Sense8’s Wolfgang Bogdanow: The Epitome of the Process of Deconstruction

Abstract

[eng] Many people fail to acknowledge the need to defy the hegemonic discourse because of their privileged position inside of it. That is why cultural products like Sense8 (2015-2018), directed by the Wachowski sisters, constitutes the sector of the media that inspires these people to become competing forces. The series depicts a cluster, a group of people psychically connected. Relevantly, the character of Wolfgang, a German mafia gangster, portrays how a person is able to consciously dismantle behaviours that directly or indirectly contribute to the reinforcement of damaging hegemonic discourses. This conscious process was first introduced by Jacques Derrida as a result to post-structuralism and it was named deconstruction. Without many studies on the series, significant works by scholars such as Raewyn Connell, Michel Foucault, Susan Bordo, Nancy Chodorow or Nel Noddings prove relevant to depict cultural issues related to this character’s deconstruction. To argue the relevance of Derrida’s process and how it works and intersects with several aspects, this paper will analyse Wolfgang taking into account significant concerns such as transnationalism, hegemonic masculinity, heteropatriarchy, white privilege, individualism and inclusion. Therefore, this essay will aim at investigating how deconstruction dismantles dichotomising and exclusive discourses embedded in our culture by focusing on Wolfgang Bogdanow as the epitome of this process. The study of this character will shed some light on the importance of portraying an empowering representation of deconstruction as a means to achieve a more equal system.