Little People Big World
I chose to do my reality tv report post on the episode called "Zach's Emergency" in "Little People Big World." I was at my house on Thanksgiving watching the "Little People Big World" marathon all day and this episode aired in mid afternoon.
The show is produced by the discovery channel (they did not give an exact name) but is aired on TLC. The show lasts about thiry minutes long and each episode is a mini-documentary of a family of two dwarf parents with one dwarf child and three regular sized children. The target audience is clearly family based and aimed at a female dominated audience with Dawn ads running inbetween each segment, along with the new Chevy minivan, and Viva papertowels. By looking at the commericals alone, you can tell they are aiming at a more domesticated person. Since this episode was more serious than others, the our gaze seemed more focused on Zach, more than ever. In the episode, he has a mysterious illness related to his dwarfism and is potentially deadly if not fixed right away. Therefore, our gaze is set upon Zach lying in his hospital bed and the camera is higher than usual, but aiming downward to present an omniscent feeling and to be able to capture the people surrounding his hospital bed at all times. The camera also dramatically switches from slow paced, focused on the face shots (when the family is praying for Zach) to operating room shots that are dramatic, and short. You can also tell that they changed the lens to make the image look more sharp and detail oriented in the dramatic scenes in the operating room. Also, when the father was being interviewed, the audience experienced flashbacks, showing pictures of him when he was in the exact same situation as Zach. The music came in and slowed down to a slower pace to make the audience focus intently on the pictures presented in front of the camera, depicting a dramatic scene once again. Myra Mendible puts it best by saying that, "The "reality" in these shows stems not from their lack of a script or
professional actors . . .but from the ways it reflects the underlying logic of our social order." The show is able to depict such raw emotion of a family that is not in the majority and able to challenge the stereotypes that people have with dwarfism, therefore challenging the logic we absorb from society.