I've just watched an edition of 1970s Schools and Colleges programme
Experiment, after seeing a BBC Archive post this morning about today being the 16th anniversary of Look Around You first broadcast. Experiment is widely regarded as the inspiration behind the series and it has to be said that the people behind it, Robert Popper and Peter Serafinowicz got the tone and look spot on. What I'd like to know is Experiment classed as hauntology? I remember being frightened by it as a child in the 1970s and it had to be said that I haven't just come over all warm and fuzzy after watching this edition in which a locust has some pretty horrific things done to it ("there's a break to give the locust time to settle down" Settle down? You've just removed its legs) by a man who looks like a fair-haired Peter Kay. And who does this particular experiment serve? I thought Experiment was aimed at O and A Level students, what they do here looks like it would only be of interest to someone doing a Ph.D thesis on the nervous system of orthoptera. The whole thing is so cold and stark, there's no theme music, no proper titles to speak of and nobody directly addressing the camera.
So I ask the question, was Granada the most hauntological of TV companies? Let's look at the evidence: Experiment (if indeed it is classed as hauntology) World in Action, Hickory House, Picturebox and the old Kabin in Coronation Street? I should cocoa.
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