8 Thought-Provoking Books About Reality TV

Reality TV has always prompted discourse. From its earliest days, critics have decried it as the downfall of civilization even as viewers tuned in in droves for the interpersonal drama, the competitions, and the bizarrely artificial setups. Decades into the genre’s formation, critics and fans still abound, and we’re still asking the ever-titillating question: How much of what we see is actually real? 

It’s a question that has, in a sense, escaped containment in recent years, where entire media ecosystems may be based on outright lies and propaganda, where mis- and disinfor...