'Dear Menie.' Emotions and engagement of Menie Grégoire's listeners - article ; n°1 ; vol.4, pg 117-155

Dominique Cardon

Description

Réseaux. The French journal of communication - Année 1996 - Volume 4 - Numéro 1 - Pages 117-155
Summary: This article examines reactions to Menie Grégoire's radio confession programme (RTL, 1967-1981). The author argues that when biographical suffering is projected into the public sphere the listener's moral engagement needs to be questioned in a specific way, and that such questioning clarifies the different frameworks of participation contracted between the programme and its public. By studying a corpus of listener mail, three forms of engagement in the programme are identified: pity, appropriation and indignation. Each of these experiences introduces a particular way of representing personal problems in the public sphere (consolation, understanding and justice) and accompanies specific descriptions of ordinary uses of the programme. Hence, the question of social learning through the media cannot be understood independently of listeners' emotional involvement and justifications vis-à-vis the programme.
39 pages
Source : Persée ; Ministère de la jeunesse, de l’éducation nationale et de la recherche, Direction de l’enseignement supérieur, Sous-direction des bibliothèques et de la documentation.

Informations

• Publié par: RESEAUX-_THE_FRENCH_JOURNAL_OF_COMMUNICATION
• Publié le: 01 janvier 1996
• Nombre de lectures: 32
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

Dominique Cardon
Liz Libbrecht
'Dear Menie.' Emotions and engagement of Menie Grégoire's
listeners
In: Réseaux. The French journal of communication, 1996, volume 4 n°1. pp. 117-155.
Abstract
Summary: This article examines reactions to Menie Grégoire's radio confession programme (RTL, 1967-1981). The author
argues that when biographical suffering is projected into the public sphere the listener's moral engagement needs to be
questioned in a specific way, and that such questioning clarifies the different frameworks of participation contracted between the
programme and its public. By studying a corpus of listener mail, three forms of engagement in the programme are identified: pity,
appropriation and indignation. Each of these experiences introduces a particular way of representing personal problems in the
public sphere (consolation, understanding and justice) and accompanies specific descriptions of ordinary uses of the programme.
Hence, the question of social learning through the media cannot be understood independently of listeners' emotional involvement
and justifications vis-à-vis the programme.
Citer ce document / Cite this document :
Cardon Dominique, Libbrecht Liz. 'Dear Menie.' Emotions and engagement of Menie Grégoire's listeners. In: Réseaux. The
French journal of communication, 1996, volume 4 n°1. pp. 117-155.
doi : 10.3406/reso.1996.3308
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/reso_0969-9864_1996_num_4_1_3308MEME'
'DEAR
Emotions and engagement of Menie
Grégoire's listeners
Dominique CARDON
Translated by Liz Libbrecht
Summary: This article examines reactions to Menie Grégoire's radio
confession programme (RTL, 1967-1981). The author argues that when
biographical suffering is projected into the public sphere the listener's
moral engagement needs to be questioned in a specific way, and that
such questioning clarifies the different frameworks of participation
contracted between the programme and its public. By studying a corpus
of listener mail, three forms of engagement in the programme are
117 Dominique CARDON
identified: pity, appropriation and indignation. Each of these experiences
introduces a particular way of representing personal problems in the
public sphere (consolation, understanding and justice) and accompanies
specific descriptions of ordinary uses of the programme. Hence, the
question of social learning through the media cannot be understood
listeners' emotional involvement and justifications vis- independently of
à-vis the programme.
118 MEME' 'DEAR
before being exploited by television,
6 'DEAR met with unanticipated public success.3
Its originality lay in its creation of a
MEME' device whereby everyday problems were
publicized for the first time, so that the
radio transported, on the airwaves, bioEmotions and engagement of
graphical suffering which normally was Menie Grégoire's listeners
expressed only in the confines of face-
to-face situations protected by secrecy
(religious confession, social aid
bureaux, doctors' consulting rooms,
confidences between friends, conjugal
intimacy) or, more often, was incommun
icable. Menie Grégoire's programme
received fewer 'opinions', 'questions' or
Dominique CARDON 'true-life accounts' than 'calls for help',
'complaints', 'grievances' or 'confes
sions'. Listeners were invited to
express themselves on the air only if
they were experiencing personal hardAt a time when TV reality
ship (intimate, family or professional), shows are a subject of wide
if they were caught up in a situation of spread controversy, it seems
conflict, dispute or trouble. The prthat the debate spawned by
ogramme was thus characterized by the the introduction and reception of the
extent of the callers' emotional engagefirst French radio-confession pro
ment, the intensity of public participagramme, hosted by Menie Grégoire from
tion (through phone calls and letters), 1967-1981 on RTL, is all but forgotten.1
and the hostess's alternation of consoliYet, the introduction of the notion of
ng, therapeutic and accusatory words. 'distance confession* into the repertoire
of radiophonie genres gave rise to
intense debate, among both profes A system for 'remote solicitation'
sional pundits (humorists, journalists,
associations of therapists, clergymen Controversy spawned by media devices
or scholars) and the programme's faith which publicize everyday problems nec
ful listeners. Commentators were at essarily involves a moral and political
first intrigued by the innovative nature evaluation of the public treatment of
of this radiophonie format which suffering and of the role conferred by
involved listeners directly in the cre these devices on spectators solicited
from a distance (Chambat, 1993; Phara- ation of the programme. Every afte
rnoon, from three to three-thirty, Menie bod, 1994). Because the complaint is
always in the form of a plea (Levinas, Grégoire dialogued live with three or
four anonymous callers selected by the 1994), a report on the experience of
programme's switchboard operators.* those who fall within its bounds (even
This first radio confession programme, ironically, aesthetically or from a dis
tance), cannot entirely dismiss the which was immediately imitated, trans
moral effects of the device. Thus, one formed and developed by rival stations,
119 Dominique CARDON
cannot overlook what constitutes the tional territory', offering possibilities of
motivational force of such programmes temporal anticipation (promises, gifts,
'solicit' their li- the fact that they common horizon of action), of mutual
'affect' him or her testing (tests of trust, evaluation of stener, that they
(Favret-Saada, 1977) - and that it is semantic features of the scene of solici
because of this experience that the publ tation), as well as conventional motiva
ic debates to which the programmes tions used to support the person's
give rise are so often weighted with engagement By contrast, in the radio-
moral considerations in which mode phonic situation established by Menie
sty, voyeurism, and manipulation of Grégoire's programme, the articulation
the listener's suffering or alienation are of the listener's personal territory with
major issues. In this study we consider that of the caller can lead to confusion,
that the reasons for which the experi embodied in the problematical overlap
ences and interpretations of the pr ping of the effect of presence favoured
ogramme are so sharply divided, relate to by radiophonie mediation, and the
the fact that the distance introduced by impossibility of co-ordinating an action
the radiophonie device between the dif towards the complainant.8 By removing
ferent characters involved (listener, the contextual signs which normally
caller and hostess) introduces a partic allow one to establish the trust granted
to the person who engages one, radio- ular kind of uncertainty as to the li
stener's role. Owing to the organization phonic distance also makes room for
of the programme, a local situation in the anxious exploration of the truth and
which the actors are in direct contact, the authenticity of the complaint. Con
is transported into a sphere of wide fession at a distance thus introduces a
spread publicity which places both number of uncertainties about the
hostess and public at a distance from nature of communication established by
the complainant's situation. If we take the device. It places listener-witnesses
Luc Boltanski's hypothesis in his book in a situation of impotence, leaving
them to their overwhelming emotions; it on the display of suffering (Boltanski,
1993), the confusion that this type of produces a loss of a sense of reality vis-
programme sows with regard to listen à-vis the situation presented on the
ers' role is due to their inability to waves; and, finally, it causes suspicion
to weigh on the intentions of the radio- bridge the gap separating themselves
from the caller's situation. Addressed in phonic benefactor (Livet, 1989).
the second person, the listeners find
themselves geometrically enclosed in The fragility of the witness's emotions
the objectivizing abstraction of the in distance confession invites us to
third person. question the way in which Menie Gré
goire's listeners managed to secure
In a situation of co-presence, this type their place in the system. Hence, the
of relationship and action is very differ relevance of examining the activity of
ent. Physical proximity directly involves reception by trying not to separate the
short forms of the listeners' experience the witness in the scene and prevents
him or her from eluding the call for a (and notably their emotional states)
response.4 The spectator shares with from consolidated descriptions of the
the complainant a 'common device in which these live experiences
120 MEME' 'DEAR
can be articulated and justified in the by either words or gestures. Yet, the li
presence of a thir