“It's destroying a whole generation”: Television and moral discourse in Belize

Abstract

An anthropological approach to television must transcend the limitations of traditional media scholarship by paying closer attention to the cultural and political context of the medium in different times and places. This paper explores the ways television has affected the small Caribbean country of Belize during the last ten years. It focuses attention on the way people talk about television in public and private, on the place of television in moral discourse. It suggests that by providing an objectified “other,” foreign television may promote new forms of nationalism.