Media Narratives : Productions and Representations of Contemporary Mythologies

The media of a society always dynamically interacts with current popular ideas and myths (myths which narrate, explain and often justify social realities—such as games of power, economic and financial inequalities, drug dealing, disasters, diseases or pandemic threats, to name just a few salient examples). In this frame, the archetypal dimensions of the imaginary, of gossiping and of storytelling also seem to play an important role even in the frame of the (so called) “rational discourse”. Media Narratives is an effort to analyze ongoing narratives (either political or fictional) in Argentina, Brazil, Greece, Mexico or the United States, expressing interpretations of contemporary events (such as crimes, scandals, diseases or political activism), but also presenting common beliefs and desires revealed by popular artistic creations. These narratives compose the mythical background of the contemporary globalized world, the “spirit of the time” as Edgar Morin named it, a spirit which is expressed in current ideas and mentalities. This effort can be characterized as a representative survey of popular beliefs of the 21st Century represented in storytelling. The articles collected in this book will reveal some important facets of our contemporary mythologies. Contributors are: Lucia Acuña-Pedro, Graziela Ares, Eduardo Barbabela, Mercedes Calzado, Omar Cerrillo Garnica, Christiana Constantopoulou, Mariana Fernández, Humberto Fernandes, Jaqueline García Cordero, Enrique García Romero, Leda Maria Caira Gitahy, Yamila Gómez, Vanesa Lio, Melina Meimaridis, José A. Ruiz San Román, Pedro Paulo Martins Serra, Hara Stratoudaki, Leandro R. Tessler, and Gabriela Villen.