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- George Berkeley. The gameshow is a funny old thing. There I was, with my feet-up, trying to make up my mind on what I was going to watch. There really was nothing on. The choice was a limited one: DIY, Cooking, Property Restoration, Fashion Make-Over, Murder Mystery or Gameshow. I happened to choose gameshow, as in this particular instance it was a Bob Monkhouse repeat from the late 1970s. People only seem to realise the absurdity of fashion when looking at it from an outside perspective. We can all see the ways in which the 1980s became a breeding-ground for some of the worst design ideas in recent memory; yet having said that, fashions equally ridiculous in the present day go unseen, unacknowledged. They are almost too obvious, too everyday, too natural to be seen as the absurd, cultural constructions that they really are. In the case of Bob Monkhouse, in an old, old, old repeat of Family Fortunes, it becomes immediately clear that there are a huge number of differences between the culture of yesterday and that of today. Fashion, obviously, being a centrepoint. But what drew my attention more was the fact that there are so many things that have not changed. The same norms and values seem to continue, and despite the external appearance of set design, presenter and contestants; it's strange to think about just how many things - on the inside - remain the same. It seems as though just as predominant social constructions like contemporary fashion are viewed as natural and everyday, so too are the constructed ideological assumptions of familiar social values and practices. Family Fortunes is a gameshow directed - as most are - towards the everyman of British culture. An individual familiar with the codes of convention of the country, who is able to recall - at will - every nuance of British identity. Family Fortunes is a show that, in asking individual questions to individual people, attempts to categorise them as a unified whole. While flattering the knowing subject as a master of his or her own culture, the show classifies the individual as the voice of the masses, so that to speak as an individual is to speak for a group. After a few jokes, Bob Monkhouse begins to introduce the first family. It's interesting to see that already a group of individuals are addressed as a single, unified group under the name of the patriarch: in this case it is the Bate family. The first person Bob questions is Mr. Bate, the man of the house, the one who wears the trousers - so-to-speak. To some extent, the entire identity of the group is encapsulated in the authoritarian comments of this one individual, the leader, the team captain: a man who gives the audience a definitive history of the family on his own terms. The other individuals within the family unit are filler, used for amusing anecdotes or embarassing past experiences, with one noticeable exception. There is a young woman in her twenties at the end of the row who has recently married into the group: a huge applause from the crowd: that's what we like to see! The family unit, self-sustainable and self-contained. Throughout the game of Family Fortunes, the cultural creation of the family structure is hailed as a powerful, knowledgeable force: there is a strong emphasis on the family unit working together cohesively in order to answer questions (to win a series of predominantly domestic prizes). In effect, the importance of the family structure as an important unit within culture is stressed, making it clear to the audience that these idealised representations of the perfect - yet everyday - family are an ideal to be realised, a dream to be aimed for. It seems as though the girl at the end of the row knew this all too well, and has managed to achieve the dream in no uncertain terms: her membership in the Bate family team (who later go onto win the game) is proof enough of this. The questions themselves are based around culturally-specific norms of gender, race and class. The families become successful at the game on the basis of their own conformity. To win, groups are required to answer seemingly natural (yet constructed) questions on culture and belonging that not only assert conservative norms and values of society, but consciously reaffirm the identities of the subjects. The fortunes of the family are decided at the level by which the family conforms as a single, unified group to the norms and values of its culture: the greater level of conformity between the two opposing families is rewarded a prize. The ability to recognise or distinguish something intrinsically Welsh, the traditional Sunday roast, or the signifiers of a teacher all represent an ability to distinguish familiar codes of conduct within a cultural context. Of course, there is a down-side. Those individuals unable to identify the standardised answers to those all-important questions are mercilessly crossed out of the game. Sure, they get another chance: but the continued inability to answer questions results in a loss: the inability, or inwillingness to conform to ideological codes of behaviour or belief results in a punishment of lack; no domestic products to take home, no big money prize. While the most conformist family walks away with all the prizes, the audience at home finds a satisfaction in their own mastery of the world around them. Family Fortunes flatters those at home by appealing to a sense of the familiar to offer them a sense of individual identity (which, in fact, is the identity of the masses). In reality, while flattering the viewer's sense of 'knowledge', Family Fortunes capitalises on the way in which its questions speak a cultural code, accessible to all who conform. A sense of the individual knowing subject is created, while the act of answering the questions asserts the priorities of a fundamentally conservative set of norms and values, designed to eradicate all sense of difference and encourage sameness in all. Culture maintains itself through the process of assuming a natural, unchanging status - free from all historical influence. As Barthes said, culture is that which seemingly goes-without-saying. Through culture's claims to universal truths, something which Family Fortunes appears to emphasise, the individual assumes a mastery over his or her own surroundings: knowledge is power, as they say. However, the knowledge, or the truth of culture is but an artificial construction. A historical manifestation of a particular set of ideological values at a particular time. The assumed truth of ideology is the cry of all, but is ultimately the game of culture. The knowing subject is, in effect, a creature of universal habit rather than personal autonomy: an individual defined only via the characteristics of the masses. It is through such gameshows as the one mentioned that culture reinforces such values: there is a sense at which true individuality (or noncomformity) is a thing to be feared, (to be rejected with a giant 'X'); while the unity of the family (conformity) is a fortune to be treasured.
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