For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch

This article revisits controversial BBC television film Ghostwatch (1992), a seasonal feature-length television special about a family plagued by a poltergeist and the television crew has entered their home hoping to capture ghostly phenomena on camera. Fictional, scripted, and filmed in its entiret...

Descripción completa

Guardado en:

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal:	Rose Rowson
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	ScholarWorks @ UMass Amherst 2021
Materias:	Language and Literature P Communication. Mass media P87-96
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/7d0a073bf47e4a92b10d164b48fa9adb
Etiquetas:	Agregar Etiqueta Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!

id	oai:doaj.org-article:7d0a073bf47e4a92b10d164b48fa9adb
record_format	dspace
spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:7d0a073bf47e4a92b10d164b48fa9adb2021-11-17T15:50:19ZFor a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch10.7275/f3wf-ga752380-6109https://doaj.org/article/7d0a073bf47e4a92b10d164b48fa9adb2021-10-01T00:00:00Zhttps://scholarworks.umass.edu/cpo/vol8/iss1/10/https://doaj.org/toc/2380-6109This article revisits controversial BBC television film Ghostwatch (1992), a seasonal feature-length television special about a family plagued by a poltergeist and the television crew has entered their home hoping to capture ghostly phenomena on camera. Fictional, scripted, and filmed in its entirety prior to airing, Ghostwatch follows the formal conventions of live, factual television: well-known British media personalities host from the studio and on location, interviewing experts on the paranormal, and periodically inviting the watching public to call the show via the BBC phone-in number, 0818118181, which had both a diegetic and an actual function. The high volume of calls that the BBC received during the program caused the switchboard to jam, leaving reportedly tens of thousands of callers unable to speak to an operator. Typically considered as a media hoax à la Orson Welles' War of the Worlds, this article moves away from such claims to assert that the circumstances of Ghostwatch’s broadcast opens up a problematic that traverses narrative and information theory: what promises do communications networks make, if any, about providing meaning? Framed through Roland Barthes' and Friedrich Kittler's respective approaches to information theory, this article proposes that Ghostwatch can be used as a starting point for rethinking problems of technical media and interpretation.Rose RowsonScholarWorks @ UMass AmherstarticleLanguage and LiteraturePCommunication. Mass mediaP87-96ENcommunication +1, Vol 8, Iss 1 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Language and Literature P Communication. Mass media P87-96
spellingShingle	Language and Literature P Communication. Mass media P87-96 Rose Rowson For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
description	This article revisits controversial BBC television film Ghostwatch (1992), a seasonal feature-length television special about a family plagued by a poltergeist and the television crew has entered their home hoping to capture ghostly phenomena on camera. Fictional, scripted, and filmed in its entirety prior to airing, Ghostwatch follows the formal conventions of live, factual television: well-known British media personalities host from the studio and on location, interviewing experts on the paranormal, and periodically inviting the watching public to call the show via the BBC phone-in number, 0818118181, which had both a diegetic and an actual function. The high volume of calls that the BBC received during the program caused the switchboard to jam, leaving reportedly tens of thousands of callers unable to speak to an operator. Typically considered as a media hoax à la Orson Welles' War of the Worlds, this article moves away from such claims to assert that the circumstances of Ghostwatch’s broadcast opens up a problematic that traverses narrative and information theory: what promises do communications networks make, if any, about providing meaning? Framed through Roland Barthes' and Friedrich Kittler's respective approaches to information theory, this article proposes that Ghostwatch can be used as a starting point for rethinking problems of technical media and interpretation.
format	article
author	Rose Rowson
author_facet	Rose Rowson
author_sort	Rose Rowson
title	For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
title_short	For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
title_full	For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
title_fullStr	For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
title_full_unstemmed	For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch
title_sort	for a ghoul time, call: telephonic terror at the boundary of narrative and information in bbc ghostwatch
publisher	ScholarWorks @ UMass Amherst
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/7d0a073bf47e4a92b10d164b48fa9adb
work_keys_str_mv	AT roserowson foraghoultimecalltelephonicterrorattheboundaryofnarrativeandinformationinbbcghostwatch
_version_	1718425423691382784

For a Ghoul Time, Call: Telephonic Terror at the Boundary of Narrative and Information in BBC Ghostwatch

Ejemplares similares