Question:

I am taking Intro to British English and am planning to write a paper on the use of language in a certain television programme. I have run into a problem, since I don't know how to cite a television programme.

I have recorded some of the episodes of the series, and the plan is to observe the way the characters speak, paying attention to expressions that are characteristic of British English. Here are several questions that have arisen:

1. How do you do this with the Works Cited? Can you quote the programme directly, or are there problems concerning the copyright of the show?
2. Is it enough to just mention the programme and the director, producer and the performers in question, or do you need to cite the programme itself?
3. Is there a difference between citing a fictional series and eg. a talk show, where the people are performing as their own persons?
4. Also, how do you cite a radio program?
5. What if you want to use information you got from a programme on television or on the radio, but you don't know and cannot find out the exact details of the programme? Can you use this kind of information at all?

Reply:

TV series can be good sources for language study, either as it is spoken in the program or translated by a subtitler. Radio and TV documentaries, talk shows and public affairs programs also provide much useful information.

The following responses are to the numbered questions above:

1. I understand the question to be whether the language used by the characters in the show may be quoted in one's paper, or whether using the language would be restricted by the program's copyright.

   Academic Fair Use allows students to use copyrighted material (not only the language, but even audio or audiovisual extracts from the programs) as long as such use meets the fair use requirements, in particular that the material used is directly relevant to the paper and would not infringe on the market value of the program. One would usually just include the program in one's Works Cited, and indicate in the text (using the Key Word of the Works Cited entry) each instance where material was used from the program.

   When quoting only the language in a program, "fair use" permission is liberal. While the script of a series episode will have a copyright, the main copyright and market value is not the script, but rather the way the episode was performed by the actors, including sets, directors, music, etc. Thus one may quote extensively from the dialogue script without infringing on the market value of the program. Conversely, audio or video clips taken from the program would need to be used selectively.

   For your paper, you may also be able to use episode scripts, which are available on-line for many popular TV series, in addition to the videotaped copy you made of the program. Episode scripts are helpful to check that what one thought one heard in the dialogue was actually what was said, as well as correct spellings and the like. And of course then extracts from the dialogue could be copied and pasted, rather than keyed in, as would be necessary if using only the videotape copy.

   If scripts can be found for the episodes you are writing about, they would be cited separately from the performance of the episode that you recorded. With your in-text citations, you might refer, for example, to the episode script for the dialogue quotations, and to the videotaped performance for visual data which may have influenced the nuances of the dialogue.

2. The basic citation for a TV program is to the program itself, or the particular episodes of a serialized program. See Citing Television and Radio Programs for citation details.

   One does not need to mention the director, producer and performers, unless they are relevant to your treatment of the topic (if, for instance, you were comparing how different actors had played Hamlet in different versions of the same 'script').

3. If you are citing what has been said by a real person, for example on a TV or radio talk show, then the citation would be similar to that for an interview.
   • Leskinen, Juice. Translator Talk! MTV3, Helsinki. 17 October 2003.

4. A radio program is cited similarly to a TV program, the main difference being (in Finland) that most TV stations may be viewed nationwide, whereas there are some radio stations that can be heard only locally. In such a case, one should add the city where the radio station is located to identify the station and program in question. Notice that the program name, the radio name, the radio location, the date, and the broadcast time are all separate 'sentences' followed by periods.
   • Alueuutiset. Radio Southwest. Pori. 14 October 2003. 12:30.

5. One cannot include information as a 'supporting fact' without a specific source. With the case in question, do you remember which radio station and roughly when you heard it? If so, it would have a broadcast archive which could be consulted. If not, try to find another source for the same information. If no citable source can be located, it is possible to mention in the paper "what one remembers having heard," etc., in order to put forth an idea, but this will have no factual weight. If such "beliefs" are presented in the paper, it must be made clear that they are not "established facts."

   For more information, see Citing Television and Radio Programs.