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Δημήτρης Χαραλάμπης, Καθηγητής, ΕΜΜΕ, ΕΚΠΑ
Summary:
The following pages attempt a discussion about the representation of the elite in American fiction products, and more specifically in the NETFLIX series, House of Cards. Once popular culture has been the subject of rigorous criticism and condemnation in the sense that it is a field not so important as to take it seriously. It has now become a concept that must be taken very seriously because it is a crucial and diffused element of our everyday life. For this reason the content of the representations in the popular or popular culture and the logic behind them becomes of particular interest. Indeed, the relevant literature is rich, but in particular, in the case of the serial to be considered, scientific research is limited. This is not due to the indifference of the researchers for this product but rather to the fact that it was recently released. Besides, a number of researches have been released on power and politics as presented in the series, or the philosophy behind it. The choice of elite theory is justified as we will see from their leading role in the series. What is happening here is the approach of the concept of power and the way of governance through the logic of elite theory.
The approach adopted by this work starts first from the definition of the concept of elite. In particular, a presentation of the most important theories about elite is made. Starting from the first approaches of the concept of elite by the theorists of the Italian School at the end of the 19th century, a linear temporal discussion is made which allows the understanding of the term and highlights how it evolves to the most recent theoretical approaches. The purpose of this chapter is to highlight those aspects of the elite study that will provide the basic features that will then be sought out in the series to be examined as behaviors and relationships between the characters.
Then follows a discussion about the deep ideological and political character of art. In this section, it is argued that art shapes to some extent the way he understands the reality around him. There is a correlation of art with politics and then there is an argument that approaches politics as a spectacle. Immediately after, given the production of the studied series and the research that it will follow in the domestic audience, a brief presentation of the process by which a "americanization" of Greek television was made. At the end of the first chapter there is a discussion about the representation of the classes in the popular culture, since as a social phenomenon, the elite allow them to be identified in the upper strata of society.
Firstly, in the third chapter we will analyze the research question that will be answered in the framework of the specific research and then we will analyze the methodology applied and the way of realization of the research.
In the next chapter we are initially analyzing the text of the series divided into individual sections that emerged from the characteristics sought as they were formed earlier in the unity with the theories of the elite. Then follows the presentation of the research to the public in a dialectical relationship with the results that emerged in the first phase of the study.
The last chapter summarizes and presents the conclusions of the study of the text of the serial and ends with a reference to proposals for further study of the subject of political representations in TV fiction products in general and especially in the particular one discussed here. (google translate, I was too bored)
Keywords:
elites, politics, representation, popular culture, house of cards
