Mídia, suporte e compósito de gêneros: por uma análise crítica de blogs no ciberativismo

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the concepts of media, genre support, and genre composite with the aim of proposing a critical analysis of blogs engaged in cyberactivism. It assumes the objective of discussing the concepts of media, support, and genre composite, aiming to develop a theoretical-methodological framework that incorporates these three categories. This overarching objective unfolds into the following specific objectives: 1) to deepen the study of media as a methodological category for the critical analysis of genres; 2) to review and examine a set of categories that operationalize the analysis of the concept of support and its functions in updating genres in the online environment; 3) to describe and analyze the generic relationships that constitute the blog, considered in this research as a genre composite. To achieve this, we rely on the paradigm of Critical Genre Analysis (CGA), engaging with perspectives from the Bakhtin Circle, Rhetorical Genre Studies, and Critical Discourse Analysis. This work, therefore, aligns with the research of Bonini (2011) and C. Lima (2013), who examined this triad from the perspective of CGA. Methodologically, this research is transdisciplinary, supported by a qualitative approach and grounded in a critical perspective. For data generation, we selected the blog linked to the website of the organization WITNESS, an international institution that aims to denounce human rights violations. Thus, we identified a set of categories that included, for the study of media: ideological orientation, media level, and its modes of updating. To analyze support, we considered the notion of interface (Souza, 2010), through categories such as: graphic-spatial dimension and human-computer interaction. Regarding hypergenre (Bonini, 2011), we chose to characterize it as a genre composite, in order to understand it as a grouping of genres that are divided into different levels: functional, autonomy, and chaining. The results led us to characterize the selected media as a counter-hegemonic micromedia (Primo, 2008b), that is, operating with more limited resources, smaller production scale, and linked to positions confronting abuses and violations of human rights. Regarding support, the delimitation by the concept of software interface enabled us to identify some semiotic patterns of the investigated interfaces, as well as contextual, operational, and discursive interaction mechanisms. In the analysis of the genre composite, organizers genres (homepage, menu, and header) and functioning (post, tutorial, and online comment) were identified at the functional level. In terms of autonomy, inseparable genres (homepage, menu, header, and online comment) and separable (tutorial) were highlighted. Finally, at the chaining level, chained genres (homepage, menu, header, online comment, and tutorial) were identified. We also suggest the possibility of unchained genres, not identified in the analyzed material.

Therefore, we hope that the proposed theoretical-methodological construct, after literature review and empirical exercise, may prove useful for other research considering objects beyond what is proposed here. Thus, we aim for the theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical implications to be relevant for studies in the field.