Essay #2

Kylor Roberts

Boczkowski

English 110C01

13 May 2009

Essay #2

Sitting down to watch T.V. is an activity that most people engage in almost daily. Some may wonder, is watching T.V. making us smarter, or just lazy and less intelligent? Steve Johnson would say that television is good for us, making us think, analyze, and learn. In his book Everything Bad is Good for You Johnson provides his readers with many reasons for this argument. Johnson’s book has been a popular discussion topic. Time Magazine writes “Everything Bad is not junk criticism; it is a brisk, witty read, well versed in the history of literature and bolstered with research--for instance, even as electronic media have supposedly "dumbed down" society, IQs in the developed world have been increasing three points a decade for a century. Johnson, it turns out, still knows the value of reading a book. And this one is indispensable.” Time and many other sources have analyzed and reviewed Johnson’s book, and many, perhaps most, agree with him. I also agree with Johnson. Over the last six weeks, I have been watching the very popular television show House. After watching this show, as well as reading Johnson’s views on television, I have been able to make some definite connections between my show and Johnson’s opinions. House is a perfect example of what Johnson is attempting to prove to his readers.

Johnson’s book is based on his theory that popular culture, while it is constantly criticized in a negative way, is actually good for us. The increasing complexity of the shows we watch and video games that we play is forcing our brains to work more, and we are becoming smarter because of it. Johnson calls this effect “The Sleeper Curve.”

House is a very popular show on television. It is aired once weekly, this season on Mondays. The main character, Dr. Gregory House, is the best diagnostician in the world. In each episode, a patient has severe and uncommon symptoms, and while the clock is ticking, House and his team must race to make the proper diagnosis and treat the patient before it is too late. House himself is quite rude, and does not play by the rules at all. He does whatever he feels is necessary to prove his point, especially if it means obtaining the proper diagnosis. House is also addicted to pain killers, and takes Vicodin far too often.

The plot of House is very complex to a viewer who watches regularly, but at the same time, can be picked up by a first time viewer with no problems. Hidden beneath the simpler plot of a medical mystery for which a diagnosis must be made, there is an extremely complex network of intercharacter relations that have grown from the start of the series, which has been airing since 2004. House is an extremely engaging show; it leaves both the casual viewer as well as the avid enthusiast waiting in anticipation for next week’s episode. It is true, as I mentioned, that one can watch House simply for entertainment, but it is hard to not get sucked up into the lives of the characters of the show. You begin to feel more and more like you are in the show as you watch. This is a sign that the show is very mentally engaging.

House is an antisocial addict, who is battling personal problems while at the same time trying to decipher some of the most difficult diagnoses that real doctors would ever be faced with. But hidden underneath this main plot, House has many other relationships which have their own plotlines. House has a past romantic relationship with his boss, Cuddy, which is referred to very infrequently, and would not be picked up on by a casual viewer. House also has a friendship with his coworker Wilson that dates back to when the two of them were in college. Two of House’s ex-team members, Chase and Cameron, are engaged, and actually get married in the most recent season, but their relationship with each other, or the fact that they had once been members of House’s team, is not mentioned in every episode. These smaller plotlines are referred to by Johnson as “Multiple Threading.” This really shows how the shows that we watch today are becoming increasingly complex. Johnson is not the only author to note this increase in complexity over the years; Joseph Rosenbloom, author of “Brain Candy” clearly states his agreement with Johnson. While discussing Johnson’s novel, he tells his readers “TV shows have become mind-dazzlingly more complex… ''Starsky and Hutch" has given way to ''The West Wing" and ''24."” There are countless other examples of smaller plotlines underneath the main story. All of these examples help to prove one of Johnson’s points: Television can be used simply as a source of pure entertainment or as a tool to make us think and analyze; ultimately making us smarter as we watch.

Another of Johnson’s topics in his book is what he calls “flashing arrows.” What he means by flashing arrows are obvious queues that alert the viewer to important upcoming events. For example, flashing arrows are most clearly seen in horror movies, when a main character leaves the door unlocked or a window open, and the camera will pause to make sure it is noted by the viewers. House, as well as many other shows on television today, have an increasingly smaller amount of these queues. The decreasing amount of flashing arrows, is actually making us think more, because we are not as clearly alerted to the coming events, and must analyze what is happening to predict what may be approaching in the show’s plot. The viewer being surprised by new twists and turns in the plot makes the show as a whole much more engaging. An example that Johnson talks about that relates to House particularly well, is that in medical shows, medical terms are not clearly defined to the viewer. It is expected that the viewers will understand the meaning of these terms through the situation in which they are used. Attempting to understand these terms as we watch is yet another way that House makes its viewers think, and it also makes the viewer more engaged by giving them the sense that they are watching actual doctors at work. Carrie, the author of the article “Does watching T.V. make you stupid?” would disagree; however. He states that “Johnson seems to have mistaken some social cues himself, believing that appearing smart and being smart are one in the same.” But this is not Johnson’s point at all, in fact, Johnson is not trying to say that the characters at play are actually intelligent, he is only saying that the illusion of intelligence that they are given makes us think more as viewers. If Carrie were to state that we are only learning to appear smarter, not to be smarter, Johnson could quickly point out the continuously rising IQ scores over the last few decades. Flashing arrows aside from this can be found in House, but are not as clear cut as those in other forms of media such as horror films. You may see an increase in musical tempo leading up to a new symptom on a patient, a dramatic soundtrack when an argument is ahead, or a triumphant song when a member of the team as a realization of the patients ailment, but these are not entirely obvious uses of flashing arrows, and the viewer must still think about what is happening and prepare to be surprised.

Another of Johnson’s points about televisions benefits is social networking. For many fans, House is not just a show that is watched once a week and then forgotten, often it is much more. The show becomes a topic of discussion between them and friends. They may discuss it with peers or family, or turn to an increasingly popular fan site. Many fan sites exist for House. A quick search from an online search engine for “House Fan Site” will generate 41,900,000 results. On these site, fans gather and discuss the happenings of the show, and try to analyze what is happening, or make predictions about upcoming events. A visit to the largest of such fan sites, titled, HouseWiki, will allow a user to quickly view a list of characters and cast, to view video clips and pictures, and there are pages to take polls and discuss the show with other fans. Even simply by watching T.V. and observing and analyzing the character’s actions, we are learning about social networks. Farhad Manjoo, the author of “Don’t Kill Your Television” agrees about the knowledge of social networking that we gain from watching television: “When you're watching one of today's popular shows, even something as nominally silly as "Desperate Housewives," you're exercising your brain -- you're learning how to make sense of a complex narrative, you're learning how to navigate social networks, you're learning (through reality TV) about the intricacies of social intelligence, and a great deal more.” The point being made here is that the people watching this show are using it as a gateway to communications with others, and that the discussions that they have with other viewers is educating them in the process.

In these ways, House is a prime example of all the points that Johnson is trying to make to his readers. HouseHouse is making everyone who watches it, whether they are aware of it or not, slightly more intelligent in the process. is a dynamic and engaging show, capturing its viewer’s attention quickly and involving them in its multiple threads. The show forces them to think and attempt to predict with its intelligent uses of flashing arrows Fan sites and peers allow viewers to connect with others via social networks to further their knowledge of the show. In all these ways,

Works Cited

Carrie. "Does Watching T.V. Make You Stupid." Stay Free! 05 Jan. 2005. 22 May 2009 .

Johnson, Steven B. "Dome Improvement." WIRED Magazine May 2005.

Manjoo, Farhad. "Don't Kill Your Television." Salon.com. 22 May 2005 .

Poniewozik, James. "Children, Eat Your Trash!" TIME Magazine 1 May 2005.

Rosenbloom, Joseph. "Brain Candy." The Boston Globe 01 May 2005.