Threads and Traces: culture, politics and media constructing the fabric of social representation Brazil/Spain

• Grant number: 13/15805-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Start date: October 28, 2013
• End date: November 16, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Communications - Journalism and Publishing
• Principal Investigator: Carla Reis Longhi
• Grantee: Carla Reis Longhi
• Host Investigator: Manuel Angel Fernandez Sande
• Host Institution: Vice-Reitoria de Pesquisa e Pós-Graduação. Universidade Paulista (UNIP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Spain

Abstract

We propose as a research the analysis of media representations of excluded subjects, in this project, specifically, groups of individuals who are homeless or living illegally, in Brazil called favelados, and in Spain without a specific name. The interest arises from the finding of increased social outcasts in the Spanish context due to the economic crisis. Within this definition of the object, we propose propose as problematic the analysis of the impact of local culture in the forms of representation of these subjects, observing the discursive strategies used by the printed media, media that has massive character, because it has a centralizing configuration and not a interactive one. We ponder how different cultures treat the same problem and constitute the process of social representation building. We know that there are economic, political and historical specificities, but we can not disregard the fact that even the European countries, today, follow neoliberal economic goals, putting economic interests of the financial system ahead of its social policies. This has always been the Brazilian reality and, although both have the same capitalists pressures to respond, the countries have deep distinctions and it is these that motivate our research, placing us to the following problem: culturally distinct countries can respond to the same logic of social representation, being pressured by same economic dynamics? To answer this problem, we propose a comparative analysis of two newspapers of the mainstream media, the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil and El Pais in Madrid, Spain. (AU)