THE REPRESENTATION OF COLLECTIVE IDENTITY IN AL-TAHRIR SQUARE AND TUNNEL MURALS: A VISUAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.31185/eduj.Vol51.Iss1.3396Abstract
This paper investigates the collective identity of the participants in October uprisings that broke out in Baghdad against the Iraqi government in 2019. It studies this in the light of visual discourse analysis model suggested by Kress and van Leeuwen (2006) and van Leeuwen (2008) by examining randomly selected murals painted by amateur protestors as well as professional painters on the walls and concrete blocks in Al-Tahrir Square and Tunnel where the uprising took place. This qualitative examination focuses on the representation of the protestors in the murals and how it reflects different aspects of their collective identity. The findings show that the painters’ could convey some different elements of their fellow protestors’ new collective identity. The study also reveals that they were too unbiased to reveal even the negative elements, and too socially brave to publicly announce their challenge to the old patriarchal social norms and some of the established social beliefs and traditions.
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