Real-Life Storytelling: The Threefold Formal Structure of Reality TV as a Procedure of Cumulative Serialization

与纯粹的虚构系列相比，真人秀节目的特点是三重形式结构。除了剧集和季节的戏剧性，真人秀节目的形式是由第三条故事线决定的，这条故事线指的是主角生活的真实。在时间上，这第三条故事线超越了具体的媒体文本——既进入过去，也进入未来。在这第三条故事线的基础上，人们可以将独特的媒体文本视为一个总体元文本的实现。该子项目研究了这种三重形式结构的形式和技术，以及它对长期运行的现实生活肥皂剧的叙事的美学和生产相关意义。典型案例研究来自德国的纪实性肥皂剧、游戏文档和选角节目，以及它们的配套电视节目、制作人报告和网站。由于真人秀作为一种混合形式，结合了纪录片、虚构和搞笑元素，它不断地在三条故事线之间以及编辑/作者和主角之间产生相互依赖和反馈循环。子项目研究了这些相互依赖关系，特别是它们作为格式化实践和区分策略的功能。总的来说，这个子项目试图得出一个系统的理论，即真人秀电视中连续变化的条件和形式，以及真人秀电视三重形式结构的美学和生产相关参数。为此，该项目依赖于对相关案例研究的分析，以及对制片人、编辑、作者、导演和主角的叙述性采访。该子项目的重点是系列形式和技术，以及区分和领先的策略，直接建立在研究小组第一个资助阶段的两个子项目上：“ARD警察程序中系列的形式和实践”（TP2）和“系列投标的动态”（TP5）。随着其对真人秀电视的关注，它扩展了研究单位的主题领域，包括一种混合电视类型，这种类型在流行系列性研究中尚未被理论化，并且由于其非虚构成分而呈现出特定的正式结构。本子项目考察了真人秀节目的系列化技术和形式，扩展和修正了现有的系列化理论概念。它以一种混合的、强烈的非虚构导向的体裁关注系列格式，因此有助于进一步区分研究单位的流行系列理论。

In contrast to purely fictional series, reality TV formats are characterized by a threefold formal structure. In addition to the dramaturgy of episodes and seasons, reality TV formats are determined by a third story line that refers to the allegedly unmediated reality of the protagonists' lives. Temporally, this third story line refers beyond the concrete media text – both into the past and into the future. On the basis of this third story line, one can read distinctive media texts as the realization of an overarching metatext. The subproject investigates the forms and techniques of this threefold formal structure in its aesthetic and production-related significance for the storytelling of long running real-life soaps. Exemplary case studies are drawn from German docu-soaps, gamedocs, and casting shows, as well as their accompanying TV programs, producers' reports, and websites. Since reality TV – as a hybrid form – combines documentary, fictional, and ludic elements, it constantly generates interdependencies and feedback loops between the three story lines as well as between the authorship of editors/authors and protagonists. The subproject investigates these interdependencies with particular respect to their functions as formatting practices and strategies of distinction and one-upmanship. Overall, the subproject seeks to arrive at a systematic theory of the conditions and forms of serial variation in reality TV and of the aesthetic and production-related parameters of reality TV's threefold formal structure. For this purpose, the project relies on the analysis of relevant case studies as well as narrative interviews with producers, editors, authors, directors, and protagonists. With its focus on serial forms and techniques as well as strategies of distinction and oneupmanship, the subproject builds directly upon two subprojects from the Research Unit's first funding phase: "Forms and Practices of Seriality in the ARD Police Procedural Tatort" (TP2) and "The Dynamics of Serial Outbidding" (TP5). With its focus on reality TV, it extends the Research Unit's thematic domain to include a hybrid televisual genre that is as yet undertheorized in research on popular seriality, and that exhibits a specific formal structure due to its non-fictional components. Investigating the serial techniques and forms of reality TV, the subproject extends and revises existing theoretical concepts of seriality. With its attention to serial formatting in a hybrid, strongly non-fictionally oriented genre, it thus contributes to a further differentiation of the Research Unit's theory of popular seriality.