Journalism, social networks and global occupation movements: a systemic crisis in the contemporary semiosphere

Abstract

his article ponders the tension created in journalism by the emergence of social networks in the processes of the social construction of reality. The focuses are the events kindled by the Indignados movement in Spain in 2012, during the “25S” protests, which called for a new constituent assembly. Waiter Alberto Casillas stole the scene by facing police truculence, and that had a great repercussion in the networks, attracting the attention of international journalism. There are two points of view which, when compared, lead to a possible synthesis about this moment of crisis: 1) the way journalism presents the events; 2) the possibilities and implications offered by the networks to the more ample dynamics of journalism. C. S. Peirce’s concept of semiosis is the basis of the reflective effort, along with a systemic view inspired by the Semiotics of Culture – especially as in Yuri Lotman. It is postulated that in the contemporary semiosphere, in which complex processes of semiosis set off by events from the chaotic reality are unfolded, journalism has to review its practices, under pain of losing the legitimacy it has acquired throughout history as a mediator of a certain kind of knowledge.