Interactive Storytelling for the Maintenance of Cultural Identity: The Potential of Affinity Spaces for the Exchange and Continuity of Intergenerational Cultural Knowledge

Abstract

In an increasingly aged society, with unmeasurable cultural richness kept by its elder elements for their vast life experience, it is urgent to preserve this cultural knowledge before it disappears. The capacity of the computational space to accommodate a virtualization of reality is evident, alongside with the possibility to preserve perspectives of reality with spontaneous and very easy to sort creations thanks to the web tools that now support content production by any common user. Despite all the relevant problematics brought by this context where the common user is simultaneously consumer and producer of information, the opportunities for the present and future of cultural identity maintenance are numerous. This paper approaches the idea of supporting the participatory maintenance of cultural identity through intergenerational storytelling and the dynamization of digital affinity spaces. Our contribution aims to grow the understanding of the role that interactive narratives can have in the real world and in the specific context of cultural identity maintenance, by developing new usage strategies to enhance cultural mediation with the tools we have available and with the help of social, ubiquitous and mobile storytelling strategies.