'One media – three screens' – Convergence and interactivity at its full potential? ARTE: French-German experiments in 'crossing the borders'

This contribution is aimed at discussing different current policies of convergence as well as questioning whether these exploit the opportunities of digital media to their full potential, especially with regard to transmedia storytelling, interactivity, participation and networking.Taking the portfolio of the ‘European Culture Channel’ ARTE as an example, I draw a sketch of existing and emerging industrial strategies as well as of new formats and user practices. In the second part of the article, I examine one specific genre within this context I look at the collaborative, networked transmedia documentary Prison Valley to consider transformations at both the macro and the micro level. Last but not least, I question whether ARTE fulfils its promise to be the first “100% bi-medial channel” (according to ARTE’s mission statement), or whether it promotes an ‘extended side-by sideness’ of devices and practices, which would constitute the first steps towards the synergetic potential of media convergence

Beyond “toolness”: Korsakow documentary as a methodology for plurivocal interventions in complexity

The hypothesis underlying this article is that new documentary practices potentially enable new forms of mediation allowing all interactors to experience complexity and deal with contingency in a world of polyvocality through multilayered configurations. An exploration of the Korsakow documentary Racing Home (Marianne McMahon and Phil Hoffman, 2014) brings into focus the epistemological and ontological status of these assemblages. A central issue is the question of how significantly specific modes of editing in Korsakow affect the overall experience for both the authoring instances and for the user-interactor: not only the authorship is shared between the interrelated agents, but also the heterogeneity of materials from various sources adds to the complexity of the assemblages. Central research questions include the role that polyvocality and algorithmic editing play in Korsakow, its specific embracement of contingency and its probing of nonlinear narratives. The answers provided through the analysis of the case study lead to the conclusion that Korsakow is more than just a tool to promote a special purpose and/or a platform to distribute material. Rather, Korsakow is best seen as a methodology to approach complex matters and provide multiple affective and cognitive ways to respond to them

Twist it once, twist it twice: Media Practices between Artistic Intervention and Informal Media Education

Dieser Beitrag befasst sich mit dem Potenzial interaktiver dokumentarisch-künstlerischer Konfigurationen einerseits sowie den Herausforderungen, die sich im Hinblick auf Bildungsangebote in, mit digitalen und durch digitale Netzmedien auftun andererseits. Dabei werden vor allem drei Aspekte untersucht, die bei der Erschliessung emergierender Praktiken im Kontext medialer Bildung zentral sind: (1) das Changieren von Medien-Erleben in interactive factuals zwischen Subjektivierungs- und Kollektiverfahrungen; (2) das Versprechen zur Partizipation als Teilhabe und Teilnahme; sowie (3) das Potenzial, handelnden Subjekten zu ‹digitaler Souveränität› zu verhelfen. Die leitende Fragestellung ist, inwiefern experimentelle, stark prozessual operierende Konfigurationen als informelle bzw. non-formale Bildungsmedien betrachtet werden können und welchen Beitrag sie auf der Meta-Ebene bzw. durch ihr experience design zur Entwicklung von Medienkompetenzen und einem reflektiert-kritischen Blick auf das eigene ‹digitale Subjekt› leisten. Nach einem kurzen Überblick über selbstreflexive interaktiv-dokumentarische Konfigurationen und eine medienhistorische bzw. -ökologische Situierung des Phänomens werden zunächst zwei für web-documentaries eher typisch konzipierte Projekte hinsichtlich ihres Beitrags zu digitaler Souveränität untersucht. Diese Projekte basieren primär auf prozeduraler Rhetorik, narrativer Immersion und komplex vernetzter Informationsaufbereitung und fördern damit das, was als digital literacy im engeren Sinne bezeichnet werden kann. Abschliessend wird anhand von network effect (USA 2015; Harris und Hochmuth) die These diskutiert, inwiefern dieses ästhetisch radikale, irritierende Projekt als provokativ-paradoxe Intervention das Spektrum klassischer Strategien des Dokumentarischen, aber auch formeller Bildungsprozesse erweitert.This contribution addresses the potential of interactive artistic-documentary configurations as well as the challenges that arise with regard to educational offerings in, with, and through digital network media. The focus lies on three aspects which are essential in the context of media education: (1) the oscillation of media experiences in interactive factuals between subjectivisation and collectivisation; (2) their promise of participation; and (3) their contribution to advancing (media) competences vis-à-vis digital sovereignty, new media literacy and agency. The guiding questions are: To what extent can experimental configurations be regarded as informal/non-formal educational media? And: In how far can they inspire – on a meta level or through their experience design – a critically-reflective view of one’s own ‹digital persona›? After a brief overview of self-reflexive interactive-documentary configurations and a media-historical and media-ecological situating of the phenomenon, two projects which are rather typical of web-documentaries will be examined with regard to their contribution to digital sovereignty. These projects are primarily based on procedural-rhetorics, narrative immersion and complexly networked provision of information, thus enhancing what can be described as digital literacy. In a second step, network effect (USA 2015; Harris and Hochmuth) will be used as a paradigm to discuss the potential of aesthetically radical, irritating projects used as provocative-paradoxical interventions to expand the spectrum of classical strategies of the documentary, but also of formal educational processes. The guiding question is to what extent experimental emerging configurations can be regarded as infor-mal/non-formal educational media and in how far they can inspire – on a meta level or through their experien-tial design – a critically-reflective view of one's own ‹digital persona›.   After a short overview of self-reflexive interactive documentary, network effect (USA 2015, Harris & Hochmuth), a configuration which is situated between interactive netart and web-documentarism, will serve as a teststone for the proposition that it is through aesthetically radical means and an irritating experience desgin that a critical stance towards one's own media practices is inspired; and that it is possibly precisely through provocative-paradoxical interventions that boundaries of both classical strategies of formal educational and documentary formats are pushed further

Wirklichkeitserzählungen als narrative Netzwerke.: Polyphone Erzählprozesse im virtuellen Raum als gemeinschaftsbildende Erfahrungsbewältigung

During the Covid-19 crisis, participatory, co-creative narrative projects emerged which tried to open spaces for coping with the experiences of the pandemic. Digital networked media offered a means not only to document and archive everyday stories, but also to create virtual communities. This article transfers concepts from narrative theory such as ‘polyphony’ and ‘networked narrative’ and applies them in analysing two paradigmatic projects: Corona Diaries, an audio-based database, and Corona Haikus, launched as a Facebook group for visual poetry. Though different as to their specific medial affordances, these projects reveal the potential of collective narrative processes to deal with otherwise ungraspable cataclysmic times

Wirklichkeitserzählungen als narrative Netzwerke. Polyphone Erzählprozesse im virtuellen Raum als gemeinschaftsbildende Erfahrungsbewältigung

During the Covid-19 crisis, participatory, co-creative narrative projects emerged which tried to open spaces for coping with the experiences of the pandemic. Digital networked media offered a means not only to document and archive everyday stories, but also to create virtual communities. This article transfers concepts from narrative theory such as ‘polyphony’ and ‘networked narrative’ and applies them in analysing two paradigmatic projects: Corona Diaries, an audio-based database, and Corona Haikus, launched as a Facebook group for visual poetry. Though different as to their specific medial affordances, these projects reveal the potential of collective narrative processes to deal with otherwise ungraspable cataclysmic times

Mythos Europäische Identität – Supranationale, nationale und regionale Identitäten in deutschen und französischen Fernsehnachrichten

Comparative PhD thesis on the representation and construction of regional, national and international identity in French and German prime time TV news

The myth of European identity Representation and construction of regional, national and European identities in German, French and international television news broadcasts

This paper presents an overview of some of the central myths (sensu Roland Barthes) of European identity in its interdependence with national and regional identities. Starting from the premises that television-news perceived as a social practice is still highly influential for how we perceive the world and ›locate‹ ourselves in it, we examine significant examples of TV-news – reaching from regional (Bavaria/Alsace), national (Germany/France) to supra-national public broadcasting stations (arte) on both the macro-level and the micro-level of the programs.Thereby, we follow a pluri-disciplinary research axis: Combining a semio-historic approach with methodological instruments from the Cultural Studies ›tool-box‹ allows us to understand topical cultural phenomena and their expressions in (mass-)media as socio-culturally embedded imprints of collective memory and imagination.Covering a wide spectrum of ›news-narratives‹, the analysis focuses on the interdependence of the preservation of heritage, traditional values and the construction of (post-)modern versions of national self-assertiveness (or the lack of it) in a globalized world – and the fact that ›audio-visions‹ of European (cultural) identity are still very elusive.These findings are taken as a point of departure to consider options for future (social-)TV-programs that can enhance the emergence of persistent ›Europeanness‹ as multifaceted, flexible pluri-identities