Professional-amateur cooperation in reality-based TV productions: investigating TV professionals’ endeavours and tensions

Abstract

Mainstream television increasingly launches productions which utilise volunteer narratives and presentations. This article focuses on TV professionals who were responsible for artistic content and expression in this kind of production: how they organised their communication and cooperation with amateur volunteers and how they reflected on their practices and aims in their creative work. The data was collected from three Finnish new-generation reality-based TV productions, targeting broad audiences and, at least implicitly, following the Nordic public service tradition. The study applied activity theory-based methodology in examining the motivated activity of TV professionals. According to the findings, the professionals in question eagerly adopted audiovisual means from documentary expression in creating attractive multivocal programmes, where the amateur presenters had access to suitable opportunities to address audiences. The TV professionals reported feeling curious about the views of their presenters and audiences, although they still took for granted their positions as strict gatekeepers of amateur selection, technology, and performance. For future reference, the article finds it possible to advance the reciprocal emancipatory learning of the production participants by deepening documentary practices and amateur participation, with co-productions used to enable real negotiations on meanings put forth by TV professionals and dedicated volunteers.