Media Text Analysis: Community

Media Text Analysis: Community
Within its relatively short existence as a mainstream mass media source, television has become an integral part of society and culture. From the humble beginnings of short news broadcasts and a few entertainment television programs in the late 1940s, the expansion of networks and programming through the ‘Golden Age’ of television through the 1950s, and the continual developments in broadcast capacity and range of programing options over the last 50 years (Stephens, n.d.), television programming has expanded to a massive media industry with ties to many social and cultural aspects.
There are now an expansive range of options in distribution methods, channels choices, and a plethora of broadcasted media texts.

He decided to attend the worst community college in Colorado, Greendale Community College, to easily replace his degree and through a mishap joins a Spanish study group with the other main characters. The show’s band of characters is truly diverse in ethnicity, race, and ideological viewpoints of any type.
Community is widely considered a sitcom (situational comedy), providing viewers with comedic storylines paired with relatable characters and ending most episodes with a learned lesson, however the presentation and messaging are not standard to the sitcom premise. The show will often have a completely different style of filming, of storytelling, or otherwise massively change from a sitcom norm in order to support the parody and story. This is in large part due to the creator Dan Harmon and his previous production history.
Dan Harmon. Dan Harmon has long been a proponent of independence and creating media that is outside of the norms. Harmon co-founded, as well as produced and distributed content to, the website Channel 101 – a platform dedicated to independent filmmakers creating 5 minute shows to be rated by the viewers and picked up for another episode (Buchanan, 2010). Harmon has also worked on projects with alternative comedians like Jack Black and Sarah

The process of pitching a show to a network executive, having the pitched show chosen to create a pilot, and then possibly have the pilot picked up as an ongoing series is a harrowing process riddled with exact structure (Metz, 2007). The relationships within the institution of broadcast television between network executive and a show’s creator can potentially limit the creative agency. If a network executive has an understanding that the target audience want a traditionally formed sitcom with a certain type of premise, like a nerd comedy, then an idea pitched that is creative but not fitting the mold may be passed