Body and senses in the production of cultural meaning: from Middle Ages to TV series, films and video games

In  medieval  times,  the  literary  nature  of  the  works,  including  written  ones,  were  determined  by  contextual  elements  such  as  the  acoustic  and  momentary channel of communication along with the domain of gestur-al, instrumental and vocal codes. These elements conditioned writers and performers when they improved and perfected their capacities and perfor-mance, on which the message as a whole depended. Today the media and entertainment  industry  also  use  complex  and  rich  connections  between  verbal and visual signs to produce highly symbolic messages through im-aginary re-enactments of the past. The wide range of discursive productions of the Middle Ages can be ana-lysed through the study of the elements and factors that become carriers of meanings and the way in which they do so. We consider that a comparable perspective is also suitable for contemporary semiotic practices that, when interpreting documentary sources of various types and incorporating them into suitable fictional formats for the general public, constitute playful re-configurations of the historical, literary and fantastic Middle Ages. Accordingly,  this  paper  attempts  to  examine  certain  components  of  mass  culture  which  have  transformed  narratives,  characters  and  fictional  worlds,  distinctive  of  the  Middle  Ages,  into  communicative  and  semiotic  practices reinterpreting historical and literary texts as a way of reflecting on people, social life and its problems in the present world. It starts from con-sidering  that  semantic  plurality  and  diachronic  bases  of  the  idea  of  body  and senses enable an interdisciplinary and comparative study, in order to understand  their  historicity,  their  ideological  effect  and  the  innumerable  aesthetic possibilities which they promote in different areas of culture. The reflections take into account the bodily and sensory aspects of the Middle Ages selected by series, films and video games with an impact, as signifi-cant elements, on current cultural orientations and attitudes.