Book chapter
Spellcasting Camp
Camp TV of the 1960s, p.120
Oxford University Press
06/28/2023
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197650745.003.0006
Abstract
This chapter examines a transitional moment across both the industrial and programming landscape of 1960s American television and US occult media through the lens of what Susan Sontag and others have referred to as one of the most enigmatic sensibilities of popular culture: camp. Looking through this affection for what Sontag described as “the exaggerated, the ‘off,’ of things-being-what-they-are-not,” this chapter focuses on the ways in which Bewitched (1964–72, ABC) refracted 1960s occultism through the lens of camp in order to produce one of the most successful TV series of the decade. Yet while Sontag denies any true political potentialities of approaching the world in a campy way, I argue that Bewitched nevertheless used its love of artifice and exaggeration to assemble a generative ideological ground for analysis of American television’s ability to engage in social critique during the 1960s, especially surrounding changing midcentury mores of gender and sexuality.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Spellcasting Camp
- Creators
- Andrew J Owens
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Publication Details
- Camp TV of the 1960s, p.120
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press; New York
- DOI
- 10.1093/oso/9780197650745.003.0006
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 06/28/2023
- Academic Unit
- Cinematic Arts
- Record Identifier
- 9984430328202771
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