Cultural Journalism and the webreview of the XXI century, innovation or tradition?

Abstract

With a view that contemplates the social and historical configurations around approximations and intercommunicability (Lajolo; Zilberman, 1996) between Journalism and Literature, in spaces constituted by Cultural Journalism (Hohlfeldt, 2003; Lima, 2013; Soares, 2014), we trace the questioning of this reflection. We focus on characterizing historical stages experienced by literary supplements and webreviews, from the nineteenth century to the twenty-first century. We used as a methodology the exploratory investigation, of a historical-critical-bibliographic nature, in a qualitative and content analysis (Herscovitz, 2012; Bardin, 1977). Our reflections are centered on six editions (Krippendorff, 1990) of the webreview ”Electric Fish”. We were inspired by the particularities to identify the trends of Cultural Journalism in the 21st century. It evolved from the supplement, which sought a broad but indistinct audience, because it was published in reference newspapers, to specific publications, directed to the interested party. Despite the changes in support and the modernization of the media, with regard to technological devices, over fifty years, the supplements continue basically with the same format. Considering the impact of technological changes on reader behaviors and modes of production of digital journalism, the type of content proposed and the division of editorials of Cultural Journalism had only changes in support – from print to digital, and in layout. Peixe Elétrico does not have the characteristics of cyberjournalism, so we see a tendency to maintain the style of doing Cultural Journalism in Brazil.