ABSTRACT
In a recent British study (McKee, 2002), children were asked the question: “What are adverts for?” One child, clearly wise beyond his years, replied: “To glue the programmes together.” We might smile at the blissful naïveté of the 6-year-old mind, and the Piagetians among us might record the statement as “preoperational,” but the kid has a point. Even as far back as 1974, the cultural theorist Raymond Williams remarked that commercial television seemed like a string of ads occasionally interrupted by programmes. If it weren’t for the commercials, there wouldn’t be nearly as much television.
