La realidad virtual como espacio de memoria: afrofuturismo e identidad racial en The Changing Same (2021).

Beatriz del Caz Pérez; Javier Moral Martín

doi:10.21134/2g6dsk45

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Published: 2026-07-30

DOI: https://doi.org/10.21134/2g6dsk45

Keywords:

afrofuturism, Collective Memory, racial identity, representation, virtual reality, immersive narrative

Beatriz del Caz Pérez

Polytechnic University of Valencia

Javier Moral Martín

Abstract

The need for self-representation within the African American community has found in virtual reality a new narrative territory. This article analyses how The Changing Same: The Dilemma (Stephenson, Brewster and Elayat, 2021) articulates that need through the parameters of Afrofuturism, building a timeless narrative of Blackness that replaces chronological time with metaphorical time. Through film analysis, the article examines how the experience overlaps past, present and future to connect modern contexts of police hypervigilance and mass incarceration with slavery, activating in the user an exercise in perspective-taking. The figure of Harriet, embodiment of the future, and the moral dilemma posed by Lamar function as narrative axes that directly address the user, turning them into an interpretive subject of history. The experience seeks to give value to silenced stories while reimagining them from a contemporary Black perspective, with the aim of building a collective identity free from the fractures of the racial past.

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Issue

Vol. 17 (2026)

Section

MON. Paisajes mutantes: prácticas, estéticas y representación en la cultura audiovisual contemporánea

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Author Biographies

Beatriz del Caz Pérez, Polytechnic University of Valencia

Beatriz del Caz Pérez es doctora en Comunicación Audiovisual por la Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV). Su investigación se sitúa en la intersección entre las narrativas audiovisuales inmersivas y la comunicación para el cambio social. Ha centrado buena parte de su trabajo en el estudio de experiencias de realidad virtual con impacto social, así como en el análisis de sus estrategias narrativas y su recepción por parte de los usuarios. Ha publicado en revistas como Fotocinema, Fonseca: Journal of Communication e IC Journal.

Javier Moral Martín

Javier Moral Martín es profesor titular en la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia. Ha participado en varios proyectos de investigación nacionales y autonómicos, y realizado dos estancias de investigación en el extranjero. Ha publicado varios libros sobre cine (entre ellos La representación doble, Bellaterra, 2013, y Lola Montes, Octaedro, 2015), co-editado otros tantos (entre ellos Cine y géneros pictóricos, MUVIM, 2009, Javier Maqua: más que un cineasta, Shangrila, 2016; Cine y Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible, Tirant Editorial, 2024), participado en una veintena de libros colectivos nacionales e internacionales (entre ellos, Directory of World Cinema: Spain, Intellect, 2011 y (Re)viewing Creative, Critical and Commercial Practices in Contemporary Spanish Cinema, Intellect, 2014; Furia española. Vida, obra, opiniones y milagros de Luis García Berlanga (1921-2010), Filmoteca Valencia, 2021), y escrito numerosos artículos en revistas científicas de alto impacto sobre cine y arte (entre ellos Archivos de la Filmoteca, L’Atalante, Fonseca, Journal of Communication, Fotocinema, Continuum).

How to Cite

del Caz Pérez, B., & Moral Martín, J. (2026). Virtual Reality as a Space of Memory: Afrofuturism and Racial Identity in The Changing Same (2021). Miguel Hernandez Communication Journal, 17, 363-380. https://doi.org/10.21134/2g6dsk45

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