1In Chile, social discourse is seen in the telenovela (Santa Cruz, 2003; Amigo et al, 2014), particularly in period and historical ones, as according to the literature it allows the inclusion of present controversial discourses that seem distant from the moment in which we live. This distance of time allows to encompass the national present and current issues, in a fictionalized history (Rodríguez Cadena, 2014).

2Thus is the case with the period telenovela, a sub format of the genre similar to the historical telenovela, which offers a unique platform for intertwining modern national historical discourse with television melodrama (Charlois, 2011). However, present period pieces are used to highlight difficult news and relevant motifs in current affairs but seen from the past. That is to say, although it has always been sustained that period telenovelas includes current themes, where the past refers to the present, today it is the present that refers to the past with themes that continue to this day.

3This paper aims to understand this phenomenon. Based on semi-structured interviews to head scriptwriters of period telenovelas, elements of national current affairs present in the discourse of the period telenovela were analyzed. Through content analysis of Yo soy Lorenzo (2019) and Hijos del Desierto (2022), the issues seen and raised by the scriptwriters were correlated with current events at a peak moment of social mobilizations resulting from the precariousness, inequalities and injustices experienced in the country for decades, as the presentation of said current affairs in telenovelas helps educate the citizens on such matters (Fuenzalida, 1996).

Theoretical framework

5This theoretical section includes what was proposed by Rosenstone (2013), when considering that audiovisual products can serve as historical sources to understand the past, since they provide other types of information (landscapes, sounds, physical expressions, etc.), at the same time that help think about the ways in which people relate to individual and social history, and the importance of fiction in the sociocultural framework. The works on Chilean television series (Antezana, 2020; Faure, 2020; and Santa Cruz & Lagos, 2021, to name a few), on cinema (Bossay, 2010; Stange et al, 2018, for example) and on telenovelas (Mujica, 2006; 2007) serve as a reference when carrying out this studio.

6To begin with, one must understand that the concept of fiction is understood as the materialization of an alternative regarding stories, affects or crises that occurred in the recent history of the country, and that their traces and consequences are still recognizable to this day. Fiction is, then, the process of constructing

The perceptible and thinkable forms of a common world, determining the situations and the actors in those situations, identifying events, establishing links of coexistence or succession between them and giving these ties the modality of the possible, the real or the necessary (Rancière, 2019: 14).

7Accordingly, we declare that fiction and reality do not function as antonyms, but rather that the former draws inspiration from the latter (Aumont, 2016) for the construction of a televised melodrama that constitutes links between «the private and the public, between information and emotion, between the fictitious and the 'real', between registration and creation» (Feld & Stites Mor, 2009), considering all the audiovisual codes that compose it (Casetti & Di Chio, 1999).

8Thus, the correlation between fiction and historical reality allows us to develop the concept of historiophoty, defined as «the representation of history and our thinking about it in visual images and filmic discourse» (White, 2010: 217). Although the critics could place the telenovela, and any other audiovisual format, as a device «poor in information» (Marín, 2013: 11), here we consider they are a way of thinking about events and people of the past, giving meaning to the present (Rosenstone, 2013), giving the audience other types of information that can help the process of construction of history and memory.

10Due to its approach anchored in the narration of a melodramatic story structured in the past, contingent situations, when included in the telenovela from a past perspective, seem distant from the moment in which it is lived, which allows the incorporation of current issues into the national history (Rodríguez Cadena, 2014).

Methodology

11The period telenovela has stood out for fostering a sense of collective memory and historical awareness with its audience, which is relevant in societies where national history has been subjected to political manipulation or revisionism. By narrating current historical events in a fictional format, the period telenovela offers an alternative way to engage with the present, which may resonate more with audiences than academic or historical accounts, educating on diverse issues (Fuenzalida 1996). In this case, since 2019, with the social outbreak in Chile, multiple movements made clear the pending issues for Chileans, in a process that culminated in a proposal for a new Constitution in 2022. However, can we say that these themes and situations at a national level were transferred to fiction? More importantly, how did Chilean screenwriters fictionalize the country's themes in the period telenovela?

12Our general objective, then, is to analyze the social discourse present in the 2019 and 2022 period telenovelas and compare it with the discourse of their creators, bearing the following research questions in mind: What are the social issues and problems present in the telenovelas of the post-social outbreak period? How do these themes relate to the historical context of the period telenovela? How do the creators of these fictions justify their thematic and narrative choices? Have screenwriters fictionalized the country's themes in Chile since the social outbreak?

14Interviews were transcribed in their entirety and translated by the authors. The same type of analysis carried out by Grassau et al. (2020) was followed, using an axial coding matrix that combined inductive and deductive thinking to analyze the data. This matrix began with a primary classification based on a series of questions, and new categories and subcategories, as well as connections between them, were subsequently generated. The key elements of the matrix included political themes within the telenovelas and intermediate categories were identified, such as gender and feminism, homosexuality, health, and childhood. Content analysis of the telenovelas focused on narrative, making a hermeneutic interpretation and correlating dimensions of social issues mentioned by their creators. The concepts from the theoretical framework were considered to analyze the discourse of the scriptwriters, and also to reflect on the issues addressed by each telenovela.

Table 1: Interviewees

Screenwriter	Gender	Experience in period telenovelas	Telenovela	Summary
Daniella Castagno	Female	Scriptwriter of Hippie (2004), set in the 60's. Yo soy Lorenzo is her second period telenovela.	Yo soy Lorenzo	Lorenzo, the son of a family in the midst of an economic crisis, is instigated to conquer Laura, a wealthy heir. However, Lorenzo confesses to his driver, Carlos, that he is homosexual. They exchange identities, expecting Laura to hate Carlos so Lorenzo can go back to his family saying the match was a failure. Things go awry when Carlos falls in love with Laura.
Rodrigo Cuevas	Male	Scriptwriter of both period and historical series, Hijos del Desierto is his second period telenovela, after Hippie (2004).	Hijos del Desierto	After the Massacre of the Santa María School in Iquique in the north of Chile in 1907, brothers Pedro and Manuel are separated: Manuel is adopted by a Navy officer, while Pedro grows up in Valparaiso after fleeing from a children's orphanage. Thirty years later, they meet again unknowing their parentage, facing each other as a detective and leader of a criminal gang as well as fighting for the love of the same woman, Eloísa.

15The corpus of analysis consisted of the first fifteen episodes of the telenovela, fifteen of the middle and the final fifteen, correlating the discourse of the scriptwriters with the telenovela itself to elucidate and contrast the social discourse proposed by the creators and the one seen in fiction.

Results and discussion

16The period telenovela can be a means to interpret and discuss the social and political changes that are occurring in the country. According to Cuevas, it helps «to think, to reflect on our present (...) It allows us to take some distance from the phenomena, from the facts, and one can aspire to a greater degree of reflection than when the facts are in front of our noses» (Cuevas, 2023). Castagno points out something similar, however, she goes one step further indicating that:

Fiction is always a contribution to think, to reflect, to have conversations as a family, and especially to put issues on the table, to set up discussions or to have some reply or allusion where someone who feels identified can say "what a horror what happened, today similar things happen". That is where we try to reach people the most, to make the conversations and topics we deal with reach homes, go beyond the screen and settle in families.

17Continuing with the same idea, although both screenwriters agree that the period telenovela invites reflection on issues of the present and puts in tension issues that continue to happen today, Castagno differs on the role of the latter. For Cuevas, telenovelas themselves have a vocation to fulfill a social and cultural role because they are broadcast on open television, which in Chile «was given to the University, that is, it had a strong component that television had to help the cultural development of peoples, of countries» (Cuevas, 2023). On the other hand, for Castagno:

Fundamentally, telenovelas are love stories. (...) I don't think I have any role or obligation or anything. The only thing fiction has is the obligation to entertain (...) We have no social, political or cultural responsibilities. Now, if we can be a contribution, on some topic and at some point, of course one incorporates it into the writing (...) but as long as that issue crosses the story you're telling, not in a pamphleteering way.

18Given this, we can assert that telenovelas are constructed in diverse ways and consistently invite reflection. Yet their uses or potentialities differ. The various perspectives of our interviewees should not be seen as a mere juxtaposition of views on the same subject; instead, they can be considered complementary parts connected to the complexity within which telenovelas are immersed, which highlight the importance of context and opportunities presented by telenovelas. We refer to Cuevas' viewpoint as the "authorial perspective" and to Castagno's as the "experiential perspective." The first emphasizes the role of the audiovisual proposal developed through the telenovela, with its power arising from the creators who shape and guide the story, while the latter focuses on the telenovela's power but from a different angle, suggesting that its influence extends beyond mere viewing, sparking conversations and dialogues among audiences. Thus, while the authorial perspective finds strength in the telenovela itself, the experiential perspective finds it in what audiences do with it. What unites both perspectives is their operation within the context in which they exist, where the cultural, media, and individual environment allows these different perspectives to intertwine.

19We have said that fiction is not the creation of false worlds, but an alternative creation that can be made on reality in a narrative and melodramatic key. In addition, the discourse on the past, from the audiovisual perspective, helps us to understand the readings that are made from the present about a society. Fiction with its creation of stories inspired by life itself, such as historiophoty and its audiovisual reading of the past, come together through the attitude they adopt when facing both associated poles. This union gives way to the contemporary. Hence, we propose to talk about a contemporary historiophoty, since period telenovelas take up certain issues and historical themes of the country, however, they do not do this to demonstrate how the events were or to propose a certain historical rigor when creating audiovisual fiction. After analyzing both telenovelas and the interviews, we conclude that this type of audiovisual fictions make discourses appear in a process of identification with the audience, which can be generated while it is questioned.

20From the notion of contemporary historiophoty, the telenovela story is analyzed to recognize the reading that is made of the present from the past, to analyze the lights and shadows of our time. In other words, the audiovisual fiction of the telenovela materializes the country's historical political and cultural disputes that were strongly exposed in the media arena during the social outbreak, since it was there that civil society overflowed into the streets. Both telenovelas allow a historical approach to the political contingency of the country throughout its history. It is as if telenovelas, deliberately or not, were transformed into a memorial device of the present time, of that time that passes today, but it is necessary to put it in tension through period fiction, which sets their plots in the past.

21Fiction and its relationship with reality is not achieved deliberately, according to Castagno; rather it is done, as we said, from an experiential logic of the audience, since identification with what is reported in fiction is sought. For her, in Yo soy Lorenzo:

We didn’t think of making a nod to current affairs, or to the social uprise, far from it. What we wanted was to represent an era. [the 60’s] (…) There was at that time a global, universal explosion, so that's why we also wanted the era to be represented by our characters. The truth is that it was never an intention to use the current reality.

22Nevertheless, current issues permeated Yo soy Lorenzo. As the social outbreak in Chile put in the spotlight different types of violence and the struggle for different rights for society, culminating in an unprecedented excessive use of force and violence by the police, in Yo soy Lorenzo, the characters marched against the corrupt mayor, protesting his homophobia and abuse of power. The march culminated in a violent crackdown by the police.

23Contrary to what was stated by Castagno, Cuevas indicates that:

What was deliberate from the beginning was something a little more general, more global. That was to feel that the decade of the 30s in the world and in Chile saw certain social and political processes. (...) And the feeling that what happened in the world in the 1930s is being repeated again today. (…) More than scenes or speeches, there is a background theme that resembles these two eras, which links them.

24Several politicians claimed that many of those protesting were aggressive criminals who killed, looted, and burned local businesses in the city. In Hijos del Desierto, Governor Cárdenas repeated a present speech by Deputy Gaspar Rivas Sánchez, of the extreme right, who gave a press conference condemning the protests and the social outburst, arguing that they were really the «scum and scourges of society». The speech was said in its entirety by Cárdenas, without changing anything. This way, it is clear that for Cuevas there is an intertwined with the problems of the past that are present to this day. The audiovisual image of the telenovelas works for Cuevas uniting two different times. The telenovela folds upon itself the present that it has to inhabit, with the past that shaped today's social problems. The screenwriter adds that:

The greatest similarity one can find between the time of our telenovela and the present is the precariousness of childhood, of helpless childhood (...) It turns out that 100 years later, when we think we have overcome many of these things, we find ourselves again with the scandalous situation of the children of SENAME.

25Since 2019, the National Service for Minors (SENAME) has been under scrutiny for 4500 complaints of abuse, in addition to the fact that the organization's homes were at their limit or overcrowded, while a PDI report on abuse in the institution was hidden. In Hijos del Desierto the kick-off is the orphanhood of two brothers and a boy who is left adrift, being part of mistreatment and abuse. Yo soy Lorenzo showed the precariousness of the system through the story of Diego, a street boy who found a family, but could not be adopted because the organization did not allow it, forcing him to return to the orphanage, from where he escaped repeatedly. Though, Castagno notes that «If things have changed a little, a lot, or not at all, it has nothing to do with us. Homosexuality, for example, is an issue to this day, unfortunately, when it should be overcome» (Castagno, 2023).

26In both telenovelas, the theme of homophobia was touched, but in more depth in Yo soy Lorenzo since the protagonist was homosexual and suffered the consequences of his sexual orientation with discrimination and rejection. Hijos del Desierto included a homosexual character, Alberto "Beto" Pirandelli, owner of a cabaret, who, although he did not have a particular dramatic arc, suffered abuse from the villain.

27Both screenwriters highlight that there are transversal problems that remain to this day. For example, the issue of gender equality was raised as vital after the social outbreak in Chile, in addition to various health issues. This is seen in the telenovelas: Eloísa González, the female protagonist of Hijos del Desierto, alluded to Eloísa Díaz Insunza, the first female surgeon in Chile and Latin America. Eloísa is a woman in a man's world who confronts machismo by challenging the stereotypes of local society with her progressive ideas. On the other hand, Yo soy Lorenzo presents Nancy, a feminist girl who rebels against the established norms of the 60's, and who ends up adopting two children when she cannot get pregnant, touching on the issue of precariousness and little coverage in fertility treatments.

28Thus, the period telenovela does not have a relationship with the present where fiction copies reality but is an inspiration and a reading of it. Today's reality appears in the period telenovela because they are social issues that have not yet been resolved. The course of history has been marked by problems that are considered timeless, since they have survived their time until reaching our time. As such, both telenovelas were deliberately told in a specific historical moment, and for both screenwriters it is the era that defines the issues. However, while Cuevas takes an issue that can be easily generalized, Castagno takes subjective aspects that can, in the same way, be generalized to the rest of society. Thus, between both interviewees we can say that the period telenovela allows for a macrosociology -of the social- and a micro-sociology -of affects- as was elucidated after the viewing of both telenovelas where the past refers to the present, but not deliberately, but from what is happening within the narrated era.

29Consequently, it is not that the present is carried into the past; it is the past that approach itself to the present. The period telenovela's reading of the time it is set in (the 60’s in Yo soy Lorenzo and the 30’s in Hijos del Desierto) shadows the time in which it was created, produced and broadcast; Therefore, we consider that the period telenovela has a view from «the contemporary». The «contemporary» is not the fact of living in the same time frame with other people or things but refers to «a singular relationship with one's own time, which adheres to it and, at the same time, takes its distance» (Agamben, 2011: 18-19). The contemporary proposes to have «the gaze fixed on its time, to perceive, not its lights, but its darkness» (Agamben, 2011: 21), appropriating history and installing it on the screen through fiction, in order to be able to question, analyze and reflect on reality (Urrutia Neno & Sánchez Sepúlveda, 2023).

30The act of putting tension in our current situation, which has become conflictive as a result of past problems, must be, at all times, a collective exercise (as Castagno points out), since what appears to be most relevant is not the mere fact of identifying that something is wrong on the audience’s part, but that the problems are social and, consequently, their solutions must appeal to the same.

31Finally, we consider it important to point out that the melodramatic genre and the telenovela as a fundamental device for exposing fictional melodrama, can be understood as a culturally mode of communication, since it is capable of televisualizing the human condition in its different facets and everyday areas of history, such as discrimination based on gender or sexual identity, the precariousness of children and adolescents, as well as the struggle of social classes to modify the status quo.

Conclusion

32It has been suggested that in the period telenovela the past refers to the present, however, this study sheds light on how the present refers to the past with issues sustained to this day. The stories themselves can figure the past, written from the present, but anchored in the social reality of the time the fictional history is embedded in. The viewing shows that in Yo Soy Lorenzo a specific social upheaval is represented, as well as mayoral elections, gender and health issues, the theme of helpless children and situations of violence/protest, which is similar to what happens in Children of the Desert. It is concluded that the period telenovela allows us to reflect and question the present from the lens of the past because they are themes that have never ceased to exist. To this end, we propose the concept of contemporary historiophoty, thought of as the reading of the past from an audiovisual discourse that questions the present from the past (the era in which the telenovela is set). Thus, fiction becomes a dialectical space because it unites two different epochs, based on the audiovisual image. These stories come from reality, but in a development where the past history of our country refers to today's Chile.