Ideology in TV Competition Shows

As Pierre Bourideu has conceptualized, “the capital” can not be limited within the borders of the actual Money-capital (Bourdieu, 1990:112). After the capital has been shaped by the social conditions, contemporary tendencies and daily routines, it turns out to “habitus” which can be called as the situation of daily ideology or the current social dynamics. With the people having been surrounded by the habitus, the notions of the capital which has been shaped by effects of the current situation becomes determinant.

Mostly Pierre Bourdieu defines this term as “symbolic capital”. Symbolic capital does not indicate the power itself... It mostly positions itself affiliated to the acclaims of the mass, current trends and the drifts in society.

Within this context the jury symbolizes the symbolic capital, much more than the actual capital. The members of the jury has already gained the acclaim of the public and with this acclamation they’ve been nominated as a part of the jury who will decide, “who is going to be able to enter in their community”. This role of gatekeeping, inevitably grants the jury the right of using the symbolic capital. As it is written above

“the object petite a” refers to the capital “A” with its symbolic power and just to represent the real power.

As in the allegory of “abdication of reason”, the jury obsorbes the light of the “capital A” with its symbolic capital, and for the competitors it is inevitable to escape from the eclipse, till the time comes. As in the metaphor, the enlightenment can not happen instantly, it needs a time and a process to become full.

So, being chosen by the jury acts as a passport for becoming a part of the community and seems to represent the “object of desire” symbolically. This symbolic way of understanding directly refers to the Hegel’s servant-master dialectics and the way of realization of itself with the symbolic power of the master.

With this allegory we have no such aim to tell that there is a master-servant duality, in the contemporary hegemonic relations. On contrary we try uncover the nature of current power relations with an allegory.

55 The Hegemonic Discourse of Judges in the TV Competition Shows

As Engel’s wrote in his book: “it is hard to deal with the capitalism, because it is a shade” and as the way of post structuralism, it is only possible to understand it by giving our whole projection over the shade from different angles. As a shade of the capitalist system and consuming culture, th competition seems tos hare the symbolic power between jury and competitors. Afte the jury elects the competitor, now it is time fort he competitor to choose the jury who he/she will get along with.

This can be understood as an independence to the competitors to choose their way but in reality, all the members who are constituting the jury, symbolizes the capitalist system and the culture industry without any doubt. It is clear that none of the members of the jury belongs to an alternative music or show community and all of them comes from the very inside of the popular culture. So with an imagination of choosing a jury, the competitor only choses the way of being popular actually. This is not a real choice and as Adorno indicated in his groundbreaking study Minima Moralia “it is the impossibility of choosing the second option”.

From a historical-sociological context, it is clear that jury-competitor relation is a minimalistic version of the actual capitalist relations and hegemonic constitution. Hall’s understanding of hegemony-subject relations and media relevance, depends on the “cultural lead” of the mass media communication (Hall, 2005:24). According to Hall, “although the hegemony doesn’t convert the life style, understanding, manners and civilization of a society according to a group of elites, it has the supremacy in process of ways of converting and reshaping” (Hall, 2005:24-36).

Starting with the proposition of Hall, we may consider that the competition shows has the supremacy in dictating the manners and understanding of hegemony over the mass. This is the sublime competence of the shows and the way they dictate their hegemony in order to reach the popularity.

With a wide perspectived understanding, it is quite clear to propose that, the competition shows are a micro model of the contemporary sittuation and it is possible to examine it with a paradigm, combining the psycho analytic view and Marxian understanding.

Any argument that implies a micro model is existing, also quietly imply that there occurs a simulation of the macro system. Avoiding from the Jean Baudrillard’s simulation and simulacre terms, “simulation”

refers to a situation which is completely equal or equivalent to the more complicated quasi version of the issue. in our study it is just the hegemony and its cultural apperarances itself. For a more meaningful explanation we use the term simulation as a researcheable piece of the common/Daily situation.

Bourdieu, while discussing the position of the arts and artists indicates that culture producers plays a key role in legitimazing the social order by producing symbolic capital deriving from the symbolic labor (Bourdieu, 1990:114). It is clear that in our example the legitimization process of the culture is much more complicated than the Frankfurt School’s ciriticize “culture industry”... in our example the culture industry has already been produced the output of culture with the popular culture or mass culture but what we are facing is the re-production of popular culture with a wat to legitimize it. Also the hegemony of the

“popular” is being reproduce by the hand of the jury so called “elites” by the mass.

in order to understand the hegemonic situation of the TV show we should enhance a sociological imagination and we should imagine that, there is a so called “jury” constituted from the very popular areas of music and entertainment market, this jury plays a role in choosing who or whom will enter the market newly with the effect of the TV Show... on the other hand there are many competitors who prefers to sing or perform the main productions of the culture industry with a hope to have a place in the production process. With a glance to this situation it will be clearly understood that there is an imagined community of cultural production, this imagination has been accepted by the mass with the power of it, so it is repeatedle being reproduced by the jury and the competitors itself. So there is no such an option fort he competitors to perform a production of high or alternative culture with a hope to enter the system. That is how the system not just legitimize but reproduce itsel by the means of symbolic capital and labor.

As the Bourdieu sociology calls the “actants” as actors, “the actors” (in our study it refers to the competitors and the jury), shapes their imaginations with the borders, which can be called reachable or un reachable. in this situation although Lacan himself suggests that “there is no satisfaction in the object of desire”(Lacan, 2005:223), actors will have, have to limit their desires with the reachable borders and these

Akin Deveci, Adile Celik

borders would clearly signify the “object petit a”. While the “Capital A” seems to be placed unreacheable, obtaining the main goods of the “petit a” should clearly be a part of justifying itself.

With such a deterministic power over the competitors it is impossible to suggest that, there is no hegemony between the components of the shows itself. As a role modal, gatekeeper and the symbolizer of the system jury would clearly play a key role in the reproduction of the popular culture and the moderator himself would play a role with his economic power over the whole programme.

As we have seen the neo marxian and post marxian paradigm with an understanding of psycho analytic perspective is quiet right while they were interpreting that the “contemporary social conditions can not be only understood by the means of production”. And there needs a more complex point of view in order to analyze the micro representations of the current system.

Although we accept that the main reason of this contemporary situation is depending on the relations in means of production and we do not exclude Marxian theory, it is crystal clear that, this would definitely be a reductionist point of view for observing our issue. Cultural reproduction processes and the economical conditions should be separated from each other without losing the analytic expression between them.

With a so merged paradigm it would be possible to understand the multi-dimensional situation of cultural reproduction.

Discourse analysis as its clearly devoted itself to uncover the ideological relations between cultural, economical and social situations would be helpful to obtain this multi dimensional perspective.

As Foucault predicted, “expression” is the formation of the social context which combines culture, economy and social formation together with an output called “ideology” deriving itself from a sociological and historical context by bundling to the contemporary situation. So it is only possible to understand the formation by deconstructing the “expression”.

2. Method

in order to deconstruct the expression, first we are going to dismantle the order of discourse which has been built over the bundle we have written above. While dismantling first the oral hegemony between the jury, moderator and competitors will be deconstructed and fragmented with the “verb-subject relation”.

The acceptance of the hegemony will be derived from the verbs which has been chosen by the jury and competitors. The notion of “you” will be examined with the “cosiness” in Turkish grammatic rules. At this very moment we should pay attention to the pronoun “you” in Turkish language. “You” when used in the singular for points out to an informal and cozy relation between the sides of the issue but the plural use of

“You” (which is called “siz” in Turkish” points to a more formal relation. So the people who doesn’t know each other usually uses the plural form of “you” in order to sustain the formal relation. As it can be seen from suca small example the verbal constitution of the ideology could be strongly effective in the understanding of hegemony.

After deconstructing the verbal/oral building of hegemony, the visual context will be deconstructed with the methods of discourse analysis that are derived from the psycho analytic perspective. As the cinema studies have been verified that, the hegemony can be constructed with the techniques used in cinema, the construction of visual hegemony in the shows will be examined. in this examination we are going to pay attention to the manners of the competitors and jury, the positioning of the sides in the stage, very clear camera moves and the visual formation of the shows itself. It shouldn’t be understood that the shows will be examined scene by scene but a general understanding of “visual expression” will be deconstructed with the means of visual discourse analysis.

Mostly, discourse analysis method, faces the criticize of “with which evidences these examples have been chosen?”. in this study we only going to examine the most significant examples which are pointing the hegemonic and ideological expression. If we take a glance at the show, it would be clearly seen that,

“chosen examples to examine” has a frequency in the show which repeats itself usually. Because of this situation, chosen examples will be able to give us a cumulative opinion about the hegemonic relations in the show.

57 The Hegemonic Discourse of Judges in the TV Competition Shows

3. Findings

The shows we’ve selected for our study, always gets a ranking in first 10 in the season they’ve been broadcasted. Mostly “O Ses Turkiye” gets ratings around %9 and share about %11 at that time Yetenek Sizsiniz ratings are about 10 percent with the share of 12 percent (decimals have been deleted for a cumulative use). With these rating and share ratios, both Tv shows are the most seen competition programmes in their own broadcast stream. The next best competition show called “Yemekteyiz” also belongs to Acun Medya which is the broadcaster of these 2 shows and stands in the 65th rank of the rating chart. These datas exactly show us that competition programmes as a TV genre, has been monopolyzed by the Acun Medya itself. As we’ve mentioned before, from a Marxian point of view it is definitely explicit that both shows have a hegemonic power with its economy politics over the genre.

As it is crystal clear that popularity of “popular culture” has a correlation between prevalence, these shows gives a chance for all the competitors to reach the widespread mass. From a widened perspective of Marxian theory we can see that these shows are determinant in order to designate the value of the meta which corresponds the arts-shows in this significant example. With such a power in the area, most of the competitors admits that “being seen in the show helped to reach better places in the show business”. For example, in Yetenek Sizsiniz a competitor tells that “Thanks to the Acun Media, with this we have been able open both domestic and abroad market with our show. I especially thank to Acun himself and his staff” and in another example from the “O Ses Turkiye” a competitor tells that “My goal is making myself a little bit Professional with the gainings from the competition, I hope to pass the first stage”.

As it is seen in both shows, competitors and also supposably the audience believes that these shows are a gateway to be successful in the area of music or stage shows. According to the discourse analysis an a priori acceptance of the power of elites in order to reach a place which has been desired, completely leads to full espousing, to the power of the elites. Such an unequal balance of the power gives a dominance to the elites who/whom seize the power with their symbolic hegemony of the area. As it has been indicated before, the power that has been seized by such a group is just a shade of the capitalist system. With an obedience to that shade the competitors accepts the whole power of the system willingly. So the sides has been determined as “decision-makers” and “obeyers”. Being unsuccessful also doesn’t mean that the competitor is completely excluded from the system. Most of the competitors (after not being elected by the jury) tells that “this has been a promotion for them, it has been a life time experience, also it is an honour to be in that stage in front of the jury”. As we have clearly mentioned before this is likely to the master-servant dichotomy of the Hegel himself. The competitors realize themselves even though they have not been elected by the jury. Because as Foucault said servant represents the power of the master with the existence... It is clearly a determinant rule of a class to have a servant. Although this seems like a dichotomy, none of the audiences, or jury nor the competitors believe that. After this acceptance of the power relations, most of the competitors tells their regards. If the competitor chooses the second option of not accepting the power of the jury, moderator himself (Acun) seizes the control and blames the competitor for not being polite or being unbelievably arrogant. Also he suggests that being such arrogant to the jury completely symbol of desparation and it is clear that those kind of competitors will surely be unsuccessful.

As it can be seen being famous or taking a part in the show business is an object of desire for the competitors and the jury holds the door for reaching it. Although they’ve not been fully satisfied or it is not certain that they’ve rached their goals, being elected by the jury represents the gathering of “petit a”

in the road of getting the “capital A” and reaching full satisfaction.

in both shows Jury suggests career planning for the competitors, for example they offer to do the show in some places or sing another genre of songs. An ability to offer a career plan is unevitably refers to the hegemonic power of the side making the suggestion. Also, the jury mostly suggests the competitors to work harder and attend the show again which signifies the inadequation of them.

in “O Ses Turkiye” after jury has elected the competitor and accepts that he/she is capable of being in the show for the further stages, the competitor selects the jury member who he/she wants to go on with.

in that process mostly the jury tries to convince the competitor to select him/herself. While they are trying to convince the competitors, they always offer: “to create a showman/girl from them, putting great stage

Akin Deveci, Adile Celik

shows to the scene” sometimes they also flirt with the competitors of the opposite sex, making domestic offers such as baking traditional Turkish foods etc. As we can see from the offerings in the convincing, they do not make any suggestions about the nature of the work. Most of the offerings are irrelevant for the competitors to make a choice.

in the theoretical part of our study, we have mentioned the usage of “you” pronoun in Turkish. All the competitors uses the plural form of “you” “siz” as a significance of the respect but except Gokhan and Yildiz Tilbe (Although sometimes she uses the singular form) in O Ses Turkiye all of the jury members or moderator uses the singular form of “you” (sen) as a significance of being more powerful. Especially Acun, beacuse of being a part of the jury in “Yetenek Sizsiniz” and holding the position of moderator in “O Ses Turkiye” always uses the singular form of “you” (sen) as a representator of power. As it is usual, hegemonic power seems to get hidden behind the curtains of being casual.

in both shows we can easily see that the moderator Acun has a dominant power over the show and the jury. in O Ses Turkiye he stands in the highest position above all the competitors and jury with a communication between the audience. He represents himself as the voice of the audience and persuades jury members to sing or being a part of the show. in Yetenek Sizsiniz Acun plays the role of chairman fort he jury and mostly the other members of the jury accepts his opinions about the competitor. Usually it can be observed that jury members may change their opinions according to the attitudes of Acun himself.

As it can be seen most of the competitors represents a loser image in front of jury. Mostly they tell

As it can be seen most of the competitors represents a loser image in front of jury. Mostly they tell