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This puts paid to the intellectual's favorite idea that TV creates "anomie" and "alienation," that it isolates Americans from one another. Wrong. Americans may watch TV alone, but they do so to access a set of shared topics. And not just shared topics but shared languages. We talked to a mother and teenage daughter, people who have a contested relationship of the kind common to adolescence, people who sometimes have difficulty finding one another in conversation. (There are several identity issues at issue, especially "you're not the boss of me.") But when watching the new TV, and characters you can conjure with, certain conversations become possible. Topics once impossible now flourish. Shows were increasing cognition in viewers. In the place of single story line, TV narratives were taking on new complexity. Some shows were even engaging in virtually secret messaging. Only the most dedicated viewers could discover the intricate plotlines. Producers were actually making running gags more complicated and dramatic subtleties more embedded with the kno