The research team of the CAT project “Screening European Populisms (2008-2020)” at IAS CEU

Between October 23-27, IAS CEU was hosting the research group of the Constructive Advanced Thinking (CAT) project “Screening European Populisms (2008-2020): Audiovisual Fiction, Social Media, and Political Affect”. The group, led by Valerio Coladonato (Assistant Professor in Film studies at Sapienza, University of Rome), including Dom Holdaway (Associate Professor, Film and Media Studies, University of Urbino Carlo Bo), Elena Pilipets (Research Associate, Digital Media and Methods, University of Siegen) and Sven Stollfuß (Professor of Media Change, Institute of Communication and Media Studies, University of Leipzig) was presenting the key points and features of their ongoing work during the seminar.

The presentation Popular and/or Populist? European Films and TV Series, between Narrative and Online Engagement was illustrating the research team’s methodological approach for selecting and interpreting fictional media content from five audiovisual markets in Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK). As explained, a multi-modal analysis has been applied which focuses on also the media products themselves, the surrounding contexts and discourses, and the reception of them in third spaces and political conversations. European films and TV series such as the Darkest Hour, the Brexit: An uncivil war and the Borgen have been used in their case studies, with the aim to trace how narrative, representation and online reception work together in the circulation of populist affect.

The presentation was followed by a discussion, which was opened by the comments of Anikó Imre (Senior Joint Budapest Fellow, IAS CEU; Professor, School of Cinematic Arts, University of Southern California).

The seminar was organized as the first part of the CEU Polányi Salon: Dimensions of Populism in a Transnational Perspective on October 25.