Immersive Telejournalistic Narratives in the Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

To build representations and meanings, telejournalism in the context of transmediation has relied on the interrelation of different languages, adapting itself according to the emergence of resources and interfaces. In this context, one can cite the exploration of 360-degree audiovisual narratives, an emerging image modality used by the press as a mechanism to bring spectators closer to events. In Brazil, 360-degree journalistic productions made by communication companies, in general, go beyond the space of television and move towards online supports, in order to instigate the participation of the enunciatee through access to interactivity resources. The present investigation focuses on this process of articulation between TV and the Internet, with the aim of pointing out reflections on the language of 360-degree audiovisual content in journalism, proposing to analyze discursive strategies and technical specificities of productions disseminated through the television support and the online environment. To this end, the series of 360-degree reports “O Vírus na Favela” was examined, launched in 2020 by the program Balanço Geral RJ (Record TV Rio - Brazil) and which sought to portray challenges faced by residents of communities in Rio de Janeiro during the Covid-19 pandemic. This exploratory study is guided by a methodological path formed by a bibliographic survey, based on discussions such as telejournalism, interactivity and 360-degree narratives, and on the analysis of the corpus-based on three principles of French semiotics presented by Barros (2005): narrative syntax, discursive syntax and discursive semantics. In addition, the semiotic analysis method for 360-degree films developed by Moreira (2020) was applied. In conclusion, it can be recognized that the analyzed series evidences the enunciators' search to follow the contemporary trend of telling stories in more than one media support, as well as creating interactivity with the viewer. Also, it was observed that TV productions have a hybrid proposal and are based on several languages, such as graphic elements, conventional videos and 360-degree videos. On the other hand, Web content, in part, is configured as interactive versions of 360-degree videos shown on TV. Such evidence may characterize that television content producers see this type of image as an accessory innovation in the composition of traditional reports.