Genre: True Crime

True Crime (as a genre)
True crime is a genre used in texts that reads-like or looks-like crime fiction. In essence, true crime incorporates both factual and fictional information to amplify the beliefs society has about crime, as opposed to the actual rates of criminal activity that occur. True crime takes advantage of the human imagination and acts as a natural attention-getter by incorporating cultural studies, law/legal theories, politics, and history, amongst other subjects to intensify stereotypical cases of crime. In its most effective use, true crime guarantees its audience a magnified look at the typical criminal case, which includes exaggerated invesitagtions in hope that investigators will discover the criminal.

History
True crime, as a genre, was first expressed through the work of  Edgar Allan Poe. In New Jersey of 1841, two men were strolling around the Hudson River when they peered into the water to find a dead body afloat. After months of an unsolved murder case, Poe took the situation as an invitation to create something out of it. He changed few minor details about the case and had his version of the story reside in Paris. He also saw a chance to solve the case the way he perceived it as happening. With much of the storyline remaining the same, Poe’s fictional version of the case ended up in New York newspapers as the initial spurt of the true crime genre.

As a genre, true crime has evolved into a significantly popular field. David H. Evans, author of A History of Violence, claims that the United States’ crime rate exceeds other developed nations' by at least five times. The increased crime rate is primarily due to the amount of exposure that American citizens have to video games, movies, and books that exploit and approve of aggression. Children are more likely to accept violence as tolerable if they are exposed to games and media created around true crime, and inevitably these children have a greater likelihood of becoming involved in crime themselves.

Use of True Crime In Text
True crime is intended to portray the story of a crime that has recently or previously occurred. The use of this genre in literature and television entails detailed descriptions of the aftermath of criminal acts as well as the eventual return to the initial scene of the crime. Detailed descriptions and analysis of unfortunate events, such as rape and murder, hold a significant amount of emotional impact on viewers. The use of true crime in these texts results in fear due to the perceptions people form of crime. Criminal evaluations and re-enactments through cliche words and images of violence sway viewers’ opinions and beliefs in relation to actual crime that occurs outside of textual references. Specifically, crimes that are amplified through texts based around the true crime genre influence naive viewers’ decisions of where to reside, how to raise children, where to invest finances, and how to view groups as potential criminals. Representations of crime in these texts influence how people perceive the world and occasionally cause personal beliefs to be significantly out of proportion to the actual events of crime.

True Crime in Literature
Books of true crime discuss violent narratives of murder and rape cases and show things that cannot necessarily be shown in other forms of text. In Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, Capote discusses in detail the murder scene of a rural family when an intended robbery had failed. The descriptions given in the book, in reality, would not be presented in newspapers or text available to society. Through the genre of true crime, authors highlight extreme acts of crime and grab readers' attention to show violent feelings and actions that otherwise would have been hidden. Books of true crime may also present the reader with autopsy photographs and evidence that could not be viewed in other texts.

True Crime on Screen (television series)
Television and movies rely heavily on true crime to incorporate forensic experts, evidence, suspects, science, intuition, technology, and logic to relay a criminal event. Television episodes such as NCIS, CSI, and Law and Order: Special Victims Unit guarantee their viewers a stereotypical criminal case developed into an emotionally overwhelming experience for the actors as well as for viewers. Most true crime television shows open with the discovery of a body or crime scene and develop into the process of characters working their way through criminal evidence to hypothesize events that may have happened. Through re-enactments and evaluations, these television shows conclude where and when the act took place, why it happened, and who it was committed by. Law and Order: Special Victims Unit is a prime example of the use of  true crime as an elite squad of NYPD detectives investigate sexually related crimes. The television episodes open as a sexually explicit crime is being committed with distraught fearful voiceovers of victims, aggressive remarks from perpetrators, and notifications to detectives that a crime has taken place. Factual and fictional information are both intertwined into these shows to emphasize the dangerousity of the crimes, as well as to give the viewer an amplified look of the event.

Cops, one of the longest running shows on television, has always held a large consistent audience due to the fact that it hides nothing from the viewers. Police officers welcome a camera man to join them on their wild chases after wanted criminals. The show is unscripted, intriguing the audience and ensuring them that what they see is actually happening. The true crime genre has drawn in many viewers by relatively making them feel as though they are a part of the action. The camera man’s job is to try and capture as many details as possible, as details are a significant characteristic of the true crime genre, so that the audience can emotionally connect to the situation. Cops has remained extremely popular to viewers because of the true crime genre. People enjoy the rush and fright that this genre ensures, and rarely is any information hidden or censored from the viewers.

In texts, true crime binds modern violence and modern media. Although its exaggerated crime encourages readers and viewers to perceive crime as more apparent and gruesome than reality, true crime is used to retract an emotional response and interest from its audience. The human taste for gore is satisfied through the genre of true crime as it communicates emotionally charged content, mainly focused on violent crimes, to contemporary society. Taylor Tilles & Sydney Nadeau