Political sorting in U.S. entertainment media

ABSTRACT Analysis of public opinion, news consumption, and social media has examined increasing political polarization and/or partisan sorting; however, few have explored the potential connection between entertainment programming and political sorting. This paper examines viewership of U.S. television entertainment from 2001 to 2016 and finds increasing differentiation in the shows watched in primarily Democratic versus primarily Republican markets. Notably, these years coincide with partisan sorting in news consumption and enhanced fracturing of the U.S. television landscape. The article confirms growing differences in the most-watched shows in heavily Democratic versus Republican regions, a finding that provides uncommon evidence of suspected differentiation by political view and of the need to adapt theories of the “mass” media function of entertainment television to a context of greater fragmentation and choice.