Webcam audiences descend from Victorian sensation-drama theatergoers who enjoyed and critiqued staged realism
Evidence
The JenniCam’s historical antecedents stretch back even further, to a 19th century genre of reality-as-entertainment: the Victorian sensation drama. These plays were essentially demonstrations of technology, in which waterfalls, locomotives, and court cases were simulated on stage to ‘thrill and chill’ audiences with displays of ‘theatrical authenticity’— verisimilitude delivered by the representational mechanisms of the era (chiefly the microphone, the phonograph and the film projector). Though some have characterized the audiences for these spectacles as credulous, theater historian Lynn Voskuil argues that sensation playgoers were England’s first truly consumerist audiences, simultaneously enjoying and critiquing the ‘so real’ phenomena placed on stage for their entertainment. Like sensation drama audiences, homecam viewers enjoy the images, sounds, and textual interactions transpiring on their screens while simultaneously engaging in sustained critiques of the “so real” that put most reporters and academics to shame. — Theresa M. Senft, Camgirls, 139
Categorization
- XREF: The ‘enjoy while critiquing the so-real’ consumer stance connects to existing notes on how audiences hold contradictory receptions — cf. material on irony and media literacy. — connects to: Knowing a webcam broadcasts transforms bystanders into image-checking performers within minutes. — Theresa M. Senft, Camgirls: Celebrity and Community in…, 68; Realism in nineteenth-century spectacle demanded an isolated observing gaze; Depicting characters as Victorian criminal types implies deep observation — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 412
Broader Connections
- Realism in nineteenth-century spectacle demanded an isolated observing gaze
#expands(0.85) - Depicting characters as Victorian criminal types implies deep observation
#expands(0.75) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 412