The new interactive multimedia documentary: discursive construction of reality for the active receiver

Abstract

Today’s technological development is leading to major and varied changes regarding the communication world. Related to a digital context that is multimedia, hypertextual and that allows interactivity, these changes imply a transformation of traditional journalistic genres and formats, which must be redefined in order to take advantage of the possibilities that the new media may offer. One of them is the documentary genre, which has been transformed adopting an innovative and interactive multimedia format known as ‘web documentary’, ‘webdoc’, etc. This reformed genre explores the Internet potentials adopting new forms of discursive approach when describing reality. Based on these aspects, this article aims to delve into the construction of the new narratives inside interactive multimedia documentary, paying a particular attention to the important role assigned to a receiver/user that becomes an active element when it comes to telling the story. It is taken as an specific object of study the ‘webdoc’ conducted by the Laboratorio de Radio Televisión Española, whose analysis will provide the main characteristics that allow us to separate the classic format of documentary from the innovative new format whose characteristics are related to the so-called narrative experience for the receiver/user in documentary genre.