British Medical Television, School of Media, University of Brighton, 27-28 July 2017

 

BOOK NOW: Scroll down for booking and accommodation details

This conference offers a groundbreaking opportunity for scholars across academic disciplines to engage with a strand of British television that has too long been ignored within the academy. We seek to consider questions such as:

• What ideological and political purposes are served by TV programmes dealing with medical issues, and how do they shape public understandings of healthcare?
• Do programmes like Holby City and Casualty serve as a vehicle for the BBC to tell its own story about the impact of government intervention and the ideological dismantling of the BBC?
• What impact will the tendering out of drama programmes to independent production have on the potential ideological relationship between the BBC and national politics?
• How are the political schemas of programmes like Holby City and Casualty reflected in other forms of medical television broadcast on UK commercial television?
• How do genres such as reality TV and documentary engage with medical issues?

The conference aims to map out the rich history of medical programming on British television and to engage with the complex relationships between the NHS, British broadcasting, and the state.

BOOK NOW (you may have to paste this URL into your browser):

http://shop.brighton.ac.uk/conferences-and-events/arts-humanities/academic-conferences/medical-television-conference

BOOK NOW: Local accommodation (select Phoenix Brewery Halls):

https://holiday.brighton.ac.uk/

Or see:

https://www.visitbrighton.com/

 

SCHEDULE

 

Thursday 27 July

 

Keynote

Patricia Holland: The Politics of Medical Television Across the 1980s.

 

Historical Developments in Non-Fiction Medical TV

Pascale Mansier: Similarities between French and British TV Medical Magazines in the Late Fifties.

Paul Bader: Power to the People: How Medical TV started talking to people rather than Doctors in the 1980s.

 

Nostalgia and Medical Television

 

Anne Jespersen: The Royal – Bridging the Gap Between Nostalgic Ignorance and Harsh, Realistic Knowledge.

Martin Fradley: ‘I can tell I’m not well… I think I’m a little bit poorly’: Working-Class Drama and the NHS in Shane Meadows’ This is England ’86, 88, 90.

Louise FitzGerald: Fluffy Cardigans and Starched Uniforms: Call The Midwife, Nostalgia and the NHS.

 

The Mutability of Medical Television

Fran Pheasant-Kelly: States of Abjection: The Politics and Practices of Jed Mercurio’s Bodies and Cardiac Arrest.

Teresa Forde: Nursing Back to Health?  From Angels to No Angels.

Elizabeth Ford: The Representation of Doctors in Children’s Fictional Television Programmes.

 

Friday 28 July

 

Keynote

Hannah Hamad: Mediating the NHS at 70: Exploring the Political Stakes of Contemporary Medical Television.

 

Medical Television: Ethics and Policies

Marta Lopera, Mònika Jiménez-Morales, Manel Jiménez-Morales: Binge Eating, Binge Watching: Narrative and Aesthetic Representation of Mental Health and Body Dysmorphic Disorders on My Mad Fat Diary.

Agata Korecka: The Man with 10 Stone Testicles: Corporeal Spectacle and ‘Humilitainment’

Rony Armon and Colleen Cotter: Televising Obesity: The Role of Personal Stories in the Depiction of Policy Objectives.

 

Popular Drama and Medical Discourse

Ruth Deller: 30 Years in Holby: Analysing Casualty’s Anniversary

Katie Marshall, Naji Tabet, John Anderson: The Portrayal of Dementia in Television Soaps

Georgina Turner: ‘And that’s how you turn the lesbian death trope on its ear!’: Holby City and the ‘Berena’ phenomenon.

 

Production and Practitioners Session

Helen Littleboy (Hospital), Joanna MacDonnell (Casualty), Spencer Kelly (24 Hours in A&E)

(subject to work commitments)