Havana in full color. Representations of the city in contemporary Cuban soap opera

Abstract

This article aims to describe representations of the city of Havana through three contemporary Cuban soap operas. The fundamental lines that have been developed to study the relationship between communication and the city are identified and some theoretical perspectives for the analysis of the representations of the city in fiction are recovered. The analysis is based on categories such as the use of geosymbols and urban landscapes, urban zones visually represented and heterotopias as resources to represent the city in soap operas. The results show that, in spite of the attempts of soap operas to reflect the social diversity and the emergent conflicts in Cuba’s contemporary society, prevails a trend to construct a normalized, optimistic and positive representation of the city.