The collaborative dimension in independent magazines
This master's thesis project stems from a personal interest in investigating how collaboration, interdisciplinarity, and participation relate to independent magazines. Through a rigorous research method and the analysis of six case studies, I identified different theoretical models of collaboration in the publishing field of independent journals, highlighting a trend away from the print artifact toward other forms of audience engagement.
ABSTRACT
The thesis investigates the contemporary independent publishing scenario, with the intention of detecting an evolution in publishing practices towards an increasing collaboration and interaction with the community of their readers. The need for independent magazines to face the complexity of modern times translates into the design of complex publishing systems that relate to the external environment and find in collaboration an important ally, which can affect the quality of the project. This assumption made possible to bring out that, if it is considered as an ecosystem in its complexity, the magazine becomes the instrument of interaction between the subjects participating in it. The aim of the thesis was to categorise the existing modes of collaboration in the independent publishing, both in the design phase and in the cultural dissemination time following the publication.
Through the collection and analysis of several case studies, models of collaboration were distinguished on the basis of the materiality and immateriality of the artefact and the space in which the interaction with audience takes place. This research, therefore, highlights how independent magazines are increasingly expanding beyond their physical presence, towards practices that occupy dimensions such as space–temporality, with the aim of engaging stakeholders in the subject matter in order to provide critical, non–stereotypical, decolonising narratives.
2022 — Politecnico di Milano
Master's Thesis in Communication Design
SUPERVISOR
Prof. Elena Caratti
Master's Thesis in Communication Design
SUPERVISOR
Prof. Elena Caratti