Consider the “Catfish”

“Catfish: The TV Show” is a recent addition to MTV’s decade-long cycle of scripted identity shows—programs like “The Hills,” “Teen Mom,” and “Jersey Shore.” In these series, cast members are often eager to serve as representatives for their ethnic group, their subculture, their nationality, their class, their sexuality, their religion, their addictions, their region of the United States or even, as in the case of “Generation Cryo,” their origins as the progeny of a sperm donor. But whereas most of these series label and codify youth identities into bounded, concrete categories, “Catfish” breaks those identities apart.