The soap opera and daily life

Abstract

Research projects carried out on the reception of cultural goods usually tend to concentrate on audience interpretations of discourse, without considering their relation with the daily social practices, from which they may not be dissociated. In the case of the soap operas, this focus gains even greater importance due to the textual characteristics of the genre itself, which makes itself adequate, very efficiently, to these daily routines. In other words, soap operas cannot be seen only as texts, rather, essentially, as social practices that insert themselves in the audience's daily life. The intention is, therefore, to show that the research carried out in the area must analyze the specific character of the genre and of the medium it circulates in. These matters must be included in any reflection on the interaction between cultural products and society.