Representation of Feminism through the Images on Banners and Postcards Displayed at Aurat March in Pakistan: A Multimodal Perspective

Abstract

In this digitalized society where communication has moved from written texts to images and videos, people are more comfortable in seeing images and scrolling videos as compared to reading textual data. Among all the fields of life affected by this digital revolution significantly, one is the feminist movement. Feminism has taken many forms in a patriarchal country Pakistan where women have always strived for their rights as equal to males in the society. A modern form of these feminist movements is “Aurat March” being celebrated by Pakistani female community on “International Women’s Day” by walking on the roads carrying banners and postcards protesting and asking for the equal rights for their gender (Batool, 2021). The current study aims to analyse these banners and postcards through the multimodal perspective. The objective is to unveil the true representation of feminism through the images of these banners and postcards. five images (banners or postcards) displayed in the “Aurat March” have been selected as the sample of the study through purposive sampling technique. It is a descriptive qualitative study that uses Kress and van Leeuwen's visual grammar (2006) framework. The multimodal discourse analysis has been used as the method of the study. The results of the study revealed that the majority of main participants in these images were women, and they were performing different gestures to represent the notions of feminist resistance, the hate for patriarchy the demand for gender equality, and the strength of female solidarity, conveyed through powerful visual and symbolic representations.