Despite the popularity of Australian television drama and reality series featuring police, there has been a paucity of research into what these programs communicate about real world policing. These ‘cop shows’ are productive forms of public relations for police agencies, particularly the co-produced reality TV variety, and as such are valuable broadcasting and policing commodities. As complex audio-visual texts, cop shows can generate myriad meanings and messages. As cultural objects these programs also rely upon and generate expressions of national identity. Drawing on 25 interviews with policing students and serving and retired police officers, this qualitative research provides insight into how prospective, current and retired police interpret televisual representations of the profession. It was found that interviewees more deeply embedded in the police culture were more cynical of the public relations messages and contested the role of women, while aspirants to the profession were more likely to endorse depictions of a diverse work force. Although interviewees regarded Australian cop shows as reflecting national attributes and cultural context, they reflected on aspects of cop shows produced in other countries to articulate what locally produced cop shows were not.

尽管以警察为中心的澳大利亚电视剧和现实电视剧大受欢迎，但对于这些节目传达的关于现实世界警务的信息却鲜有研究。这些“警察表演”是警察机构特别是共同制作的真人秀电视节目的公共关系的生产形式，因此是有价值的广播和警务商品。作为复杂的视听文本，警察表演可以产生多种含义和信息。这些程序作为文化对象，也依赖并产生民族身份的表达。这项定性研究以对治安学生以及在职和退休的警官的25次采访为基础，对准，现任和退休的警官如何解释该行业的电视图像进行了深入研究。研究发现，被调查者更深地植根于警察文化中，他们对公共关系信息持愤世嫉俗的态度，并且对女性的角色提出异议，而该行业的有抱负者更倾向于认可对多样化劳动力的描述。尽管受访者认为澳大利亚的警察表演反映了国家属性和文化背景，但他们还是反思了其他国家/地区生产的警察表演的各个方面，以阐明本地生产的警察表演没有。