Television style

Style signifies and has significance. The lighting in a scene shapes our understanding of a character’s moral values. A cut in a commercial juxtaposes images of a car being driven down the road and a young girl running through water sprinklers—generating a visual metaphor. Slow motion shots of runners paradoxically signify their heightened speed. Through these and myriad other techniques, television relies on style—setting, lighting, videography, editing, and so on—to set moods, hail viewers, construct meanings, build narratives, sell products, and shape information. Television Style examines this process. It dissects how style signifies and what significance it has had in specific television contexts.