The group is structured around the research and study of the non-human animal in European and North American literature, as well as in different visual media (cinema, theatre, television, photography, painting, sculpture, etc.), with the aim of advancing in the field of (Critical) Animal Studies which, especially in the Anglo-Saxon sphere, have re-oriented both the philosophical conceptualisation of the animal and the interpretative mechanisms suggested by its aesthetic representation as otherness.

Taking as a starting point the most recent philosophical and scientific theories related to animal subjectivity (from studies of consciousness and sentience to the ethical consequences that derive in legislation and/or regulations on animal welfare, or the also derived principles of animal rights and animal liberation), the aim is to study and compare how the works of certain authors, artists and other types of creators can offer an aesthetic treatment that questions anthropocentric parameters, while responding to current concerns about animal nature. This largely revisionist treatment allows us to further explore the semiotics that intertwine the literary and visual cultures of different nations with the ethical conceptualisation of the animal as a subject-of-a-life that, beyond the more traditional and historically rooted allegorical systems to which it has been subjected, questions the conceptual and artistic boundaries between species, within the framework of the "animal turn" in the age of the anthropocene.

The group's research activity focuses on the analysis of creative industries and cultural markets from a multidisciplinary and transversal perspective that combines theories, principles and tools from economics, sociology, management, marketing and finance. This approach addresses the main effects of technological change, both on supply and demand, in a scenario that has allowed the emergence of new cultural markets. Thus, digitalisation has meant a reduction in the fixed costs of production, distribution and promotion for industry, leading to innovations in processes or products and services. In reference to consumers, we find, among other things, a change in consumer habits, with the reduction of costs in the search for and discovery of new products and services, and the breaking down of barriers to participation.

Specifically, the aim is to analyse both qualitatively and quantitatively the impact that social changes (diversity and democratisation) and technological changes (acceleration of the digitalisation of content) have had on the different agents that intervene in the different cultural markets. In this sense, the scope of the study contemplates analysis both on a sectoral level (music, audiovisual, video games, performing and plastic arts) and from a more aggregated perspective.

The members of the group have extensive research experience in the field of economics and management of culture, creative industries and the arts. In this context, they have developed research focused on analysing the use of ICTs and cultural participation, the extension of audiences and the new business models that have emerged as a result of technological change. In addition, some members of the team are linked to different academic associations as members of their scientific committees: International Association of Arts and Cultural Management, AIMAC, Montreal; International Music Business Research Association, IMBRA, Vienna; Workshop on Cultural Economics and Management, WCEM, Seville. At the same time, they have actively participated in the transfer of research results through the signing of numerous agreements and contracts with entities linked to the creative, cultural and social sector. Finally, some of the members of this team belonged to a group already registered in the Office for the Transfer of Research Results (OTRI) of the Universitat de València.

Culture as a resource for development. Practices, discourses and representations in contemporary modernising processes. The relationship between culture and the processes and imaginaries of development is a crucial element for the design of new policies, particularly those referring to the cultural and educational spheres, both in the countries of the North and the South. Traditionally, the concept of "development" has been associated with a predominantly economic and growth-related dimension. But the decision of the United Nations to adopt the Human Development Approach proposed by Amartya Sen has designed a new political landscape in which the income component is displaced as the main indicator of development, in favour of a reading of well-being that goes beyond economic growth. In this context, it is pertinent to ask ourselves about the value of culture in times of globalisation, in its two dimensions: as an articulating axis of resistance to the hegemonic discourses on the development model promulgated by some of the main international organisations, and as a product traversed by the market in the process of economic globalisation. Is it possible to think about "development" on the basis of a field (culture) which is problematic in its scientific status, its particular productivity and its dubious innovation? In this context, what deserves consideration, what has always constituted the object of study of the field of the Humanities? How to analyse, from this field, the artistic productions that promote certain representations of "development"? Undoubtedly, the cultural sphere has become a privileged place for representing development processes, giving them intelligibility and projecting social meanings onto them. It is therefore necessary to review the nature of these representations, as well as to analyse and historicise the place given to culture in the institutional design of development strategies and plans, in order to redefine the way in which artistic productions contribute to these processes and the most appropriate way to approach them.

The research group works on the dialogue between the different representative arts and literature through the semiotic and cultural transmission of literary topoi from and towards the Anglo-Saxon tradition. The group’s research focuses on the study of different cultural practices from the perspective of intertextuality, intermediality, semiotics, reception and adaptation. The period of study covers from the Middle Ages to the present day, with an exhaustive analysis of the creation map, transmission and influence of cultural, artistic and literary heritage in the Anglo-Saxon tradition. The group also works on investigating the impact of the objects of cultural consumption considered in contemporary societies. To this end, it carries out advisory and consultancy work for cultural agents, companies related to the performing arts, film, television and digital industries, as well as companies in the publishing industry and cultural centres interested in the production, conservation, teaching and dissemination of cultural products related to or originating from the Anglo-Saxon tradition.

Literary texts and media artefacts are particular spaces for the representation and study of violence as a micro-phenomenon. Research on the subject of violence in different fields of knowledge, such as sociology, philosophy and history, has focused on macro-violence phenomena such as war, terror or torture, and has contributed to the definition of violence as a crucial dimension of Modernity (and post-modernity). Research in the field of philology allows us to take up the definitions of other fields of research and explore the deadlocks, the ambivalent aspects, the implosive manifestations in order to come to represent a new complexity of the phenomenon of violence.

Our studies will focus on a series of research problems derived from a reconceptualisation of the phenomenon of violence from the point of view of literary and artistic discourse. The starting point, from German philology, is to contribute to the study of the phenomenon of violence in general to a specific approach to history (largely common throughout Europe), marked by a period of fascism and dictatorship in Germany, Portugal, Spain and Italy in the 20th century.

The innovative potential of our research lies in the exploration of intertwinings, interdependencies, interconnections and modes of naming and exposing practices of violence present in different literary discourses, and is thus a crucial starting point for the analysis of the complexities related to this particular topic. Recent research shows that literary texts have the capacity to integrate and discuss microviolence, present in various aesthetic manifestations, language, everyday life and privacy, as well as macroviolence, present, for example, in epic narratives about war and violent conflict, and to create a connection between these two categories. Therefore, the different perceptions of violence in literary discourses will be studied as a mode of knowledge production reflecting certain hidden dynamics, especially in the field of German literature and cultural studies.

The aims of the group can be summarised as follows: 

• to articulate dimensions of violence revealed in literary texts that have not yet been recognised as such; 
• to analyse the inherent ambivalences of the social production of violence as it can be perceived in texts; 
• question the established dichotomy between victim and executioner; 
• to raise the question of whether the predominance of certain narrative discourses idealises and legitimises certain ideological contexts, i.e. contributes to a naturalisation of violence.

Study of the reception of classical literatures, including their late periods, cf. both Greek and Latin Christian literature, medieval Latin literature, Byzantine literature, Renaissance and humanistic literature, to national literatures.