Jason Mittell

Jason Mittell is a professor of American studies and film and media culture at Middlebury College whose research interests include the history of television, media, culture, and new media. He is author of three books, Genre and Television (2004), Television and American Culture (2009), and Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling (NYU Press, 2015), and co-editor of How To Watch Television (NYU Press, 2013). Mittell's work on film and television is based on [Cognitivism (aesthetics)|cognitivist] assumptions. This means that to Mittell “comprehension is based on the cognitive poetic model developed primarily through David Bordwell’s work on film narration. The core assumption of this approach is that viewers actively construct storyworlds in their minds, and that the best way to understand the comprehension process is through the tools of cognitive psychology.” In Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling, however, Mittell repeatedly stresses the fact that he believes that cognitivist approaches are fully compatible with cultural approaches in terms of understanding and studying television shows.

Education

Mittell received his Ph.D. in Communication Arts from the University of Wisconsin–Madison's Media & Cultural Studies Program (part of the Department of Communication Arts) in August 2000. In the spring of 1996, Mittell obtained an M.A. in the same concentration and program. Mittell completed his undergraduate studies at Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio in 1992, graduating with a B.A. and majoring in English and Theater.

Academic positions

Mittell taught Communication at Georgia State University from 2000 to 2002. Currently, he is a professor at Middlebury College, where he teaches a number of courses related to television, culture, and media, such as Television and American Culture, Theories of Popular Culture, Media Technology and Cultural Change, American Media Industries, Animated Film & TV, Narration Across Media, Media and Childhood in American Culture, and Urban American and Serial Television: Watching The Wire.

His research interests include pop culture topics such as television history and criticism, media and cultural history, genre theory, narratology, animation and children's media, cultural historiography, and new media studies and technological convergence. He is currently writing a book on contemporary American television narrative. Mittell also writes a blog entitled JustTV.

Use of Wikipedia for college research

In an interview in the New York Times on February 21, 2007, Mittell defended the use of Wikipedia as a citeable resource for college-level research. Mittell responded to critics that questioned the accuracy and reliability of an online document that anyone in the world can edit at any time by arguing that “The message that is being sent is that ultimately they see it as a threat to traditional knowledge...[;] I see it [Wikipedia] as an opportunity. What does that mean for traditional scholarship? Does traditional scholarship lose value?”

Books

• Genre and Television: From Cop Shows to Cartoons in American Culture (Routledge, 2004).

The book "...proposes a new understanding of television genres as cultural categories, offering a set of in-depth historical and critical examinations to explore five key aspects of television genre:history, industry, audience, text, and genre mixing." Mittell uses a number of "well-known television programs" to develop "...a new model of genre historiography and illustrat[e] how genres are at work within nearly every facet of television..." Mittell's book "...argues that through analyzing how television genre operates as a cultural practice, we can better comprehend how television actively shapes our social world."

• Television and American Culture (Oxford University Press, 2009).

"A terrific introduction to the study of television, this textbook masterfully integrates a look at American television's industrial practices, its genres and narrative strategies, and its cultural roles. Professors will find this textbook comprehensive and well-organized, while students will find it engaging and provocative."

Selected articles

• "The Great Saturday Morning Exile: Scheduling Cartoons on Television's Periphery in the 1960s," in Prime Time Animation: Television Animation and American Culture, edited by Carol Stabile and Mark Harrison (New York: Routledge Press, 2003).
• "Before the Scandals: The Radio Precedents of the Quiz Show Genre," in The Radio Reader: Essays in the Cultural History of US Radio Broadcasting, edited by Michele Hilmes and Jason Loviglio, (New York: Routledge Press, 2002), 319-42.
• “A Cultural Approach to Television Genre Theory,” article reprinted in The Television Studies Reader, edited by Robert C. Allen and Annette Hill (New York: Routledge Press, 2005).
• “Classic Network System” and “Generic Cycles: Innovation, Imitation, Saturation,” in The Television History Book, edited by Michele Hilmes and Jason Jacobs (London: British Film Institute, 2005).

• Mittell's homepage
• Ethan Thompson, Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi, quoted at Oxford University Press