What Viewers Think Tony Danza Knows about Teaching: An Examination of the Reality Show Teach’s Discussion Forums

• In Event: Roundtable Session 47
  In Roundtable Session: Using Popular Culture to Explore the Sociocultural Aspects of Learning

Abstract

In the fall of 2010, Tony Danza starred in the short-lived reality television series "Teach: Tony Danza" on the cable channel A&E. In this show, Danza, a film and television actor who starred in the shows "Taxi" and "Who’s the Boss," decides to follow through on his long-ago college dream of becoming a teacher. The show’s representations of Danza’s daily lived experiences as an English teacher sparked a wave of conversation about teaching on online discussion boards (including A&E’s), radio programs, and interview talk shows. In this paper, we explore the implications of that representation under the scope of computer-mediated dialogue studies and consider what this conversation reveals about the public’s notions of the educational issues raised in this show.

Authors

• Jacqueline Bach, Louisiana State University

• Susan Weinstein, Louisiana State University