MLS Communication Journal
Vol 2 No 2 (2024)
ISSN: 2792-9280
Reality strikes back: performing social change through the new forms of truth
Published Jul 23, 2024
Abstract
The concept of reality is in crisis. To be more precise, the mediation of reality is in crisis due to issues such as fake news, the emotional dissemination of content that appears to be informative, posturing on social media, the virtualization of experiences, and synthetically generated content. In parallel, new formats, heirs of non-fiction, have emerged in recent years to account for a different relationship with the real. Beyond journalism, there are creative non-fiction narratives, interactives, 360º documentaries, VR documentaries, and documentaries through Instagram Stories. The aim of this research is to delve into the characteristics of these new formats and their relationship with the real through Multimodal Discourse Analysis. The sample includes six avant-garde projects that address topics such as climate change, sexism, cultural repression, suicide, sexual diversity, and identity. It is concluded that most of the analyzed projects present a symbiosis of form and content to enhance their messages. The strongest link to the real lies in the revelation and elevation of the authorial voice. These forms are committed, purposeful, and combative in representing reality, but somewhat conservative in the performativity for change that opens up in the connected digital context.
Keywords:
Communication, Digital media, New formats, Social change, Non-fiction
Article Details
How to Cite
Sánchez-López, I., & Gifreu-Castells, A. (2024). Reality strikes back: performing social change through the new forms of truth. MLS Communication Journal, 2(2). https://doi.org/10.69620/mlscj.v2i1.2797
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References
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Baudrillard, J. (1993). No tomar lo real como real. Chasqui, 44(83). https://dialnet.unirioja.es/ejemplar/336746
Borjan, E. (2020). Challenges of Documentary in the Age of New Media. Filozofska istrazivanja, 40(4). https://doi.org/10.21464/fi40403
Bubeck, S., Chandrasekaran, V., Eldan, R., Gehrke, J., Horvitz, E., Kamar, E., Lee, P., Tat-Lee, Y., Li, Y., Lundberg, S., Nori, H., Palangi, H., Tulio-Ribeiro M., & Zhang, Y. (2023). Sparks of Artificial General Intelligence: Early experiments with GPT-4. arXIV:2303.12712. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2303.12712
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Carlson, M. (2017). Legitimating News in the Digital Era. Columbia University Press.
Corbetta, P. (2007). Metodología y técnicas de investigación social. McGraw Hill.
Das, D., & Upadhyay, A. K. (2024). Deconstructing complexities in the adoption of new forms in news media: a systematic literature review. Cogent Arts & Humanities, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/23311983.2024.2303819
Domarchi, J., Doniol-Valcroze, J., Godard, J-L., Kast, P., Rivette, J., & Rohmer, E. (1959). Hiroshima, notre amour. Cahiers du cinema, (97), 1-18.
Evans-Zepeda, C.A. (2020). Technology, Activism, and Social Justice in a Digital Age. Journal of Communication, 70(2), E11–E13. https://doi.org/10.1093/joc/jqz037
Finneman, T., y Thomas, R. (2018). A family of falsehoods: Deception, media hoaxes and fake news. Newspaper Research Journal, 39(3), 350–361. https://doi.org/10.1177/0739532918796228
Firth, J., Torous, J., López-Gil, J.F., Linardon, J., Milton, A., Lambert, J., Smith, L., Jarić, I., Fabian, H., Vancampfort, D., Onyeaka, H., Schuch, F.B. and Firth, J.A. (2024), From “online brains” to “online lives”: understanding the individualized impacts of Internet use across psychological, cognitive and social dimensions. World Psychiatry, 23, 176-190. https://doi.org/10.1002/wps.21188
Genette, G. (1966). Fronteras del relato. En E. Verón (Ed.), Análisis estructural del relato (pp. 193-208). Tiempo Contemporáneo.
Gifreu-Castells, A. (2015). Evolución del concepto de no ficción. Aproximación a tres formas de expresión narrativa. Obra digital, 8, 14 – 39. https://doi.org/10.25029/od.2015.54.8
Glaser, B. (1992). Basics of grounded theory analysis: Emergence versus forcing. Sociology Press.
Glaser, B. G., y Strauss, A. L. (1967). The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. Aldine.
Gottfried, J., y Shearer, E. (2016). News Use Across Social Media Platforms 2016. Pew Research Center.
Lee, L-H, Braud, T., Zhou, P., Wang, L., Xu, D., Lin, Z., Kumar, A., Bermejo, C. y Hui, P. (2021). All one needs to know about metaverse: a complete survey on technological singularity, virtual ecosystem, and research agenda. Journal of latex class files, 14(8). https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.11200.05124/8
Levitskaya, A., y Fedorov, A. (2020). Analysis of Manipulative Media Texts: World Media Literacy Education Experience. Media Education, 60(3), 430-442. https://doi.org/10.13187/me.2020.3.430
Lewandowsky, S., Ecker, U., Seifert, C., Schwarz, N., y Cook, J. (2012). Misinformation and Its Correction: Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 13(3), 106-131. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100612451018
Livingston, J., Holland, E., y Fardouly, J. (2020). Exposing digital posing: The effect of social media self-disclaimer captions on womens body dissatisfaction, modo, and impressions of the user. Body image, 32, 150-154. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2019.12.006
McGonagle, T. (2017). Fake news: False fears or real concerns? Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, 35(4), 203-209. https://doi.org/10.1177/0924051917738685
Nichols, B. (1997). La representación de la realidad: cuestiones y conceptos sobre el documental. Paidós.
O’Halloran, K. (2011). Multimodal Discourse Analysis. En K. Hyland y B. Paltridge (Ed.), Companion to discourse (pp. 120-137). Continuum.
Ortuño, P., y Villaplana, V. (2017). Activismo Transmedia. Narrativas de participación para el cambio social. Entre la comunicación creativa y el media art. Obra digital: revista de comunicación, (12), 123-144.
Pauwels, L. (2012). A multimodal framework for analyzing Websites as cultural expressions. Journal of computer-mediated communication, 17(3), 247 – 265. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2012.01572.x
Peirce, C. (1974). La ciencia de la semiótica. Nueva Visión.
Pérez-Seijo S, Silva-Rodríguez, A. (2024). Innovation in Digital Media beyond Technology: The Audience-Centered Approach and Pending Challenges. Journalism and Media, 5(1), 311-324. https://doi.org/10.3390/journalmedia5010021
Plantinga C. R. (1997). Rhetoric and Representation in Nonfiction Film. Cambridge UP.
Sánchez-López, I. (2020). Narrativas en la era digital. Mediaciones del relato y empoderamiento creativo en la Generación Z [Doctoral Dissertation, Arias Montano]. https://bit.ly/3oHId0t
Sánchez-López, I., Bonilla-del-Río, M., y Soares, I. de O. (2021). Digital creativity to transform learning: Empowerment from a com-educational approach. Comunicar, 69, 113-123. https://doi.org/10.3916/C69-2021-09
Tandoc Jr. E., Lim, Z. W., y Ling, R. (2018). Defining fake news: A typology of scholarly definitions. Digital Journalism, 6(2), 137–153. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2017.1360143
Tandoc Jr. E., Thomas, R., y Bishop, L. (2021). What Is (Fake) News? Analyzing News Values (and More) in Fake Stories. Media and Communication, 9(1), 110-119. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v9i1.3331
Themba, B. (2018). Social Media Activism: Limitation and Benefits. International Network Organization for Scientific Research, 4(1), 30-37.
Ufarte-Ruiz, M. J., Peralta-García, L. y Murcia-Verdú, F. J. (2018). Fact Checking: un nuevo desafío del periodismo. El Profesional de la Información, 27(4), 733-741. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2018.jul.02
Vosoughi, S., Roy, D., y Aral, S. (2018). The spread of true and false news online. Science, 359(6380), 1146-1151. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aap9559
Weinrichter, A. (2004). Desvíos de lo real. El cine de no ficción. T&B Editores.
