Women Studies

Women Studies

A Social Semiotics of Image of Women in Official Iranian Newspapers (2021-2024)

Document Type : -

Authors
Bahar Atashkar 1
Ehsan Aqababaee 2
Afsane Kamran 3
1 PhD student in Social Sciences, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
2 Associate Professor, Department of Social Sciences,University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
3 Assistant Professor, Department of Multimedia, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran
10.30465/ws.2026.51765.4383
Abstract
As women's participation in the public sphere grows and their roles expand, so does their representation in the gazettes, which follows various patterns. Recently publicized images of women highlight various aspects of their lives, including professional roles, different clothing, and the use of their bodies to convey messages, as well as a greater focus on power relations between them and dominant societal structures. However, stereotypical and traditional patterns in representing women still exist, which demonstrates the resistance of mass media against cultural structures or being affected by them. This paper analyzes published images in gazettes from 2021 to 2024 (1400-1403 AH) using a qualitative method and Kress and Van Leeuwen's social semiotics approach. The study aims to evaluate and analyze the representational, interactive, and combined meaning of women's images in the gazettes published during this period as cultural scripts that reflect the ideological structures. The findings reveal that, while women's social and public roles have improved in such images, Iranian gazettes use women's clothing and social roles as semiotic resources to emphasize roles such as national-religious identity, childbirth, and maternal duty. On the other hand, they challenge or criticize employment restrictions and gender inequalities in society.
Keywords
gazettes
gender
representation
social semiotics
Subjects
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  • Receive Date 25 April 2025
  • Revise Date 29 July 2025
  • Accept Date 14 September 2025