Steven Berlin Johnson Everything Bad Is Good For You Summary

Steven Berlin Johnson “Watching TV Makes You Smarter” is the excerpt from Everything Bad Is Good for You that was posted in the New York Times Magazines in 2005. In this article, by glancing at the historical development of the television narratives, Johnson indicates the older TV shows such as Dragnet or Starsky and Hutch have only one or two main characters, just follow a single thread narrative; in contrast, the more recent shows such as Hill Street, The Sopranos are far more different with the earlier shows, most of them are with a number of primary characters and multiple threads, “a single scene in The Sopranos will often connect to three different threads at the same time, layering one plot atop another” (Johnson, 2005). Johnson also

Due to this, parents might not want their children to watch any TV shows which contain those elements in order to protect their children from so-called bad culture. This article is facing to the parents who have that similar thought, and offer those parents “a change in the criteria we use to determine what really is cognitive junk food and what is genuinely nourishing” (Johnson, 2005). Most of the TV shows that Johnson uses in this article are familiar and known by the parents, such as 24, Survivor, The Sopranos, Alias etc., it was able to make the explanation much easier, and persuade them to his point. He also suggests that parents should take this as an opportunity but not a crisis, something they force their kids to accept is no longer a smart culture, it is only a sharing from

Within the content, in order to prove the opinion of “Watching TV Makes You Smarter”, Johnson through analyzes the development trend of TV shows, compares the old and recent TV shows to come up with sound reasoning such as the recent TV shows require more attention and critical thinking to support his idea.

The diction Johnson uses is professional, basic and not contains much ornateness, it gives a sense to the audience that the author is an experienced person, and his information is important to be referred. Also, he uses the first-person point of view, call himself as “I” and address the audience by using “you”, this strategy makes his article more like a communication between him and the audience, it not only properly delivers his arguments, but also lets the audience be comfortable to adopt his ideas.

Johnson break his article into 5 parts, by starting his arguments with point out his idea, then go deep further step by step, provide evidences and examples, it is perfectly structured. Moreover, plus with using the charts to analyze the differences between movies, makes his argument more convincing. Overall, the tone of this article is informative and pretty