El relato criminal como escenario de valores y lugar de reconocimientos

• Main Author: Francesc Barata
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Universidad Complutense de Madrid 2008-01-01
• Series: Mediaciones Sociales
• Subjects: Mediación comunicativa; Relato criminal; Peligro social; Pensamiento primario; Arquetipo
• Online Access: http://revistas.ucm.es/index.php/MESO/article/view/22400

This article explores the media visibility in peoples’ tragedies –especially violent crime- as a mediation space between the criminal ideas and as an exploration spot for collective distress. The author holds that the current tough hand puni-tive ethos against crime, needs the criminal archetypes spread by the cultural industries, which are centred in the biog-raphies of those deviated and devoided of the necessary contexts to understand the criminal phenomenon. The Media con-tribute to the building of a crime oriented society, but if these stories captivate peo-ple to such extent, it is because, besides from that logical dimension, they also provide a symbolic language that links us to human suffering and transgression. From this perspective, they are accounts which refer to evil, to death constantly stalking and to the dangers that make us anxious. These constitute a chain of ghosts and dreams of a primary thought, activated beyond the civilising beacons. Stories that straightforwardly question the darkest corners of our emotions and also, even if it is hard to accept it, stories that would help us relate to violence.