Daenerys Targaryen Will Save Spain: Game of Thrones, Politics and the Public Sphere Articles uri icon

publication date

  • January 2019

start page

  • 423

end page

  • 442

issue

  • 5

volume

  • 20

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 1527-4764

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1552-8316

abstract

  • This article deals with the use of the American television series Game of Thrones (HBO: 2011-) as part of the political discourse of the emerging political party Podemos in Spain. First, we focus on Podemos leader, Pablo Iglesias, who, in 2014, edited a book devoted to analyzing this series from a political science viewpoint. We then move on to study ideologically charged symbolic gestures and the detailed analysis of the parallelisms between Daenerys Targaryen¿s revolutionary enterprise and Podemos¿s bottom-to-top quest to seize power. We then scrutinize how emergent political forces that threaten the enduring hegemony of traditional parties use popular cultural artifacts to intervene in the social fabric and how they attempt to tune in with the Internet-dedicated, socially networked younger classes. This article, thus, analyzes how the relationship between politics and serialized TV fiction has morphed within the Spanish mediascape, paying special attention to the impact of participatory culture.

subjects

  • Information Science

keywords

  • podemos; pablo iglesias; television & politics; television fiction; participatory culture; game of thrones