Telenovelas and society: constructing and reinforcing the nation through television fiction

Abstract

This study focuses on certain aspects of the socialising function exerted by the medium of television. More specifically, it examines in detail some of the televisual strategies used by Spanish public television to reinforce the idea of Spain as ‘state’ and ‘nation’. To achieve this, the study analyses two telenovelas produced in Spain, La Señora (The Lady) and Amar en tiempos revueltos (Loving in Troubled Times), which represent the adaptation of the genre to the cultural characteristics of its target audience. Although both series adhere to the principal rules of this melodramatic formula, they propose, in a similar way, an exercise of interpreting the country’s recent history. They explain and interpret the past of this society, thus justifying the collective present day. The analysis of both texts allows us to identify some of the semantic keys used today by the television media to evoke and legitimate the idea of the Spanish nation.