Soap Operas, Cross-Culturally Considered

Even though soap operas are typically considered a women's genre, soap operas are often watched and enjoyed by both men and women around the world. Soap opera as a genre was created for radio during the 1930s in the United States. Soap and detergent companies such as Procter and Gamble, Colgate-Palmolive, and Lever Brothers sponsored these early radio programs. Since then, soap operas gradually became one of the most profitable, influential, and successful programming in U.S. broadcasting history and are also a popular genre around the world.

Most of these early shows were aired everyday for 15 minutes. These early soap operas mainly targeted housewives and focused on the issues of family, love, and relationships. Furthermore, they usually centered on a primary family and followed its ...