‘Let’s go now to the difficult part of the day’: Judges’ mediatized identities in MasterChef Greece

Abstract

Viewing the MasterChef Greece judges’ identities as mediatized, namely, as constructed via particular semiotic resources (linguistic, visual, spatial) mostly resulting from decisions made by the show’s production, we examine the communicative and social functions of the show as being a popular example of a reality TV programme. The judges hold a crucial role, as their assessment affects the subsequent development of the show. By adopting a micro-level discourse analytical approach, we focus on the analysis of two interactions, in which two different judge personas emerge, namely the ‘harsh’ and the ‘supportive’ judge. The analysis of these interactions indicates that the two personas serve the judges’ mediatized identities as both professional chefs (expertise) and TV presenters (suspense, viewers’ engagement). Yet, they are related to contrasting constructions of both the culinary (authority vs. mentoring, hegemonic vs. ‘soft’ masculinity) and the (reality) TV world (negative vs. positive emotionality). Both personas seem to relate to the broader Greek sociocultural context, such as the gendered ideologies and the politeness strategies prevailing in Greek society. However, while the ‘harsh’ judge persona reflects more overt and traditional forms of control and regulation, based on surveillance and suppression, the ‘supportive’ judge persona echoes the more covert technologies of governance of late modernity, based on self-reflexivity and emotionalism.