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Hakikat, İktidar ve Beden: Heretic (2024) Filminin Sosyolojik Bir Çözümlemesi

Year 2025, Volume: 8 Issue: 2, 499 - 521, 31.12.2025
https://doi.org/10.47951/mediad.1789894

Abstract

Bu makale Heretic (2024) filmini, post-truth çağda hakikat, inanç ve iktidar ilişkilerinin yeniden üretimi bağlamında sosyolojik olarak incelemektedir. Çalışmada Foucault’nun hükümet etme ve hakikat rejimleri yaklaşımı, Butler’ın toplumsal cinsiyetin performatifliği ve Baudrillard’ın hipergerçeklik kavramı bir araya getirilerek filmdeki temsil biçimleri çözümlenmiştir. Nitel söylem analizi ve sahne-temelli tematik kodlama yöntemi kullanılmış, bulgular dört eksende toplanmıştır: (1) dinsel söylemler bir iktidar teknolojisi olarak kurgulanmakta, (2) hakikat, simülasyon ve temsiller üzerinden askıya alınmakta, (3) kadın bedeni disiplin ve kontrol pratikleriyle yönetilmekte, (4) etik direniş ise kolektif özneleşme ve ötekine yönelim üzerinden şekillenmektedir. Sonuç olarak Heretic, yalnızca bir gerilim filmi değil, post-truth çağda hakikatin kırılganlığını, bedensel siyaseti ve etik özneleşmenin imkânlarını açığa çıkaran bir kültürel metin olarak değerlendirilmelidir. Çalışmanın önemi, sinema ile medya sosyolojisi alanlarına sağladığı kuramsal ve analitik katkıda ortaya çıkmaktadır.

References

  • Adorno, T. W., & Horkheimer, M. (2002). Dialectic of enlightenment: Philosophical fragments. Stanford University Press.
  • Althusser, L. (1971). Ideology and ideological state apparatuses. In Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays (pp. 85-126). Monthly Review Press.
  • Arın, E. K. (2020). İdeoloji ve ideolojik eleştiri paradoksunda sinema. Ege Üniversitesi İletişim Fakültesi Medya ve İletişim Araştırmaları Hakemli E-Dergisi, 6, 70-90.
  • Aytekin, M. (2018). Sinemada söylem ve ideoloji: Samira Makhmalbaf filmleri üzerine bir inceleme. Akdeniz Kadın Çalışmaları ve Toplumsal Cinsiyet Dergisi, 1(1), 59-76.
  • Barthes, R. (1972). Mythologies. Hill and Wang.
  • Bartky, S. L. (2015). Femininity and domination: Studies in the phenomenology of oppression. Routledge.
  • Baudrillard, J. (1994). Simulacra and simulation. University of Michigan Press.
  • Beck, S., & Woods, B. (Direktörler). (2024). Heretic [Video recording]. A24.
  • Bordwell, D., Thompson, K., & Smith, J. (2004). Film art: An introduction (C. 7, s. 479). McGraw-Hill.
  • Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77-101.
  • Burchell, G., Gordon, C., & Miller, P. (1991). Introduction. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon, & P. Miller (Eds.), The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (pp. ix-xxix). University of Chicago Press.
  • Butler, J. (1990). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. Routledge.
  • Butler, J. (1997). The psychic life of power: Theories in subjection. Stanford University Press.
  • Comolli, J. L., & Narboni, J. (2014). Cinema/Ideology/Criticism. In Contemporary Film Theory (pp. 43-52). Routledge.
  • Corner, J. (2011). Theoretical frameworks in media research. Manchester University Press.
  • Couldry, N. (2003). Media rituals: A critical approach. Routledge.
  • Couldry, N. (2012). Media, society, world: Social theory and digital media practice. Polity.
  • Couldry, N., & Hepp, A. (2017). The mediated construction of reality. Polity Press.
  • Cusack, C. M. (2016). Invented religions: Imagination, fiction and faith. Ashgate Publishing.
  • Dean, M. (2010). Governmentality: Power and rule in modern society (2. bs). Sage Publications.
  • Elsaesser, T. (2001). Postmodernism as mourning work. Screen, 42(2).
  • Fairclough, N. (1992). Discourse and social change. Polity.
  • Fairclough, N. (1995). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language. Longman.
  • Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison. Pantheon Books.
  • Foucault, M., Burchell, G., Gordon, C., & Miller, P. (1991). Governmentality. In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (pp. 87-104). University of Chicago Press.
  • Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum.
  • Gill, R. (2007). Gender and the media. Polity Press.
  • Gramsci, A. (1971). Selections from the prison notebooks. International Publishers.
  • Hall, S. (1993). Encoding/decoding. In The Cultural Studies Reader (pp. 90-103). Routledge.
  • Hall, S. (1997). Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices. Sage.
  • Harper, D. (2024). Heretic. https://www.etymonline.com
  • Harsin, J. (2018). Post-truth and critical communication studies. İçinde Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228613.013.757
  • Heise, T. S., & Tudor, A. (2016). For a sociology of the cinema. İçinde The SAGE handbook of cultural sociology (pp. 321-333). Sage.
  • Heretic. (2024). İçinde Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press.
  • Hjarvard, S. (2008). The mediatization of religion: A theory of the media as agents of religious change. Northern Lights: Film & Media Studies Yearbook, 6(1), 9-26.
  • Hoover, S. M. (2006). Religion in the Media Age. Routledge.
  • Hsieh, H.-F., & Shannon, S. E. (2005). Three approaches to qualitative content analysis. Qualitative Health Research, 15(9), 1277-1288.
  • Jameson, F. (1991). Postmodernism, or, the cultural logic of late capitalism. Duke University Press.
  • Kellner, D., & Share, j. (2021). Critical media studies: An introduction (2nd ed.). Routledge.
  • Kracauer, S. (2019). From Caligari to Hitler: A psychological history of the German film. Princeton University Press.
  • Krippendorff, K. (2013). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology (3. bs). Sage.
  • Kuhn, A. (1994). Women’s pictures: Feminism and cinema (2. bs). Verso.
  • Levinas, E. (1998). Otherwise than being or beyond essence. Duquesne University Press.
  • Levitt, H. M. (2018). Journal article reporting standards for qualitative research. American Psychologist, 73(1), 26-46.
  • Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E. G. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Sage.
  • Lister, M., Dovey, J., Giddings, S., Grant, I., & Kelly, K. (2009). New media: A critical introduction (2nd ed.). Routledge.
  • McIntyre, L. (2018). Post-truth. MIT Press.
  • Meyer, B. (2009). Aesthetic Formations: Media, Religion, and the Senses. Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Miles, M. B., Huberman, A. M., & Saldaña, J. (2014). Qualitative data analysis: A methods sourcebook (3. bs). Sage.
  • Mulvey, L. (2006). Visual pleasure and narrative cinema. İçinde Media and cultural studies: Keyworks (pp. 342-352).
  • Nowell, L. S., Norris, J. M., White, D. E., & Moules, N. J. (2017). Thematic analysis: Striving to meet the trustworthiness criteria. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 16, 1-13.
  • Otter.ai. (2024). Otter.ai (Version 3.0) [Computer software] [Software]. Otter.ai. https://otter.ai
  • Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies (4. bs). Sage.
  • Rose, N. (1999). Powers of freedom: Reframing political thought (s. 40). Cambridge University Press.
  • Saldaña, J. (2021). The coding manual for qualitative researchers (4. bs). Sage.
  • Shohat, E., & Stam, R. (2014). Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the media. Routledge.
  • Silverstone, R. (1999). Why study the media? Sage.
  • Thompson, J. B. (1995). The media and modernity: A social theory of the media. Polity Press.
  • Tracy, S. J. (2010). Qualitative quality: Eight “big-tent” criteria for excellent qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10), 837-851.
  • Van Zoonen, L. (1994). Feminist media studies. Sage.
  • Waisbord, S. (2018). Truth is what happens to news: On journalism, fake news, and post-truth. Journalism Studies, 19(13), 1866-1878. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2018.1492881
  • Wayne, M. (2001). Political film: The dialectics of third cinema. Pluto Press.
  • Wejbert-Wąsiewicz, E. (2020). Film and cinema as a subject of sociological study. Between tradition and the present. Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Sociologica, 73, 89-110.
  • Yılmaz, E., Bakır, B., Ünal, Y., & Saliji, S. (2008). Sinema ve ideoloji ilişkileri üzerine. İçinde Sinema İdeoloji Politika. Nirengi Kitap.
  • Žižek, S. (1989). The sublime object of ideology. Verso.
  • Zola, É. (2021). Vérité (Truth). Everest Yayınları.

Truth, Power, and the Body: A Sociological Analysis of Heretic (2024)

Year 2025, Volume: 8 Issue: 2, 499 - 521, 31.12.2025
https://doi.org/10.47951/mediad.1789894

Abstract

This article offers a sociological analysis of Heretic (2024) by examining how the film reproduces relations of truth, belief, and power in the post-truth era. Drawing on Foucault’s concepts of governmentality and truth regimes, Butler’s idea of performativity, and Baudrillard’s notion of hyperreality, the study analyzes the film’s representational strategies. Using qualitative discourse analysis and scene-based thematic coding, the findings are organized around four axes: (1) religious discourses are constructed as technologies of power; (2) truth is suspended through simulation and layers of representation; (3) the female body is governed through disciplinary and control practices; and (4) ethical resistance emerges through collective subjectivity and orientation toward the Other. The study argues that Heretic is not merely a thriller but a cultural text that exposes the fragility of truth, the politics of the body, and the possibilities of ethical subjectivation in a post-truth context. The significance of the study lies in its theoretical and analytical contribution to the fields of cinema and media sociology.
Methodologically, the study employs a critical-interpretive design that combines qualitative discourse analysis, thematic coding, and scene-by-scene transcription. Codes were operationalized with clear inclusion and exclusion criteria, and analytic transparency was maintained in line with JARS-Qual standards. This approach ensures not only theoretical depth but also replicability for future research in media sociology. The findings reveal four central dynamics: (1) religious discourse operates as a technology of power that governs the subject; (2) truth is suspended through simulation and hyperreality, producing aestheticized effects of belief; (3) the female body emerges as a contested site of discipline and resistance; and (4) ethical alternatives are forged through solidarity and orientation toward the Other. Collectively, these insights demonstrate that Heretic functions as more than a thriller: it is a cultural text that exposes the fragility of truth, the politics of embodiment, and the possibilities of ethical subjectivation in the contemporary post-truth landscape.

References

  • Adorno, T. W., & Horkheimer, M. (2002). Dialectic of enlightenment: Philosophical fragments. Stanford University Press.
  • Althusser, L. (1971). Ideology and ideological state apparatuses. In Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays (pp. 85-126). Monthly Review Press.
  • Arın, E. K. (2020). İdeoloji ve ideolojik eleştiri paradoksunda sinema. Ege Üniversitesi İletişim Fakültesi Medya ve İletişim Araştırmaları Hakemli E-Dergisi, 6, 70-90.
  • Aytekin, M. (2018). Sinemada söylem ve ideoloji: Samira Makhmalbaf filmleri üzerine bir inceleme. Akdeniz Kadın Çalışmaları ve Toplumsal Cinsiyet Dergisi, 1(1), 59-76.
  • Barthes, R. (1972). Mythologies. Hill and Wang.
  • Bartky, S. L. (2015). Femininity and domination: Studies in the phenomenology of oppression. Routledge.
  • Baudrillard, J. (1994). Simulacra and simulation. University of Michigan Press.
  • Beck, S., & Woods, B. (Direktörler). (2024). Heretic [Video recording]. A24.
  • Bordwell, D., Thompson, K., & Smith, J. (2004). Film art: An introduction (C. 7, s. 479). McGraw-Hill.
  • Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77-101.
  • Burchell, G., Gordon, C., & Miller, P. (1991). Introduction. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon, & P. Miller (Eds.), The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (pp. ix-xxix). University of Chicago Press.
  • Butler, J. (1990). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. Routledge.
  • Butler, J. (1997). The psychic life of power: Theories in subjection. Stanford University Press.
  • Comolli, J. L., & Narboni, J. (2014). Cinema/Ideology/Criticism. In Contemporary Film Theory (pp. 43-52). Routledge.
  • Corner, J. (2011). Theoretical frameworks in media research. Manchester University Press.
  • Couldry, N. (2003). Media rituals: A critical approach. Routledge.
  • Couldry, N. (2012). Media, society, world: Social theory and digital media practice. Polity.
  • Couldry, N., & Hepp, A. (2017). The mediated construction of reality. Polity Press.
  • Cusack, C. M. (2016). Invented religions: Imagination, fiction and faith. Ashgate Publishing.
  • Dean, M. (2010). Governmentality: Power and rule in modern society (2. bs). Sage Publications.
  • Elsaesser, T. (2001). Postmodernism as mourning work. Screen, 42(2).
  • Fairclough, N. (1992). Discourse and social change. Polity.
  • Fairclough, N. (1995). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language. Longman.
  • Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison. Pantheon Books.
  • Foucault, M., Burchell, G., Gordon, C., & Miller, P. (1991). Governmentality. In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (pp. 87-104). University of Chicago Press.
  • Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum.
  • Gill, R. (2007). Gender and the media. Polity Press.
  • Gramsci, A. (1971). Selections from the prison notebooks. International Publishers.
  • Hall, S. (1993). Encoding/decoding. In The Cultural Studies Reader (pp. 90-103). Routledge.
  • Hall, S. (1997). Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices. Sage.
  • Harper, D. (2024). Heretic. https://www.etymonline.com
  • Harsin, J. (2018). Post-truth and critical communication studies. İçinde Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228613.013.757
  • Heise, T. S., & Tudor, A. (2016). For a sociology of the cinema. İçinde The SAGE handbook of cultural sociology (pp. 321-333). Sage.
  • Heretic. (2024). İçinde Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press.
  • Hjarvard, S. (2008). The mediatization of religion: A theory of the media as agents of religious change. Northern Lights: Film & Media Studies Yearbook, 6(1), 9-26.
  • Hoover, S. M. (2006). Religion in the Media Age. Routledge.
  • Hsieh, H.-F., & Shannon, S. E. (2005). Three approaches to qualitative content analysis. Qualitative Health Research, 15(9), 1277-1288.
  • Jameson, F. (1991). Postmodernism, or, the cultural logic of late capitalism. Duke University Press.
  • Kellner, D., & Share, j. (2021). Critical media studies: An introduction (2nd ed.). Routledge.
  • Kracauer, S. (2019). From Caligari to Hitler: A psychological history of the German film. Princeton University Press.
  • Krippendorff, K. (2013). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology (3. bs). Sage.
  • Kuhn, A. (1994). Women’s pictures: Feminism and cinema (2. bs). Verso.
  • Levinas, E. (1998). Otherwise than being or beyond essence. Duquesne University Press.
  • Levitt, H. M. (2018). Journal article reporting standards for qualitative research. American Psychologist, 73(1), 26-46.
  • Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E. G. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Sage.
  • Lister, M., Dovey, J., Giddings, S., Grant, I., & Kelly, K. (2009). New media: A critical introduction (2nd ed.). Routledge.
  • McIntyre, L. (2018). Post-truth. MIT Press.
  • Meyer, B. (2009). Aesthetic Formations: Media, Religion, and the Senses. Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Miles, M. B., Huberman, A. M., & Saldaña, J. (2014). Qualitative data analysis: A methods sourcebook (3. bs). Sage.
  • Mulvey, L. (2006). Visual pleasure and narrative cinema. İçinde Media and cultural studies: Keyworks (pp. 342-352).
  • Nowell, L. S., Norris, J. M., White, D. E., & Moules, N. J. (2017). Thematic analysis: Striving to meet the trustworthiness criteria. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 16, 1-13.
  • Otter.ai. (2024). Otter.ai (Version 3.0) [Computer software] [Software]. Otter.ai. https://otter.ai
  • Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies (4. bs). Sage.
  • Rose, N. (1999). Powers of freedom: Reframing political thought (s. 40). Cambridge University Press.
  • Saldaña, J. (2021). The coding manual for qualitative researchers (4. bs). Sage.
  • Shohat, E., & Stam, R. (2014). Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the media. Routledge.
  • Silverstone, R. (1999). Why study the media? Sage.
  • Thompson, J. B. (1995). The media and modernity: A social theory of the media. Polity Press.
  • Tracy, S. J. (2010). Qualitative quality: Eight “big-tent” criteria for excellent qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10), 837-851.
  • Van Zoonen, L. (1994). Feminist media studies. Sage.
  • Waisbord, S. (2018). Truth is what happens to news: On journalism, fake news, and post-truth. Journalism Studies, 19(13), 1866-1878. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2018.1492881
  • Wayne, M. (2001). Political film: The dialectics of third cinema. Pluto Press.
  • Wejbert-Wąsiewicz, E. (2020). Film and cinema as a subject of sociological study. Between tradition and the present. Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Sociologica, 73, 89-110.
  • Yılmaz, E., Bakır, B., Ünal, Y., & Saliji, S. (2008). Sinema ve ideoloji ilişkileri üzerine. İçinde Sinema İdeoloji Politika. Nirengi Kitap.
  • Žižek, S. (1989). The sublime object of ideology. Verso.
  • Zola, É. (2021). Vérité (Truth). Everest Yayınları.
There are 66 citations in total.

Details

Primary Language English
Subjects Radio-Television, Sociology of Religion, Communication Sociology
Journal Section Research Article
Authors

Nuriye Çelik 0000-0001-6368-1956

Submission Date September 23, 2025
Acceptance Date November 28, 2025
Publication Date December 31, 2025
Published in Issue Year 2025 Volume: 8 Issue: 2

Cite

APA Çelik, N. (2025). Truth, Power, and the Body: A Sociological Analysis of Heretic (2024). Journal of Media and Religion Studies, 8(2), 499-521. https://doi.org/10.47951/mediad.1789894

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