watch a program, or several programs?
Collaborations with members of the Meredith community
The book features several collaborations with Meredith College faculty and alumni. He co-authored a chapter on moral decency on the television show. The Unicorn with Ellie Jones, ’20. Benko and Alisa Johnson, Associate Professor of English and Associate Dean of Arts and Humanities, are the authors of the book’s final chapter, “A Black Captain America: Race in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier”, An analysis of race and representation in the recent Disney+ series. The book cover was designed by Bailey Birtchet, ’21.
Benko has a lot of praise for his Meredith collaborators.
“Alisa Johnson and I have been colleagues for years, but I didn’t know how passionate she was about comics and these characters,” Benko said. “Writing with her was a way to get to know her better and that was a lot of fun. It is a credit to the collaborative culture that Meredith fosters these conversations so that such opportunities are possible and can come to fruition.”
The contributions of former students Birtchet and Jones were strengthened through their previous experiences in the Undergraduate Research Program.
Bailey Birtchet designed a brilliant cover that evokes how television, in this case in the form of a remote control, shapes and organizes our lives. Ellie Jones and I collaborated on an article for [his previous book] The ethics of comedy and for this book too. It is extremely gratifying to see her grow from a student in my classes to conversation partner, researcher, and co-author. She is someone who benefited from the Undergraduate Research Program, just like Bailey. All the extra work they did over the summers and multiple semesters gave them the project-taking skills that set them apart from their peers.”
What matters in the show is important to the audience
Benko said that the book’s content argues that “there is synchronicity between what matters on these shows and what matters to the audience.” Because of this connection, television choices provide an opportunity for critical thinking.
“The show becomes a script of what matters to the audience insofar as it offers strategies for negotiating the world so that one can access and enjoy what matters to them. What I hope is that people think more critically about why they’re invested in a particular show or a particular character and put it in terms of what matters to them and then think about how it came to be important, why it’s important and what steps should they follow. take to access what matters to them. Audiences invest a lot of time and emotion in television shows; I hope this book explains why they do it and what they get out of it.”
Live better through television is Benko’s third published book, following The Good Place and Philosophy Y The ethics of comedy.
learn more about Live better through televisionpublished by Rowman & Littlefield.