La guerra come saga: Telegram come dispositivo seriale nel conflitto russo-ucraino = War as Saga: Telegram as a Serializing Device in the Russo–Ukrainian Conflict

Abstract

This article examines the role of Telegram in the construction and circulation of narratives about the Russian-Ukrainian war in Italy, arguing that the platform functions as a serializing device through which the conflict is organized into structured and recurring storylines. Drawing on a socio-semiotic and netnographic approach, the research analyses a corpus of institutional, non-institutional, anti-institutional and counter-institutional channels active in the Italian context between 2022 and 2024, reconstructing the logics through which Telegram organizes, legitimizes and stages antagonistic versions of the war. The analysis shows how the absence of a central visibility algorithm, the cross-platform vocation, the distributed architecture and the fringe status of Telegram foster the emergence of a rhizomatic narrative ecosystem. This ecosystem is characterized by initiatory access to channels, discovery-oriented practices, and a truth regime grounded in opposition to informational hegemony. Within this environment, narrator-performers - milbloggers, OSINT analysts, political influencers, institutional hubs - simultaneously act as characters within the fabula and as authentication devices for the narrative, producing a continuous dramaturgy of the conflict. The study identifies three main forms of seriality: a chronological seriality, anchored in specific theatres of war (Kyiv, Mariupol, Bakhmut); a thematic seriality, based on recurrent storylines ranging from fantasy sagas to spy stories, from conspiratorial frames to accusations of genocide or sabotage; and a mythic-memorial seriality, drawing on symbolic repertoires such as the Second World War, the orc/fantasy imaginary, or Russian patriotic mythology. Finally, the article shows how user experience acquires performative traits: users act as players engaged in quests of search, verification, decoding and counter-narration, turning Telegram into a hybrid environment midway between video games, competitive arena and ritual space. The platform thus not only hosts war narratives but also deeply shapes their serial form, their modes of legitimisation, and the symbolic conflict they enact.