Research lines

1. Visual Culture and Social Processes

Analyzes the production of media images in culture and social processes. Studies the uses and the ideological, social and cultural impacts of image in various medias. It also includes the investigation of the image as an expression of historical memory in various cultural contexts.

Research Projects

Myths in the media: ideology, social imagination and instrumental re-enchantment in the consumer society – André Azevedo da Fonseca

One of the elements that constitute the constructed imaginary about the twenty-first century is the fabulous development of the sciences. However, despite the history of rationality that allows the progress of scientific knowledge, observations persist among technology users an imaginary full of mythologies, beliefs and superstitions that attribute sacred and miraculous qualities not the field of consumption and politics. Part of the dynamics is verifiable in the worship of the public to markings in the passions and politicians who attribute sacred knowledge to the partisans and demonic to the adversaries. We note, however, that dynamics are not spontaneous. A whole literature of advertising manuals explains how to employ architectural symbols to carry publicity of sacred meanings. We assume, therefore, that the mythification of images in propaganda, politics or cinema seems to indicate a less properly religious and more utilitarian purpose, in economic or ideological terms. The purpose of this project is to investigate, in a set of images conveyed by means of communication, an exhibition of sacred narratives used to cause impacts on the social imagination in order to reach the objectives of political propaganda and advertising for consumption. The object of study is recent reports and publicity of popular brands of the most diverse products; Big-box Hollywood films and also independent films that bring discussions about mythology; In addition to pieces of political-ideological propaganda, produced by agencies and activists, circulating on social networks. For this, we will employ methods of qualitative research, such as documentary analysis and bibliographic research, from the perspective of communication, cultural history, cultural studies and theories of myths and social imaginaries. As a result, we seek to broaden our understanding of media symbols that attribute sacred meanings to the images associated with consumption, politics, and cinema in the twenty-first century.

Media images of Latin America: journalistic-literary texts of Gabriel García Márquez. – Maria Cecilia Guirado Carvalho

The media images of Latin America are safeguarded in García Márquez literature. They were selected by the keen observation of journalistic practice and transcribed for his books, according to the aesthetics of Magical Realism. This project aims to examine the process of creation of the 1982’s Nobel Prize for Literature, as well as the implementation of its narrative for journalistic, literary and its adaptations for radio and cinema. The recurring themes-images in the work of García Márquez reproduce and represent the pains and delights of the continent. Representations also leave guided by the Brazilian media agenda a possible translation between the real and the imaginary

Reports, records and representations: the Brazilian censorship in the international press view – Marcia Neme Buzalaf

This project aims to conduct a study on how the outside look that foreign newspapers built over the most violent years of Brazilian dictatorship (1968-1975) can be revealing about representations, texts, images and facts in contrast to a production influenced by political censorship environment. The corpus will be made from materials obtained from the New York Times newspaper, Washington Post, The Guardian and The Observer. The methodology will take into account this detached view, and the analysis will occur in the historiographic field and journalism theories. The research will have exploratory and analytical character. The contribution sought is in order to enrich the knowledge of the history of Brazilian journalism and improve the perception of newsworthiness and representation with the use of data sources made available nowadays by the wide range of scanned materials the researcher’s reach.

Memory Trigger: the use of photography for the history recovery from the north of Parana in the 1930s to 1960s– Paulo César Boni

This project aims to apply and test a new methodological technique, the use of photography to engage the memory trigger, and to recover, study, organize and classify the history and iconographic documents (with emphasis focused on the photograph) from the decades of 30, 40, 50 and 60’s in northern Paraná. To this end, the following methodological procedures will be adopt: bibliographical research, documentary research, iconographic analysis – with emphasis focused on photography, oral history (interviews with pioneers, scholars, researchers, historians, authors, journalists and authorities in the region) and the use of photography as memory trigger engaging at first, the project is intended for application settings, reapplication and consolidation of a new methodological technique. However, from the survey data and documents (official and oral testimony) and iconographic documents (available for public consultation from local or private albums), the study aims to contextualize the information and photos and organize them by theme and chronologically. Finally, the project aims to contribute to the development and consolidation of a new methodological technique, the use of photography as a memory trigger, and the recovery and organization of fragments in the history of northern Paraná – and its iconographic collection (photo) – in the 30, 40, 50 and 60’s, providing their results to academic and public consultation, in easily accessible locations, preferably in the form of scientific articles in journals and thematic books.

Reports of a neo-liberal offensive: charge discourse analysis in the Brazilian press of FHC Era (1995-2002) – Rozinaldo Antonio Miani

This research project aims to analyze how charge, in the discursive context of the Brazilian press, portrayed the evils of neoliberal offensive in Brazil, as well as their economic, political and social impacts on society during the FHC Era. The analyzes will be carried out based on charge discourse analysis methodology. For its interdisciplinary nature, the project will contribute to a historical and sociological understanding of FHC Era, from a historical and historiographical analysis, enabling an appropriation and a questioning of the political and ideological foundations that potentiated the advance of the neoliberal offensive in Brazil from second half of 90’s. It is also the continuation of a research process to establish a theoretical and methodological review of the recent Brazilian history, with the documentary based on the iconographic sources.

Signs of the crisis of capitalism – historical determinations of the audiovisual forms of communication production (from national television systems to the world computer network) – Manoel Dourado Bastos

The present project aims to study the process of transformation of historical determinations between communication and capitalism, particularly the processes related to audiovisual forms, focusing on the interpretation of the period from the communicative hegemony of national television systems to that of the global computer network . From the contributions of the political economy of information, communication and culture (EPICC), we intend to characterize the audiovisual forms of modern communication as aspects of complex historical dynamics that unfold from the reproduction patterns of capital and the modern nation-state, elements Of capitalism. Communication is thus recognized as a specific historical process of capitalist modernity. It is initially about observing the global expansion of national television systems, characterizing it as an essential element to capitalism in the twentieth century. Then the interest lies in the systemic crisis of capital and the corresponding emergence of the world’s computer networks. It is particularly sought to evaluate the continuities and ruptures of this historical process in line with the debates on the current historical state of capitalism. In this light, the world-wide network of computers maintains essential aspects of the national systems of television, surpassing them like a complex of media and of control to the dynamics of militarization of the daily life.

The image representation of the judiciary in Brazilian republican press (1889- 1964) – Alberto Gawryszewski

The purpose of this work is supported in its own uniqueness. To the present moment, no scientific work has been done on the proposed topic. The judiciary, like other republican powers, were and are subjects  of cartoons and caricatures from the national press. Using various ideological source for the same object (judiciary) will be able to check many questions: would it be no difference in the visual language between consulted journals? Over time justice (judiciary) was represented in which way by the journals? Would there be a direct relationship between image / text? After all, is justice more plausible as cartoon or caricature? What forms of expression are most used by artists, cartoon or caricature? The charge (and caricature) is really an important historical source when the subject is the judiciary? Finally, many may be the questions that will occur during this study. The proposed period is the beginning of the Brazilian Republic until the inauguration of the “dictatorship” of 1964. The papers used were daily, weekly, of general circulation, small circulation, extended period of very short period, left, right and center newspapers. All of them, as a source of opinion formation, had the judiciary as subject of discussion and / or comment. Then the cartoon and caricature acted as a formative element of opinion, alone or accompanying text. Therefore, this research seeks to clear the history of the judiciary and its juridicial action / social impact through cartoons and caricature produced by the press to be used in this study (1889-1964).

Images, signs and war narratives in Paraguayans, Bolivians and Brazilians cemeteries – Alberto Gawryszewski

The central issue to be developed in this research is the use of photographic images, signs and narratives found in graves and mausoleums referencing the wars, in specific case the Chaco War (1932-1935) between Bolivia and Paraguay, and in Brazilian cemeteries about World Wars. It will also be made a comparative study of these mausoleums and individual military graves. The cities chosen to compose the comparative map are the major cities in each country: La Paz, Sucre, Cochabamba, Oruro, Santa Cruz de La Sierra and Potosí, Bolivia; Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, Brazil; and finally, Asuncion, Concepción, San Pedro, Fuerte Olimpo, Villarica and Caacupé, Paraguay. A comparative study of languages ​​between the living and the dead, between earthly and heavenly relationships, the perspectives of beyond, will give a quirky / historical aspect of this project. This is not to make a classification or creation typologies, much less family history. The project is proposed to be used for studies on the photographic image and the signs that compose the grave as a historical source, but investing in an analysis that considers the relationship between living and dead, the guard of professional and national memory. This implies an insertion of these objects in time and production conditions, and the observation of its evolution, and the development of a typology for these sources as individuals, considering them in different locations.

 

2.Imagem and Languages

Studies the processes of image coding in languages among various media. Investigates the the image expression mechanisms in specific media languages, its forms of meaning articulation and aesthetic manifestations in semiotic processes.

Research Projects

Offensive Images: Demonization of the Other and Pamphleting in the XVI Century – Alberto Klein

The religious reformation of the sixteenth century, which has Martin Luther as one of its main actors, can be studied as a unique communicational phenomenon, since it was the first major public debate in modern Europe after the invention of Gutenberg’s printing with movable type. The media character of this event can be attested not only by the intense production of books, including the Bible translation into vernacular by the German reformer, but also by spreading virulent pamphlets, which involved much of the population in public debates between reformers and Roman Catholic Church. Luther and his partner Phillip Melanchthon signed 183 leaflets only in the year 1523. Despite the eminently historical period, we intend to dwell on the images stamped in these woodcut pamphlets (xylograph). Thus, we will analyze the sense mechanisms among the production of the offense and the semiotic processes of demonization of the other, combining visual elements that encode three centuries later in a new language, the charge. Among these elements, we will investigate visual forms that are structured in a binary and polar base, reflecting in a symbolic removal of otherness. The prospect of this study is mainly based on the semiotics of culture, systematized by Ivan Bystrina, besides the contributions of the image theory from W.J.T. Mitchell. If the offending images form a set of visual production in contemporary media, we will study them at the dawn of the press.

Symbolic construction and agenda setting through image and languages ​​in telejornalistic production – Florentina das Neves Souza

The visual elements have extreme weight in building the credibility of a story. In television news, images and texts are aligned and are structured according to merchandise production aesthetic to enhance the objectivity and impartiality offered to the viewer. Taking into account the various components of telejornalism language as reports, notes, “live”, simulations, graphics, weather maps, vignettes, scenarios and even the presentation and positioning of mediators, this project investigates the factors presented in the image coding processes and their expression mechanisms in the language in local and national editions of the most watched TV news nowadays. For corpus analysis, the project examines the newscasts from the valences  methodology and the notion of news framing, articulated processes that composes the factors that can ensure the schedule. The main source will be the routes used by groups of media and political studies. As a prognosis result, we intend to know which treatment is done by editors, reporters and presenters of the news programs of TV for a given subject and audience.

Representation and symbolization, via image, of interferences (interventions) in the environmental conditioners of the intra-urban area of ​​Londrina – Miguel Luiz Contani

The research analyzes the encoding process of the image, in its various media (with emphasis on the diagram and photograph) manifested in communication mechanisms linked to a slice of the urban development. Environmental issues are raised to identify ways of meaning articulation and aesthetic manifestations in the city space and its expression.

For a Phenomenological Critique of Advertising Technical Image: The Problem of Attention – Rodolfo Rorato Londero

One of the currently main problems identified by the advertising is saturation advertising and the overexposure of consumer attention. Questioning whether this shortage scenario is a real problem or a consequence, this research aims to show how the advertising itself encourages this fight for attention through its scientific texts. It should be understood, therefore, that attention is a psychologizing concept created to sustain a capitalist consumer economy, which requires a phenomenological critique of the technical image of advertising, ie, the image constructed from scientific texts advertising. The methodology is based on bibliographical and documentary research, especially reading the history of the attention from Jonathan Crary, the Phenomenology of Perception from Merleau-Ponty and advertising manuals of the first half of the twentieth century.

Strategic management of the design in the coffee route: appreciation of local products through image and Identity- Rosane Fonseca de Freitas Martins

The project aims to strengthen, through the design, the coffee route image program, in the north of Paraná state, managed by Sebrae, investigating the relationship between subject, image and ways of representation construction for meaning attribution (reduction of knowledge), incorporating natural qualities, and values, seeking greater emotional association of users with the program, and assist business owners and managers to visualize and enjoy the benefits that design and its management can provide (still little known in practice). The methodology employed will be a qualitative exploratory inquiry, which  the study corpus will be built in multiple cases of local products associated with the route, involving several designs: survey, case studies, ethnography, primary and secondary data. It will be investigated the efficacy of visual manifestations next to its target audience and its impact on the coffee route image in all cases: how the public perceives and associated codes of created images (reduction of knowledge: conceptualized and synthesized) considering the process of design thinking. Is expected to be a contribution to regional development, by interfering with the identity of local products (brands, shape of goods, packaging, labels and visual communication in general) strengthening its competitiveness, increasing its value and contributing to involved local agents activities and encouraging the related economy with productive avocation of the region.

Image and subjectivity: a map of the semiotic modes of dream in the postmodern cinema – Silvio Ricardo Demetrius

This research aims to analyze and interpret the image components found in a crop of recent film history that has lead some authors to consider expressed characteristics of postmodernism in the field of expression. As exemplary delimitation of this production the analyzis focus on the filmographies of three contemporary directors: David Lynch, Michel Gondry and Jean-Pierre Jeunet. The historical framework of cinema that serves as the base project is proposed by Gilles Deleuze, the passage of a classic cinema to a modern one. This passage operates towards a gradual withdrawal of the narrative as a structuring of film language and the opening offered by cinema to an image that precipitates abstractions. Image-thinking, characteristic of film which the language domain becomes the hallmark of its modernity. The biggest question that permeates the project is the discussion about the emergence of a post-modern cruising that includes these historically separate domains to a line that articulates the film as a way of thinking and the traditional line that bounces off all its language according to the determinants of strictly narrative language and was consolidated in the industrial model that holds cinema productions.