Blurring the Line Between Fiction and Reality. Functional Transmedia Storytelling in the German TV Series ABOUT:KATE

Amelie Zimmermann, Mediarep.Org
2021 Image  
New technological innovations offer a range of possibilities not only to tell a story via a single medium, but also to expand the diegetic world of the story via diverse devices. This leads to an expanded story universe (i.e., hyperdiegesis), not only confronting the recipients when they use the story's core medium but also accompanying them in their daily life when using social networks or reading newspapers. This article takes into account the existing definitions of transmedia phenomena and
more » ... heir structures in order to suggest a theoretical approach that uses semiotic and structuralist models applicable not only to individual texts but also to their interdependent constructions. These models are then applied to the ARTE production About:Kate (2013). Here, the transmedial way of telling the story (›discours‹) is functional for the content of the series (›histoire‹) and the communication of its overall semantic meaning.
doi:10.25969/mediarep/16488 fatcat:pyqvwckf7zdszcmvom2euyylf4