Media Criticism of Modern Family

Introduction:

In 2009, ABC aired the first episode of Modern Family, a show about three families who are all related. Since then the show has become a huge success as audience’s find enjoyment in watching the characters as they face everyday trials and tribulations. Each episode runs for a half hour and takes place in a California suburb. The producer’s center the plot on a specific controversial issue in which the characters are forced to confront and handle, as well as resolve and give their reactions prior to the shows ending. For the purpose of this analysis, a narrative methodological approach will employed. The narrative methodological criticism is effective because mass-mediated stories play central roles in how society understands themselves, other people with whom they have contact with, as well as the rest of the world and beyond.

Through the analysis of a specific episode of Modern Family using elements from narrative methodologies will be used in the form of a semiotic-structuralist view as well as a visual approach, to make the argument will be made that the show is popular among many different types of audiences because of the producer’s ability to use stories as a way to construct their understandings of themselves and their lives, their immediate environments, and even worlds outside their direct experiences. Examples from the episode will serve as a representation for entire series and will be used to assist in showing how the audience is able to take that understood world, and apply it as a guide their own worlds.

Concepts from the visual narrative that are used are color, framing, icons and interactions of/with others. From the semiotic-structural analysis concepts such as discourse of time, narrative...

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...in between along that spectrum, they are still family and what that mean to each person is different. The show goes against a lot of the beliefs society holds as conventional and values however that is what really makes the families depicted different from many others on airing. The audience is drawn to the show because of the fact characters face real life issues and work through them which send the message comforting the audience in that they too will get through whatever life presents them with. All of this analysis was portrayed through the use of narrative methodologies with help from the structrualist theory of internal equilibrium.

Works Cited

Lloyd, Christopher, dir. "Coal Digger." Modern Family. ABC: 21 Oct 2009. Television

Vande Berg, L. , L. Wenner, and B. Gronbeck. Critical approaches to television. 2. Allyn & Bacon, Inc., 2004. 56-201. print.