In this study, we have analyzed Warner Bros. Games communication regarding their recently published video game, Hogwarts Legacy, in relation to the controversial backlash the author of the fictional universe, J.K. Rowling, has received. We have arrived at two research questions to study the subject: What discourse can we identify that has been formed through the excerpts we’ve found from Warner Bros. Games external communication, about and in Hogwarts Legacy regarding the controversies that have circulated the game? and How does this discourse illustrate Warner Bros. Games’ external communicative management of the situation, and how can we interpret this from a critical perspective? Our study is based mainly on Faircloughs (1989) three-dimensional model within the Critical Discourse Analysis tradition, with help from Beck (1997) and his theories on the modern society with his term sub-politics. We have used these frameworks to analyze a total of seven artifacts from Warner Bros. Games and their related organizations. Our collected material has been limited, but our results we’ve gathered from it show that the communication of Warner Bros. Games and their related organizations within the same brand has been ambiguous and tentative. This leads to a series of problems, both ethically, for those affected by the situation, and operationally, for Warner Bros. Games as an organization. Our study contributes to the field of organizational communication by showing an example of how affected modern organizations are by their surroundings, including parts that do not directly relate to their operations. It also demonstrates the influential position individual celebrities carry over certain brands and organizations, which can result in critical issues. More research is required on the subject, to help us understand the phenomena and give us tools to work with them. Hopefully, our study is an example of such research.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-513033 |
| Date | January 2023 |
| Creators | Rudfeldt, Viktor, Lerpold Torgander, Noah |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Institutionen för informatik och media |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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