Just because you tape your favorite soap operas and spend your evenings glued to the tube doesn't mean you are a mindless couch potato, says a film-studies scholar at the University of Rochester.

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"Viewers aren't passive in their response to popular culture," says Constance Penley. "People don't just consume popular culture. They use it to think, to criticize, to debate."Soap operas and movies can actually prompt viewers to wrestle with political or social problems and to question gender roles, she adds.

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