Transformation As Narrative and Process: Locating Myth and Mimesis in Reality Tv (Television) (Critical Essay‪)‬

Abstract: The terrain of television has been perceived as mythopoeic with its ability to integrate the real and the unreal, crafting a liminal space which is always betwixt and between. The recent debates about the medium have centred on the genre of reality television where new boundaries are constantly transgressed. This paper re-visits the theories of television as a myth space and examines why reality television is accommodated within this liminal paradigm where the familiarity of folklores and storytelling fuse narratives of transformation in lifestyle-based reality programmes. This transformative agency in television assumes both concrete and abstract forms reflecting both the cultural context of a society and the power of the medium to represent and distort the real.