docusoap

[ dok-yuh-sohp ]

noun

1. a television series that chronicles the purportedly real lives of an interconnected group of people, often in a melodramatic way.

Word History and Origins

Origin of docusoap¹

First recorded in 1990–95; docu(mentary) + soap (opera)

Example Sentences

What’s unfortunate is that this novel stuff comes wrapped in the shiny, same-y packaging of a standard docusoap.

From Time

It’s hard to imagine many of their reality-TV descendants—some preternaturally vapid and others actively playing up their shallowness, on The Real World, but also in broadcast reality competitions and the docusoaps of Bravo, E!

From Time