COMMUNICATION IN A CARNIVAL CULTURE
America is not really an intellectual society . . . .
William Irwin Thompson 22
Television is not famous for reasoned discourse.
Walter Goodman 23
"Zip it, puke breath," admonishes the host. "Mort! Mort! Mort!," exclaims the horde. 24
ZAP!
TV Guide looks back on the 1980s and ranks its "Top 20." Oprah Winfrey trumps Ronald Reagan, Vanna White tops Sam Donaldson, and Hulk Hogan trounces Dan Rather, who narrowly beats out PeeWee Herman. 25
ZAP!
In a liberated U.S.S.R., Geraldo becomes the first American television show to air daily. 26 Tales of "crossdressing transsexuals from a topless doughnut shop" 27 find Huxleyan expression where once there was Orwellian terror. 28 Back in the U.S.A., NBC and Geraldo Rivera team up to produce an expose on devil worship. The result: "the highest Nielsens ever for a two hour documentary." 29
ZAP!
In a more serious vein, Ted Koppel interviews the televangelistturned felon Jimmy Bakker, and Barbara Walters has a candid talk with Oliver North's secretary, Fawn Hall. The applause meter records the best ratings for both. 30
ZAP!
Race and riottorn Los Angeles fires up while The Cosby Show winds down. 31
ZAP!
Former VicePresident Dan Quayle makes frontpage headlines when he stops talking about the economic recession and starts talking about the title character of the hit comedy series Murphy Brown, criticizing her for bearing a child out of wedlock. 32 Later, Quayle goes so far as to write a letter to the fictional newborn son of the fictional television mother. 33
ZAP!
Meanwhile, the future President, Bill Clinton, decked out in dark hipster glasses, does a mean sax gig on the Arsenio Hall Show. 34
Call it just another day in TV America. These may not be our highest cultural moments, but they certainly are our most common fare. Admittedly, we occasionally suffer cerebral printtypes like Allan Bloom, 35 but, in the end, there is nothing quite like "Bart Simpson," the celebrated cartoon character. MTV, A Current Affair, Sally Jesse Raphael, Entertainment Tonight, The Dating Game reruns, local news, monster truck derbies, docudramas, 36 and infomercials 37 - they are all a significant part of our daily electronic life. "And the beat goes on," 38 forever on and on.
Like it, loathe it, or just tolerate it, this is characteristic of much of American discourse as it is. And it is this discourse that should be an integral part of a cultural approach to the First Amendment. In 1971, Columbia University Press published Professor John Hohenberg's Free Press/Free People, 39 which discussed the world history of political speech and press cultures against the backdrop of the high principles of free expression. Some two decades later, the same press took a 180degree turn toward an examination of less lofty popular expression in issuing Professor James Twitchell's Carnival Culture.
