Abstract
Both television production practice and academic writings indicate the necessity of the localization of TV formats to fit sociocultural circumstances in different countries. This article narrows its focus to the issue of emotion display during localization. Inspired by Paul Ekman’s <em>neurocultural theory of emotion</em>, which describes human emotion expression in actual social situations, this article attempts to apply Ekman’s ideas about relations between culture and emotion to the field of media communication and to build a theoretical framework for the analysis of cultural influence in emotion display during the adaptation of a TV format. Applying the theoretical findings to the case of the singing competition show <em>The Voice of China </em>(adapted from <em>The Voice of Holland</em>), this article shows how the collectivist nature of Chinese culture influences the aesthetic and dramatic tools used to elicit emotion and to control emotion display in the Chinese version of the show.
Highlights
Transnational TV formats are crucial phenomena in global media communication and have received much attention in global media communication research, where many studies have explored how a TV format could be localized in different cultures and countries (e.g., Mikos, 2015; Moran, 2009; Waisbord & Jalfin, 2009)
Cultural influences may occur, according to Ekman (1972), in the following categories: a) elicitors of emotion―events, expectations, memories, etc., which may vary across cultures, b) display rules―culturally varied norms and values to control the facial appearance according to a given social situation, and c) consequences of emotional arousal, such as facial behavior, action patterns of face and/or body, verbal behavior, physiological change, etc
Transferring Ekman’s work into the context of global television formats, I have discussed the influence of culture on the three categories: 1) the emotion elicitors, 2) the display rules, and 3) the consequences of emotional arousal
Summary
Transnational TV formats are crucial phenomena in global media communication and have received much attention in global media communication research, where many studies have explored how a TV format could be localized in different cultures and countries (e.g., Mikos, 2015; Moran, 2009; Waisbord & Jalfin, 2009). Cultural influences may occur, according to Ekman (1972), in the following categories: a) elicitors of emotion―events, expectations, memories, etc., which may vary across cultures, b) display rules―culturally varied norms and values to control (intensify, de-intensify, neutralize, or mask) the facial appearance according to a given social situation, and c) consequences of emotional arousal, such as facial behavior, action patterns of face and/or body, verbal behavior, physiological change, etc. After clarifying the interpretation of media communication as a macro social situation with regard to emotion display, I return to the three categories in Ekman’s theory―emotion elicitors, display rules, and consequences of emotion arousal―where cultural influences may occur. Culture may define display rules that lead display producers or emotion performers to downplay or overplay certain emotions in micro-situations, and, culture may influence emotion elicitors and display rules in ways that impact emotion arousal
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