Bringing class to light and life: A case study of reality-based television discourse

• Mediatized texts deploy objects as ventriloquized interactants.
• Discursive markers uphold and erase class boundaries at one and the same time.
• Narrative structure of reality shows employ masking and unmasking of class identity.
• Vectors in camera shots create a dialogic relationship with audiences.

This paper examines representations of class and status differences in American reality-based television programs and some of the ways their design produces a form of dialog. This inquiry is situated in the context of two contemporary social phenomena: ambivalence toward class stratification in U.S. public discourse at a time of increasing class stratification, and a growth in the production and consumption of status-based reality television shows on U.S. broadcast and cable networks. For this study, a year of episodes from two programs were observed, one from network television set in the world of work, and one from cable television set in home life and leisure. Four cases selected from this corpus are analyzed multimodally to show how talk, images, and objects operate discursively to construct a dialog on class. Drawing from theories on the discursive construction of identity and agency, and focusing on members׳ methods of categorization and ventriloquism, we offer an understanding of class as enacted and engaged in - not just represented and talked about, but performed dialogically.