Promising Images of Love. The Mediatisation of Values and Norms in Religious and Secular Wedding Narratives

Programma di finanziamento: H2020-MSCA-IF-2020

Ente finanziatore: Commissione Europea

Responsabile scientifico: Marie-Therese Mäder

Supervisore: Carla Danani

Ruolo UniMC: host institution

Durata: 36 mesi

Digital and electronic media play a central role in contemporary wedding rituals, be it during the preparation, theritual itself or afterwards. Wedding photographers and videographers stage the couple during the wedding ritualand reception/party and these depictions shape the wedding couple’s and their guests’ memories in the future. Theresearch question is: How do contemporary media representations of religious and secular weddings in Europecommunicate norms and values? Weddings are understood as a constitutive rite de passage that is commonly practicedin religious traditions as well as in a variety of cultural and secular contexts. Secular and religious traits of weddingrituals produce a complex and often complementary relationship. Wedding practices shape and communicate gender,social, cultural and economic values of individuals and groups. The interdisciplinary research considers theoriesfrom the study of religion, cultural studies, media ethics, and political philosophy and applies a multi-methodologicalapproach that includes media analysis, ethnographic studies, and qualitative methods. The project scrutinizes howmedia representations and practices enclose and reshape religious and secular norms and values as well as stereotypeswith the intent to highlight the performativity of their mediatisation. Due to the power of images media ethicalquestions arise and the research provides a theoretical framework to discuss it. One of the intended short-termresults is to suggest best practice for social actors in the field of wedding media productions and to develop researchtools for analysing the mediatisation of values and norms. Long-term results are to increase social awareness of theperformativity of images (that express hierarchical relationships among individuals, genders and in religions), in orderto strengthen a more inclusive, secure, innovative, and reflective European society and culture, to improve respect andto prevent subordination.

SITO WEB: http://promising-images.eu