Taking the Heritage Film into the 21st Century

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2018 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Culture and Applied Geography, grade: 3, University of Bremen, language: English, abstract: This thesis is divided into two main parts. The first part is going to be about Downton Abbey as a part of the heritage film genre and the second part is going to be about the social class structure and social mobility within the series. It will therefor explore possible answers to questions such as: To what extend does the series represent historical reality? How does Downton Abbey represent a modern approach of Heritage film? How the class relations between characters are in the series, and last but not least, how do the characters in the series move on the social ladder? The structure of the thesis will be as follows. The first of two main chapters in this thesis deals solely with the heritage film genre and Downton Abbey's representation thereof. It begins with definitions of terms related to the genre and the attempt of a definition for the genre itself. It continues with the genres characteristics which are afterwards used as the basis for examples given from the Downton Abbey series to showcase how it is recognizable it is a heritage television series. It also mentions how heritage films create tourism for the places they are shot in. The chapter continues with a subchapter on how some of Downton Abbey's characters deal with topics that are relevant in the 21st century such as gender inequality, members of the queer + community and politics.