Elements of national and cultural identity in Spanish television fiction productions distributed by the platform RTVE Play

Abstract

Introduction: During the last decade, several audiovisual platforms have proliferated in the Spanish media environment. One of them is RTVE Play, a free service offered by the Radio Televisión Española corporation (Spanish Radio and Television). It includes dozens of audiovisual productions financed by the institution, broadcasted by its linear television channel La 1 or created specifically for the Internet. Methodology: This article analyzes a sample of the 30 series premiered between 2018 and 2022 to research what features of Spanish national and cultural identity construction can be found in them. Thus, it explores what referents and discourses about the national context are available in the audiovisual works of RTVE Play. Using a coding sheet applied to the analysis of the pilot chapters of the fictions in the sample, several categories are considered, such as anthroponyms, locations, language, national symbols, social issues raised in the narrative, among others. Results: The results obtained evince little abundance of strong identity elements and scarce diversity in the representation of autochthonous cultural forms of some regions of the country with notorious specificities. Conclusions: Some aspects that exceed the categories used, such as the recurrence of women as main characters in roles requiring significant authority, suggest possible research lines for future studies about the most recent fictions financed by RTVE.