Republic of Iraq

Ministry of Higher Education

And Scientific Research
University of Al-Qadisiyah
College of Education
Department of English

A Multimodal Discourse Analysis of Politicized Humor in

selected Protest Posters
A Thesis
Submitted to the Council of the
College of Education, University of Al-Qadisiyah
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Master of Arts in English Language and Linguistics
By
Raja'a Mizher Radi
Supervised by
Asst. Prof. Sami Basheer AL-Hasnawi (Ph.D.)

January Jamadaa alakhira

2021 A.D. 1442 A.H
 ‫بسم اهلل الرمحن الرحيم‬

‫إِنَّ اللَّه يأْمُرُكُمْ أَن تُؤدَُّواْ األَمانَاتِ إِلَى أَهْلِها وإِذَا حكَمْتُم بيْن النَّاسِ‬

‫أَن تَحْكُمُواْ بِالْعدْلِ إِنَّ اللَّه نِعِمَّا يعِظُكُم بِهِ إِنَّ اللَّه كَان سمِيعاً بصِرياً‬
‫﴿‪﴾58‬‬

‫صدق اهلل العلي العظيم‬

‫النساء (‪)58‬‬
 Approval of Scientific Supervisor
I certify that this thesis, entitled (A Multimodal Discourse Analysis of
Politicized Humor in Protest Posters), by Raja'a Mizher Radi, has been
prepared under my supervision at the University of Al-Qadisiyah, as a
partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in
English Language and Linguistics.

Signature:
Supervisor: Asst. Prof. Sami Basheer AL-Hasnawi (Ph.D).
Date:

In view of the available recommendation made herein, I forward this

thesis for the Examining Committee.

Signature:
Name: Asst. Prof. Angham Abdul Kadhim Al-Rikabi (Ph.D).
Head of Department of English/ College of Education, University of Al-
Qadisiyah
Date:
 Certification of Scientific Expert

I certify that I have corrected the scientific content of this thesis, and so
it has become qualified for discussion.

Signature:
Name:
Degree:
Address:
Date:
 Committee’s Report

We certify that we have read this thesis under the title (A Multimodal
Discourse Analysis of Politicized Humor in Protest Posters) and, as
Examining Committee, examined the student in its contents, and that in
our opinion it is adequate as a thesis for the degree of Master of Arts in
English Language and Linguistics.

Chairman Member
Signature: Signature:
Name: Name:
Date: Date:

Member
Signature:
Name:
Date:
Approved by the Deanery of the College of Education, University of
Al-Qadisiyah.
Signature:
Name: Prof. Sattar Hameed Hamza (Ph.D.)
Dean of the College of Education
Date:
 Dedication

To my family, friends, and those whom I love.

vi
 Acknowledgements

The first and foremost thanks are due to Almighty Allah for His
countless blessings, without which this work would not have come to
light.

A special thank is due to my supervisor, Dr. Sami, for his invaluable

advice, great patience and encouragement. I am really proud to be one of
his students.

My deep gratefulness is due to my M.A. courses teachers, Prof. Basim

Al- Ghizawi, Prof. Qasim Salman (Ph.D), Asst. Prof. Maysaa Kadhim
(Ph.D), Asst. Prof. Sawsan, Prof. Salima Abdul- Zahra, Asst. Prof. Dr.
Angham AL- Rikabi, Asst. Prof. Amal Jasim (Ph.D), Asst. Prof. Saadia,
and Asst. Prof. Sahar Abdul-Ameer. Many thanks go for their hard work
and efforts.

My love and thanks are to my husband, Arkan, my sister, Hayat, and my

children for enduring hard times with me, my colleagues and to everyone
helped me to accomplish this thesis.

vii
 Abstract

Humor is a valuable political means used to identify, highlight and even

attack incongruities in political discourse and action. It is to bring to the
surface the incongruous reality of politics and politicians' incompetent
decisions and actions. This study aims to investigate politicized humor in
anti-Trump protest posters specifically in ‘Women March’. It reveals the
implicit and dominant views of the protesters in a socio-political context.
Given the fact that criticism is the main function of Politicized humor, it
is customary for protesters to use it as a source of resistance to attack
politicians' decisions and delegitimize their political practices in order to
achieve political reform. The data consist of (35) protest posters collected
from internet archives of ‘Women March’. Kress and van Leeuwen’s
(2006) modal of reading images among other modes is used to approach
the collected data, it shows how Politicized humor discourses could be
composed of only images, words or both to reinforces protesters’
solidarity against Trump controversial policy as part of their shared
experience.

Verbal and non-verbal modes of expression could be analyzed to show

the symbolic functions of politicized humor guided by social,
psychological, and cognitive theories of humor. These different modes
cooperate to represent the important themes and messages, it depicts a
critical social comparison between in-group and out-group in a specific
context. The findings of this study explores the importance of Politicized
humor in protest context, it is more like a "process" that protesters exploit
to achieve their desired goals. Thus, it is a powerful weapon of criticism
and reform.

viii
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dedication v

Acknowledgements vi

Abstract viii

List of Abbreviations xiii

Lists of Symbols xiv

CHAPTER ONE: Introduction

1.1Statement of the Problem 1

1.2 Value of Study 3

1.3 Purpose of the Study 4

1.4 Procedures 4

1.5 Methodology 5

1.6 Organization of the Study 6

CHAPTER TWO: Literature Review

2.1 Introduction 8

2.2 What is humor all about? 8

2.3 Humor: A Historical View 10

2.4. Humor: A Multiperspective Overview 12

2.5 Theories of Humor 18

2.5.1 Social (Superiority theory). 19

2.5.1.1 Hobbes’ superiority theory 21

ix
2.5.1.1.1 Affiliation and reference group models. 22

2.5.1.1.2 Vicarious superiority theory: An identification class model. 22

16 2.5.1.1.3 Disposition theory: An attitudinal model 23

2.5.1.2 Social Representations Theory. 24

2.5.1.2.1 Communicative Mechanisms 28

2.5.1.2.2 Objectification. 29

2.5.1.3 social identity theory (SIT). 30

2.5.1.3.1 Social Categorizations 31

2.5.1.3.2 Social Comparison. 32

2.5.1.4 Negative Social Status (Unsatisfactory Identity). 32

2.5.1.5 Identity Improvement Strategies 33

2.5.1.6 Social Creativity 34

2.5.1.7 Disparagement Humor. 35

2.5.2 Psychanalytical (Relief Theory) 38

2.5.3 Cognitive (Incongruity Theory) 40

2.6 Humor in Politics 44

2.6.1 Political Humor: Previous Studies 49

2.6.2 Political Humor in Protest 51

2.6.3 Critical Theory 56

2.6.4 Politicized Humor in Multimodal Protest Posters 58

2.6.5 Humor in Multimodal Politicized Protest Posters 60

2.6.5.1 Humor: A Linguistic Perspective 60

x
 2.6.5.2 Humor: Multimodal Perspective 63

CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Introduction 67

3.2 Research Approach 67

3.3 Data Selection 67

3.4 Context of Study 69

3.5 Research Ethics 70

3.6 Data Analysis: A Multimodal Approach 71

3.6.1 The Representational Dimension 75

3.6.1.1 Narrative process 76

3.6.1.2 Conceptual process 77

3.6.2 The Interactive Dimension 77

3.6.2.1 The gaze 78

3.6.2.2 Social distance 79

3.6.2.3 Angle 80

3.6.2.3 Modality 82

3.6.3 The Compositional Dimension 83

3.7 Significance of this work 86

CHAPTER FOUR: DATA ANALYSIS

4.1 Introduction 89

4.2 Data classification 89

4.2.1 word-image posters 92

xi
4.2.2 word-image posters 107

4.2.3 word- only posters 143

CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

5.1 Findings: A brief Look 150

5. 2 Conclusion 163

5.3 Suggestions for Extra Researches 164

References 165

Arabic Abstract 176

Arabic Cover Page 177

xii
List of Abbreviations

Politicized Humor PH

Social Representation Theory SRT

Social Identity Theory SIT

Multimodal Discourse Analysis MDA

xiii
List of Tables

Table 1. The Three Families of Theories (Attardo 1994: 47). 19

Table 2. Image-only posters 90

Table 3. word-image posters 90

Table 4. word-only posters 92

xiv
List of Figures

Figure (1): Merging the two theories (Superiority Theory and Social
Identity Theory) in one model

Figure (2): Humor as Overlapping Motivational Theories (Lynch

2002:430)

Figure (3): Main types of visual representational structure (Kress. and

van Leeuwen, 2006:59).

Figure (4): Interactive meanings in images (Kress and van Leeuwen,

2006:149).

Figure (5): participant's viewer-oriented gaze

Figure (6): Detachment in the horizontal oblique angle

Figure (7): vertical eye level angle

Figure (8): model of visual space (Kress and Leeuwen’s 2006:197)

Figure (9): Toilet– based poster

Figure (10): Trump as a humiliating object

Figure (11): Russia-Trump posters

Figure (12): Defeat Trump poster

Figure (13): Ridicule of Trump’s outward appearance

Figure (14): Bad Peach President

Figure (15): Wall policy poster

Figure (16): Obama –Trump comparison

xv
Figure (17): Women's self-confidence

Figure (18): The struggle of women against their oppressors

Figure (19): Russian – Trump posters

Figure (20): Feminine body organs

Figure (21): Ridicule of Trump's words

Figure (22): Defeat Trump posters

Figure (23): Ridicule of Trump's actions

Figure (24): Posters of Trump's threat by women

Figure (25): Expansion the scope of the protest

Figure (26): Ridicule of Trump's slogan

Figure (27): Trump fired in all colors

Figure (28): Trump's solitary representation

Figure (29): Trump accompanied by a competitor

Figure (30): Redefine feminine body organs

Figure (31): The ironic use of Trump's words

Figure (32): Create humor through word- image cooperation

Figure (33): Create humor by word - image combination

Figure (34): Create humor through word- poster carrier image

combination.

xvi
 CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
1.1 Statement of the Problem
Humor in political situations is quite usually approached with
reference to humorous actions politicians do to ridicule or undermine
their opponents, or those by cartoonists, political commentators,
journalists, artists, and common people for the sake of criticizing
politicians and political affairs. This is normally referred to as political
humor (henceforth PH) (Raskin 1985, and Tsakona and Popa, 2011).
Instead, we in this work use politicized humor to refer to humor used by
ordinary people in protest posters against particular political issues. This
is "Gallows humor" in Obrdlik (1942) words, where protesters use
humor as a serious means to seek a specific goal. In this context,
‘Women March’ provides a productive setting to examine the use of
humor for a reformist purpose by criticizing the political status quo and
supporting certain dominant values. As such, this thesis looks at 35
protest posters from different Internet sites with the use of "Kress and
van Leeuwen’s" (2006) "visual social semiotics" as a framework. In
these posters, various social, psychological, and cognitive elements are
reflected and overlap with multimodal analysis as ideas that support the
analysis process.
From a social perspective, humor reflects the demonstrators' solidarity
and homogeneity towards their social interests and beliefs. For them,
the use of politicized humor can be a "social corrective" method to
highlight, eliminate, and prevent any social disorder. Hence, it is a form
of criticism and social control based on projecting the norms and values

1
of a particular community and heightening social limits between the in-
group and out-group individuals.
Lim Fei (2004:220-221) explains that meaning-making process can be
achieved through the use of different dependent and interdependent
semiotic resources like words, images, gestures, sounds, etc. As a result
of the proliferation of multi-media, it is no longer a matter of spoken
and written words. Meaning can be currently expressed and approached
with the use of different modes; i.e. words, images, or both and even
further to include colors, video, and audio. It is a question of
manipulating multiple social elements, which all need to be socio-
linguistically coherent to reflect its producers’ identity in a specific
context. In light of this, language is not and should not be considered
and approached with a mere reference to linguistic units, but further to
include its non-verbal use as a social practice, a point that requires a
more developed approach of analysis. Thus, the current thesis focuses
primarily on how to represent both visual and verbal elements that
collaborate to create meaning and communicate the protesters' message
by using multimodal discourse analysis (henceforth MDA).
The main question guiding this research, in general, is to explore and
discuss the visual and verbal representations of the politicized humor
that appear in the anti-Trump protest posters specifically in ‘Women
March’, to find out to what extent humor serves in conveying the
protesters' message and whether or not it contributes to reform
measures. For this end, this research addresses five main research
questions:

1. In what way(s) are the participants (in-group and outgroup)

represented?

2
2. What kind of relationship is suggested to exist between the
represented participants and that with the viewer as well?
3. How can visual analysis help clarify the importance of using humor
in protest posters?
4: Under what linguistic mode (verbal/ non-verbal) does humor serve
protesters in the contexts understudy?
5: How does humor strengthen protest for political reformation?

1.2 Value of Study

Studying PH helps to show how the boundaries between politics as a

serious question and humor as a funny one come to be blurred in our
world. Humor in politics works to offer different perspectives on
political practices and questions how positively or negatively effective
these practices are on the social construction in a particular context. It
helps to know how humor can be used as an avenue of resistance and
rebellion against politically ill-formed actions and support dominant
values and views on politics. It is an endeavour to explore how humor
can be politicized and how politics can be used as a source of humor in
a particular context.

Based on protest posters as a source of data, this work serves to go

beyond language in its mere linguistic entities and see how other social
semiotic resources like images work, in isolation or in collaboration
with the word, to form a particular humorous text for certain political
meaning. This is to say which one creates the sense of humor, the word
or image, or both and what happens if one of the two is not there. Such
questions help to move from literacy in its basic understanding, being
able to read and write, into ‘visual literacy’ as an eminent need of our
postmodern world of knowledge.

3
1.3 Purpose of the Study
PH is closely related to the ordinary people, as they depend on in their
protest against authorities. It is associated with their "social, cultural,
and moral" considerations" (Kuipers 2008:361). Hence, this work
serves to explore how humor is politicized in the context of protest and
what messages it conveys to reinforce the social identity of the
protesters and chart the first steps for reform. This provides a good
resource for the study of humorous discourses and can reveal important
issues related to the effect of the politicization of humor in a protest
context. The practical part of this study can also be useful for the public
as it increases their awareness of the implicit message that those protest
posters convey.
It is right so far that humor studies have shown some interest in PH
(Tsakona and Popa, 2011), however, little literature can be found on the
investigation and analysis of such concept from a multimodal
perspective. Because of this and the possible impact of politicized
humor in protest context and the fact that it could be a process by
protesters to seek political reformation, the researcher intends to
investigate and analyze the politicized humor in the protest posters.
1.4 Procedures
The main procedures of this study will be as follows:
1. Explanation of the concept of humor in general, its theories, with
adding some socio-psychological theories to its social theory
(superiority) as an update that facilitates dealing with individuals
belonging to their groups, and to justify the psychological motives for
protest.

4
2. Reviewing the literature on politicized humor as a field of study,
some previous studies, its use in protest context, with an explanation of
the purpose of its politicization in such a context.
3. Presenting a theoretical account of Kress and van Leeuwen’s (2006)
multimodal discourse theory in response to the aim, scope, and nature
of the collected data.
4. Data description, discussion, conclusions, and implications for further
studies.
1.5 Methodology
The present study is qualitative. It focuses on analyzing the politicized
humor in the selected anti- Trump protest posters of ‘Woman March’
2017. Due to its significance in directing PH towards meaningful critical
directions, ‘Women March’ formed the overall context for this research.
In the analysis stage, the researcher tries to examine the content of the
collected data with the use of Kress and van Leeuwen’s (2006) model to
investigate the possibility of presenting the intended meaning through
various means (words, images, colors, and page layout). Thus, a group
of protest posters against Trump’s policy with their different designs,
‘word-only posters’, ‘image-only posters’, and ‘word-image posters’,
can be approached with the use of MDA approach. Drawing on
Halliday’s (1994) Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL),
multimodality helps the research to consider how the text (protest
posters in this case) is composed of different modes in the meaning-
making process. It is a ‘multimodal semiotic analysis’
(O’Halloran:2011). Multimodality in this sense does not prioritise
words over images but shows how both work, as linguistic units, to get
a particular meaning across. Meaning is not fixed but potential. It is not
solely a question of linguistic literacy (knowing the read and write), but
it exceeds that to include individuals’ ‘visual literacy’. In word-image
5
and image-only texts, this is a question that belongs to "Kress and van
Leeuwen’s" (2006) "reading images: the grammar of visual design".
This is ‘visual grammar’ which gives the poster the potential to mean, it
is used metaphorically to refer to the set of socially constructed
resources and rules for making meaning.
Thus, by decoding the oral and visual messages in the protest posters,
and most importantly, examining the interaction between them in
creating politicized humor, this work aims to explore how humor is
‘effectively’ represented in protest posters in accordance with cultural
and socio-political conditions of the protesters. Using Kress and Van
Leeuwen's 2006 framework of 'reading images, protest posters are
analysed according to interpersonal, interactional, and compositional
dimensions. Communicative act in this sense is broader in scope and
more technical since it demonstrates how images in texts interactively
work with other semiotic resources in a communicative event
(O’Halloran, K. 2008).
The findings of the study show how humor can be used as a corrective
means against political disorder, ideology, and ‘unfair’ political
environments. It reveals a series of incongruities within the visual
images themselves and between the visual and verbal texts as humor is
based on contradiction and surprise, hence it is exploited by protesters
to show their superiority at the expense of demeaning their opponent
and thus proving their social identity.

1.6 Organization of the Study

The study is systematized into five chapters. Chapter One is an
introductory one. It states the problem, the value, the aim, the
procedures, the methodology, and the organization of this work.
Chapter Two deals with reviewing the literature that provides an in-

6
depth discussion of the broad concept of humor and its multiplicity as a
field of study, and then clarifying its theories that will be adopted in the
analysis process as ‘ideas’ that support the meaning obtained from the
use of multimodal analysis, and an ‘inference’ that summarizes the
importance of the use of humor by protesters in their protest posters.
Humor in politics, on the other hand, takes the study from
generalization to specificity, providing a brief survey of how humor
comes to be normally related to politics, criticism, protest, reformation,
and resistance to those in power. The concern of Chapter Three is to
shed light on the research approach, criteria for data selection,
collection, and analysis to answer the research questions. Chapter four
is devoted to data classification, description and analysis. The study
ends with Chapter Five which states the findings and conclusions
followed by the references.

7
 Chapter Two
Literature Review
2.1 Introduction

This chapter presents the theoretical part of the present study through a
comprehensive explanation of the basic concepts that constitute this
research. It discusses the concept of humor, its plurality in various
disciplines, and then explains the basic theories that underlie its origin
with regard to the relationship between these theories and the function
of humor. In addition to the notion of politicized humor, its previous
studies, and its function in socio- political context. The emphasis is also
given to the protest and its multimodal posters.

2.2 What is humor all about?

Humor is a broad term with various definitions and meanings. It is

normally associated and discussed in relation to comic, irony, satire,
ridicule, parody, mockery, etc. Different scholars try to define it in
relation to different issues and in different contexts. Some of them deal
with it as a communicative activity. In this sense, Martineau (1972:
103) earlier conceived it as "one social process" in almost every public
system or "any communicative instance which is perceived as
humorous" that is why it could be considered as a powerful means to
understand group structure (see section 2.5.1). Others treat humor as an
individual feature, in this sense, Koestler (1964: 31) defined it
physiologically as "the only domain of creative activity where a
stimulus on a high level of complexity produces a massive and sharply
defined response on the level of physiological reflexes". In the same
regard, Martin and Ford (2018:16) assert that humor is the "mental
8
processes that go into both creating and perceiving such as amusing
stimulus and also the emotional response of mirth involved in the
enjoyment of it". Furthermore, some scholars such as Long and
Graesser (1988:37) define humor in its broadest sense as "anything
done or said, purposely or inadvertently, that is found to be comical or
amusing".

Meyer (2000: 317–23) defines four rhetorical functions of humor in

communication: identification; clarification; enforcement, and
differentiation. He (2000: 317–23) also linked them to theories of
humor (see section 2.5) where humor can be linked to one or more of
these rhetorical functions. The first function is involved when the
purpose of humor is to "build support by identifying communicators
with their audiences", and therefore increase the speakers' credibility.
The second function involves the use of humor to clarify an issue in
order to obtain an audience agreement regarding it. Therefore,
clarification and identification functions of humor reflect
communicators' unity. So, they refer to the protesters use of humor to
convey the belief that they are citizens with legitimate rights. The third
function entails the use of humor to enforce rules and norms on which
there is some sort of disagreement on the part of the audience, thus
humor goal is to change the situation. The last function is involved
when the audience faces total disagreement with a humorous topic, that
is why humor is used by "one group contrasting themselves with their
opponents, their views with an opponent’s views, their own social group
with others, and so on". It reflects the belief that the protesters feel at
odds with the authority work and its role in the political structure. They
use humor to show a rejection of this regime’s policy in order to change
the current conditions. So, in contrast to the first two functions, the

9
enforcement and differentiation functions reflect the divisive type of
humor which despite its nature, can unite individuals of a particular
group (in-group) against their enemy (outgroup) by supporting their
social norms and showing opponents' irrationality or inferiority.

As a matter of fact, it is difficult to decide the nature of humor

because it is neither good nor bad. In addition to amuse people, it can be
used to hurt others. That is why, Meyer (2000: 323) refers to "the
paradox of humor" in uniting and divide describing it as "a double-
edged sword". Billig (2005:176) also has completed these paradoxes
stating that humor can be both a public and private case, because it can
be found in all cultures of the world, but not all agree on the same
humorous things. Humor tells us who we are and there is nothing
universal in relation to the laughable; "it is the stimulus and the human
participant(s) which bring humor about" (Raskin, 1985: 4).
Nevertheless, there is some agreement among scholars regarding the
characteristics normally present when an act of humor occurs as there
must be common elements. It is clear from the above that humor is of a
long history and has been studied from different perspectives, as will be
seen in the following sections.

2.3 Humor: A Historical View

Humor could be found in the discourses of many people either as

being healthy, generating laughter and joy, or demonic at others,
generating both hearty laughter as a physical manifestation and a
devilish intent. That is why humor has been considered in the discourse
as being the subject of debate as far as the claim it would receive,
whether of entertainment or of disdain. Bodily fluid was one of the first
explanations for the meaning of humor since this term is derived from
the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks, it was concerned with the
10
balance that the fluids in the human body should maintain. Thus, humor
was considered to be responsible for controlling human health and
emotions (Keenoy, 1944: 140).
Philosophers, psychologists, playwrights, and critics have searched a
lot to determine the bases of humor, and why it occurs, beginning with
classical writers like Plato and Aristotle who play an important role in
determining the concept of humor and drawing its theoretical side,
however, their views are different concerning the positive side of
humor. According to Plato, humor is a mixture of two opposite
sensations like enjoyment and sorrow that is why his condemnation of
humor is much more absolute than Aristotle who focuses on the artistic
value of it. For Plato, humor corrupts the soul, while Aristotle sees it as
a positive stimulus that improves the mood. (Attardo 1994: 18-20).
During the medieval period, humor was used in plays by Ben
Jonson (1600) as a form of comedy and was realized as "a quirky or odd
character trait" (Scheel 2017:10). Also in his Leviathan (1651) Thomas
Hobbes presented a theory of humor, usually referred to as the
superiority or disparagement theory (As it will be explained below in
2.5.1) (Attardo 2017:7). Later in 1776, James Beattie made a major
study on humor justifying the reason of laughter to the existence of two
or more inconsistent, or incongruous parts or situations, giving a
glimpse into the theory of incongruity of humor (As it will be explained
below in 2.5.3) (Paulos1980:3), However, the starting point for humor
as an "active term" was with the contribution of Morris in 1744, which
stimulated the ability to understand and portray comedy. Then Paul
(1783/ 1825) developed a complete theory of humor, with him humor
acquired its aesthetic value. This was exploited psychologically by
Freud (1856-1939) as humor was rated the best way to achieve self-
motivated pleasure (Scheel 2017: 10).

11
 More recently, the term has been associated with the exaggerated
temper, or "humors", of comic characters with multidimensional
characteristics (Butler et al., 2015: 499). However, the contemporary
sense of ‘humor’ has changed considerably to be a comprehensive term
for "all laughter-related phenomena" including "jokes, stand-up
comedy, television sitcoms, political satire, and ridicule". Therefore, it
may be offensive and truculent on one hand, ethical and logical on the
other (Martin, 1998: 4). Such a flexible view to ‘humor’ makes it as a
powerful means of coping and as an outlet in times of disorder and
friction (Kessel and Merziger 2012: 6). Thus, the history of humor, as
we have seen, is long and full of contradictions, it has been linked to
human health, and its contradictions were the reason for its
condemnation in a period of time, but it remains an integral part of our
life, so the areas that dealt with are varied as we will see in the next
section.
2.4. Humor: A Multiperspective Overview
Humor is a universal trait that has existed in every culture,
highlighting all important aspects of human nature. It could be
experienced in nearly every type of interpersonal relationship and
having a far-reaching impact on daily life, however, researchers are
unable to isolate an agreed definition for it and to describe what it
means to say someone has a "sense of humor". Some of them regard it
as synonymous with "its physical manifestation, laughter", others
associate it with the "comic, the funny, or the ludicrous" or it could be
equivalent to "wit and comedy" (Carrell, 2008: 306). For Attardo
(1994:4), such a lack of agreement can be attributed to the fact that
humor has been carried out to be the core of research for different
scholars of different lines of thoughts, psychologists, linguists,
anthropologists among others, to encompass any entity (an event or
12
object) in a situation that provokes laughter, amusement, or is supposed
to be funny.

Based on the above, the researcher in this context intends to highlight

the contribution of other disciplines to the concept of humor with
reference to psychology, anthropology, sociology. Psychology for
example has consistently been an important discipline contributing
much to the information on humor, however, the latter became a subject
of study in the field of psychology only in the seventies and the focus
was on the experimental and cognitive aspects, but it developed in the
mid of the 80s to be applied in the framework of mental health and
treatment (Carrell 2008:306).

The psychological functions of humor have been classified by Martin

and Ford (2018:33) into "three broad categories: (1) cognitive and
social benefits of the positive emotion of mirth, (2) uses of humor for
social communication and influence, and (3) tension relief and coping"
(such issues will be explained in detail in section 2.5.2). This
classification highlights the close relationship between humor and
positive psychology showing the effectiveness of humor in "emotional
health, and social relationships". It helps describing and evaluating the
character over the "lifespan". Likewise, humor research could benefit
from seeing advancement accomplished in different zones of positive
psychology, and this adds much to the comprehension of "humor and
laughter" which can be contemplated in connection to "cognition,
motivation, and emotion" (Ruch, 2008: 19).

According to psychologists, there are many ways by which

individuals use humor in their daily life. They are called humor styles,
hence, in their study for possibly "adaptive and maladaptive" forms of
humor, Martin, et al. (2003) found that each one of these forms could be

13
in extra division to include "interpersonal and intrapersonal" humor.
The first is "directed towards others", while the second is self-centered.
Their conclusion directed them to assume four separate "dimensions of
humor", specifically "affiliative, self-enhancing, aggressive, and self-
defeating humor". "Affiliative humor" includes the inclination to say
jokes and other funny things in order to simplify social communication
and decrease interpersonal stress; "Self-enhancing humor" involves a
habitually funny viewpoint on life, and to keep up this viewpoint
despite pressure or difficulty, so it assists individuals how to deal with
problems. Both styles offer an adaptive purpose with positive humor.
"Aggressive humor" includes using disparagement humor which can be
aggressive, harmful or demotes others without regard for its possible
effect on them. "Self-defeating humor" involves humor extremely at
oneself in a self-disparaging way, trying to "amuse others by doing or
saying funny things at one’s own expense as a means of ingratiating
oneself or gaining approval", This style also justifies the use of humor
as a form of apologetic disavowal, or to hide negative feelings (Martin
et al 2003: 53-54).

"Sense of humor" refers to "humor as a stable personality trait or

individual difference variable (Martin, 1998:17), hence, it may be
conceived as (1)an intellectual ability to produce, comprehend, and
reproduce jokes (2) an artistic reaction (e.g., realization, and amusement
of humorous text (3) usual actions to laugh and say jokes, (4) temper
attribute (5) an opinion (e.g., having optimistic opinion toward humor;
(6) managing speech or justifiable strategies (e.g., ability to preserve a
humorous perception to stand against disaster (Martin et al 2003:49).
In line with this idea, Martin (1998:15-16) summarized Eysenck’s
(1972) three connotations for the sense of humor in a person: (1)

14
coincidence in laughter over the same things "conformist meaning", (2)
the usual amount of laughter "quantitative meaning", and (3) the fruitful
consequence of humor by entertaining others "productive meaning".
However, Ruch and Kohler 1999 focus was on the mood basis of
humor. They researched the universality of humor in terms of emotional
and mental underpinnings despite the difference in its expressions
across cultures and time. More Recently, Svebak (2014:3048) described
the "sense of humor" as "A characteristic of the individual and reflects
readiness for understanding as well as producing humorous cognitive
processes and to display related effects of smiling and laughter". Thus,
psychologists have made a lot to study humor because they justified the
reasons for its use and showed its negative and positive connotations, so
they opened the horizons for other areas to deal with.

Further, anthropology introduces important justifications for the

variety of "humorous expression". To explain humor, scholars in
anthropology suggest four contexts: "cultural context, social context,
individual context, and comparative context". Cultural context requires
familiarity with the values and concepts necessary to understand
humorous expressions. Social context examines the conditions and
situations that control joke telling, i.e. "Time, setting, personnel, the
relationships among the participants, the nature of their conversation,
and interaction". Individual context examines the experiences of
individuals in order to understand their jokes or justify their reactions to
the humor directed at them. Comparative context "refers to those
traditions of humor that are equivalent, analogous, or otherwise
interconnected to those under investigation", for example, the basis of
Christie Davies’s theory regarding stupid jokes was the comparison he
made between Poland and other countries (Oring 2008:196 - 204).

15
 As an anthropologist Apte (1985: 16) clarifies the close relationship
between humor and culture, asserting that humor is nothing but an
extrapolation of the cultural practices of individuals and groups. He also
clarifies that "joking relationships mark group identity and signal the
inclusion or exclusion of a new individual" (1985: 56), and therefore,
show awareness of the social identity of the group (see section 2.5.1.3)
(1985: 66). The results of these studies enrich not only the field of
anthropology, but also open prospects for researchers from other fields
such as sociology to delve into the study of humor and determine its
social function for individuals and groups.

Sociology in turn tends to be an important area for the analysis of

humor in general and the humor discussed in this study in particular
since its recent studies focus on offensive humor to reflect its direct
connection with essential social problems such as ethnic, sexist, and
PH. From a sociological perspective, the importance of humor can be
studied at: (a) the level or type of a society that can be reflected in its
"polity, religion, ethnic groups"; and (b) the level of a small group
where there is a goal behind using humor by its members (see section
2.5.1.2). The macro/ formal level of analysis, with the aid of social
anthropological humor studies, enables the classification of humorous
expression in various societies to see their social function and find the
similarities and differences among them. Whereas the micro / informal
level illustrates the correlation between sociology and social psychology
in explaining the social meaning of humor and the possibility of using it
among social performers in their social resistance against power
(Powell and Paton 1988: XV). Ethnic humor, for example, is used for
fun like White and Black jokes, but its main function is a racial conflict

16
since it is connected with groups that have antagonistic relationships
(Kuipers 2008:370-373).

Tsakona and Popa (2011:4), indicate the social function of humor in

order to achieve "social corrective" resulting from the superiority theory
(see section 2.5.1), according to them, humor could be used as a way to
denounce what is socially unacceptable to emphasize specific society's
standards and determine the "social boundaries between in-group and
out-group members". The theory assumes that individuals compare the
groups they are members of (their in-groups) with other groups (the out-
groups). If it turns out that the in-groups have a lower (perceived) social
status, i.e. possess a relatively large number of important negative
features, the individual’s social identity is diminished (see section
2.5.1.3).

As an important aspect of this study, PH is considered as one standard

within "the socio-political system" as Craik and Ware (1998:81) see it,
they identify four functions for it: a) "to express one's political values
and attitudes indirectly, b) to see authority figures deflated, c) to express
what would ordinarily not be tolerated, d) to explore taboo topics, and
e) to show the triumph of justice"(for further information see section
2.6).

Two types of humor proposed by Billig (2005:202) reflect the

centrality of humor in social life: "disciplinary" and "rebellious",
according to him, the social function of humor can be attributed to its
role in sustaining or changing social order. Disciplinary humor is
directed towards those who violate standard societal rules, it therefore
functions in a conservative manner to help maintain social order.
Rebellious humor, on the other hand, attacks the social norms
themselves and thus can be seen as a protest and revolt against such

17
laws in an opportunity to bring about a radical reform or improvement.
However, disciplinary and rebellious humor might overlap practically in
aspects of their corresponding effects, e.g. preserve or rebel against the
social order. Billig (2005:203) attributes this overlap to the "wider
ethical, personal and ideological considerations" involved in classifying
jokes. This overlap falls within the framework of the multidisciplinary
nature of humor (which was proven through the above survey). The
plurality also extends to theories of humor, which in turn include social,
psychological and cognitive aspects, as we will see in the next section.

2.5 Theories of Humor

In their attempts to understand the origin and importance of humor,
philosophers and scholars proposed several theories under different
names, but the most prominent are superiority theories, relief theories,
and incongruity theories. These theories vary in a number of ways, but
more specifically " in the relative emphasis placed on the structure of
humor content versus the significance of social context in the elicitation
of amusement" (Ferguson and Ford 2008:284). For example, superiority
and psychoanalytic theories emphasize the hostility that the user of
humor has against the target in a particular context, while incongruity
theories highlight "the irony and surprise of humor content", that is why
the former theories emphasize context and also provide further imitation
for "disparagement humor" than the latter (Ibid). There are many
synonyms for the classification of these theories, as in Attardo (1994:
47) below:

18
 Table (1): The Three Families of Theories (Attardo 1994: 47).

2.5.1 Social (Superiority theory)

It is the oldest among other theories since it is traced back to Plato,
Aristotle, and Hobbes. Aristotle, for instance, claimed that we respond
to weakness and ugliness through humor (Martin,1998: 29). In other
words, we laugh at misfortunes of others in order to show our own
superiority (Raskin, 2008:29-30). Quoted by Martin (1998: 29), the
superiority approach is in Thomas Hobbes’ words that "the passion of
laughter is nothing else but some sudden glory arising from some
sudden conception of some eminence in ourselves, by comparison with
the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly". Therefore,
superiority results from the disparagememt of previous follies, or
perhaps targeting a specific person or group.

Plato further reasoned that humor is somewhat evil when it is used

against weak people (Masaeli and Heidari-Shahreza 2016: 230) to the
extent that even superiority theorists are looked at as "enemies of
laughter" since they deal with ridicule as a reflection of "ideological
positivism" rather than as something negative. When Thomas Hobbes

19
put his standard version of the superiority theory in the seventeenth
century, it reflects the dreadful image of society at that time (Billig,
2005: 6-7), and this is what distinguishes Hobbes from Plato and
Aristotle especially in terms of the framework of their thoughts.
However, a mild form of superiority such as making fun of faulty action
could be used positively as "social correctives" to support the
community and show that such action was inadmissible in a perfect
society. In this respect, Fine (1976) has given a description of how
"sexual humor" sets and strengthens the appropriate social rules in
society by laughing at “lower” type of actions or language from the
viewpoint of society’s norms (cited in Meyer 2000: 314). So, in the
superiority theory, humor emerges, not only from an illogical or
unanticipated impression, but from seeing oneself as higher, accurate, or
victorious in contradiction of one who is lower, mistaken, or defeated
(Ibid). In a like manner, Gruner (1997:13) describes a sense of
superiority, saying that we laugh at "clumsiness, moral or cultural
defect, suddenly revealed in someone else, to whom we instantly and
momentarily feel superior". Martin (1998: 33) also summarized the
hostile attitudes expressed through humor within the superior approach
and explained "that people laugh more at jokes that disparage people
toward whom they have negative attitudes and laugh less at jokes that
disparage those with whom they identify", that is why "racist and sexist
humor" could be best used under the realm of superiority theory to
show an "us against them" presenting a condition according to it our
group will be superior on the other and celebrate this superiority by
inviting others to laugh (Lippitt, 1991: 55).

Therefore, the principle of superiority states that laughter is a way to

show who is better, superior, or triumphant in a competition struggle

20
between groups. Furthermore, the theory of superiority is socially
focused to consider humor as a means of correcting social misbehavior
or wrongdoing. This socially corrective theory involves strengthening
what is true and good by mocking what is wrong according to a society
or culture's usual conventions. It also helps to reinforce a sense of unity
among in-group members. Protest posters in this case are more
politicized with the use of humor in order to point figure toward socio-
politically ill-formed agenda legislated by those represented in the
posters under study.

Actually, there are many reviews for superiority theory, however, the
researcher focused on Ferguson and Ford 2008 s' theoretical framework
since it shows several updates and is not limited to what was covered by
the classical writers and Hobbes. They (Ferguson and Ford 2008)
studied the theory of superiority under the name of disparagement
humor, which is considered to be synonymous with it as shown in table
(1). It involves the humorous ridicule of another individual or social
group.

Ferguson and Ford developed a model to explain the use of

disparagement humor depending on three updated modals for Hobbes'
superiority theory: affiliation and reference group model, an
identification class model, and an attitudinal model.

2.5.1.1 Hobbes’ superiority theory

Plato and Aristotle discussed comedy and mirth mainly in terms of

"ethical considerations", while Hobbes dealt with humor and laughter in
terms of his assessment of "human nature" as having "competitive
tendencies" (Lintott, 2016: 354-5). Accordingly, Michael Billig
demonstrates:

21
 Hobbes puts ridicule at the centre of humour and thereby
questions the goodness of laughter. He is telling us to look
behind the smiles and the jests. If we do so, then we will see
something not too pleasant (2005, 52).

Thus, Hobbes' theory of superiority emphasized the importance of

"self-esteem enhancement" which derives from noticing other
people's misfortunes. In other words, people enjoy underestimating
others because in return they feel good about themselves.

2.5.1.1.1 Affiliation and reference group models.

Hobbes' theory of superiority did not remain the same, but was
expanded by Wolff et al. (1934) by presenting the concept of
affiliation as "a broader psychological extension of the self", they
defined "affiliated objects" as "those objects towards which a subject
adopts the same attitude as he does towards himself " (cited in
Ferguson and Ford 2008: 289). when they put forward the idea that a
person through this concept exceeds the limits of individual
selfishness to take the same opinion as to the group he belongs to
regarding a specific subject. Therefore, a person experiences
promoting self-esteem when he realizes disparagement of another
group to whom he does not belong or affiliated (Ferguson and Ford
2008:289). Priest and Abrahams 1970 demonstrated this by a study
which concluded that participants from a particular political party
(the Democratic Party in their study) enjoyed jokes that disparage a
candidate from a competing political party (the Republican Party in
their study) rather than jokes that disparage their candidate.

2.5.1.1.2 Vicarious superiority theory: An identification class

model

22
 La Fave et al. (1973 and 1996 [1976]) revised Wolff et al. (1934)
theory of affiliation and reference group by adding the concept of
identification class (IC) in their vicarious theory of superiority. An IC
is characterized as an affiliation towards a particular group or class. A
Positive IC is one the person belongs to and holds a positive attitude
towards it. A negative IC is one the person is not affiliated with or
has a negative attitude against. A. B can be referred to individuals or
classes of individuals or even animals or intimate objects. The
hypothesis says:

Let's believe J is a joke in which identification class A is victorious

over identification class B. Then the more positive S’s attitude
towards A and the more negative S’s attitude towards B, the greater
the magnitude of amusement S experiences with respect to J. (La
Fave et al. 1996 [1976]: 67)

In their study, La Fave et al. (1973) relied on two groups of

university students, the identification class of the first group is
America, while the IC of the second group is Canada. As expected,
Pro-Canadians enjoyed jokes that degraded the Americans more than
jokes that degraded the Canadians. Pro-Americans enjoyed jokes that
degraded more of Canadians than jokes that degraded Americans.
Thus, vicarious superiority theory is sufficient enough to analyze
disparagement humor since it identifies the positive attitudes with the
disparaging group as well as the negative attitudes against the
disparaged group (Ferguson and Ford 2008:292-293).

2.5.1.1.3 Disposition theory: An attitudinal model

Apart from affiliation or identification class, Zillmann and Cantor 's

1996 [1976] and Zillmann 1983 produce something called

23
 "Disposition theory", it is the negative/positive disposition towards
the underrated/ offensive entity that determines "the magnitude of
mirth". The founders of this theory rely on choosing specific
identities of "disparagers and disparagees" to evoke "sympathy or
antipathy" reactions. For example, disparaging the antipathic entity
by a sympathetic person leads to extreme laughter, while the reverse
may achieve minimum or no laughter. Zillmann and Cantor 1972
examine disparagement between "professors and students" with
cartoons depicting "superior-subordinate relationships" in order to
achieve other superior-subordinate groupings' reactions. (Zillmann
1983:90-91).

Thus, in Wolf et al. (1934) modal, membership in the disparaged

group is what controls the expectation of humor, Likewise, La Fave
et al. (1973) evaluate humor according to the individual's attitude
towards the group, as people do not appreciate humor if they have a
positive rather than a negative attitude towards the disparaged group
and vice versa. Ferguson and Ford (2008) also speculated that
individuals engage in disparagement humor as a way of restoring
positive distinctiveness, which is in line with social identity theory
(see section 2.5.1.3). This in itself gives the researcher a hint about
the possible link between disparagement humor as one of the
designations of superiority theory, and social identity theory to be a
model (see figure 1). According to them, when there is an identity
threat, an individual may respond to the threat with an expression of
ridicule. If this disparaging humor results in positive distinctiveness
of the individual or in-group, then those involved will experience
amusement.

2.5.1.2 Social Representations Theory (SRT)

24
 Social representation theory is "a social psychological framework of
concepts and ideas to study psychosocial phenomena in modern
societies". Since such phenomena could be perceived only if they are
rooted in "historical, cultural and macrosocial conditions". Therefore, it
combines the psychological and social aspects to present a clear picture
of individuals' values and beliefs.

Similarly, Wagner et al. (1999:95-96), define it as the "ensemble of

thoughts and feelings being expressed in verbal and overt behavior of
actors which constitutes an object for a social group. According to
Moscovici 1988, this theory concerns:

The contents of everyday thinking and the stock of ideas that give
coherence to our religious beliefs, political ideas and the
connections we create as spontaneously as we breathe. They
make it possible for us to classify persons and objects, to
compare and explain behaviours and to objectify them as part of
our social setting (Moscovici 1988: 214)

In short, collective meaning prevails over social representation to

create a common perception that unites societies, organizations, and
groups. It focuses on phenomena and struggles that are subject to debate
to alter collective thinking in society. As a theory of communication, it
connects society, individuals, the media, and the public (Höijer 2011:
3). Actually, there are common points that combine this theory with the
psychological theory of humor where it can be used as a bond for those
who are protesting against politicians. Protest by itself is an in-group
strategy or a collective identity that can create solidarity and collective
motivation within the ranks of the protesters.

According to Moscovici 1973, social representation provides a clear

picture of the "material and social world" of individuals, and also allows

25
them to classify their group according to their values and principles.
Furthermore, Höijer (2011: 5-6) summarizes the kind of group
perception that social representation theory takes into account through
the following notes:

1. Social representations refer to a process of creating new ideas that

differ from traditional opinions, which leads to many challenges with
regard to people, groups as well as institutions. These phenomena are
especially suitable for studying and producing new social
representations through public protest.

2. Social representations are formed through the general vision that

society creates for itself and may fall within the frameworks of large
societies and can also be found within small subgroups of people.

3. Social representations can be understood as complex and

comprehensive theory because they carry "metaphors and images that
include emotions, attitudes, and judgments". They are also an integral
part of interactional activities such as "dialogues, debates, media
discourses and scientific discourses".

4. Social representations indicate the awareness of communication in

public protest in order to know the similarities in opinions that reflect
the creation of "new social representations". This has to do with
politicized humor as a part of social representations, since protesters use
it to suggest new understandings to existing policies that need to be
changed.

Moscovici (1988) identified three forms of social

representations: hegemonic, polemic, and emancipated. All members
of society regularly share hegemonic representations and form
collective reality around a specific social issue (Deaux and Wiley

26
2007:11). Representations are so polemical that "different groups
actively disagree about a representation, putting forward competing
positions. Rather than being shared by the society at large" (Deaux and
Wiley 2007:11), they are determined by "antagonistic relations" and
"intended to be mutually exclusive" (Moscovici 1988: 221), that is why
they are elaborated in the context of an inter-group ideological conflict.
Emancipated representations also represent distinct group ownership
but are less polarizing, and instead able to coexist between subgroups
with "a certain degree of autonomy with respect to the interacting
segments of society" (Moscovici 1988: 221). Whether the
representation is polemic or emancipated, it reflects the "critical
implications for relationships between groups and how members of
different groups understand themselves" (Deaux and Wiley 2007:11).

Deaux and Wiley 2007 show the difference among these

representations stating that polemic representations differ from
hegemonic and emancipated representations to the extent that group
experiences and their meaning may differ sharply. As for hegemonic
and emancipated representations, they may differ according to the
degree of firmness in the history and experiences of the group.
Furthermore, they touch on the idea of positioning that is involved in
these representations saying:

In hegemonic representations, the group is positioned together

by virtue of its members’ shared experience. In emancipated
representations, groups are united by a central core but differ in
how that central core is anchored as a function of their group
history. In polemic representations, different experiences with
status lead devalued groups to establish new representations

27
 aimed at reframing the value of their group (Deaux and Wiley
2007 :26).

2.5.1.2.1 Communicative Mechanisms

This theory declares two fundamental mechanisms for basic social-

cognitive communication: anchoring and objectifying. Anchoring
"makes the unknown known by bringing it into a well-known sphere of
earlier social representations so that we may compare and interpret it",
so, it means that any unknown ideas or a new phenomenon may turn
over time to become more common and an integral part of a certain
society because it is linked to a familiar context or phenomenon. While
Objectifying "makes the unknown known by transforming it into
something concrete we may perceive and touch and thus control".
(Höijer 2011:7).

Actually, the matter of perceiving politicized humor protest posters as

a form of social representation depends on the design and content of
that poster. Despite the fact that the poster itself is an objectifying
process, it has come to be represented in different semiotic modes and
carries ideological themes within a socio-political context as a tangible
means of anchoring.

Höijer 2011 suggests a set of subcategories for these communicative

mechanisms to represent "conceptual analytical tools in empirical
analysis". Thus, anchoring mechanisms: "Naming, Emotional
anchoring, Thematic anchoring, Metaphoric anchoring, and
Anchoring via Basic Antinomies". Beginning with "Naming" which
reflects how a new or strange phenomenon must be named in order to
become more free and famous, in addition to removing the ambiguity
around it, for example, a new political group can be called terrorism.
Therefore, Naming is necessary to indicate the dimensions of the

28
phenomenon and its characteristics. It may reflect affection or hate
depending on the viewpoint of the social groups that use it as for
example, describing behavior as a terrorist and so on. "Emotional
Anchoring" refers to "a communicative process by which a new
phenomenon is fastened to well-known emotions". Through it, what is
unknown or obscure becomes known. Social phenomena or events may
be based on feelings of fear or imminent threat, or on feelings of anger,
or mercy. They are included through language, images, or
drawings. Thematic Anchoring can also occur at more essential
"thematic levels" through the application of "underlying categories of
meaning, antinomies such as life/death or culture/nature, etc., or by the
use of metaphors". It can be used to capture the deep structural layers of
social representations as fundamental ideas to produce and implement
new social representations while communicating with different
contexts. Such topics are built and maintained socially and culturally by
social processes, that is why, the interviews, for example, must go
beyond the vocabulary and visualizations used. Themes may be
visualized in ways that reflect the idea of ideology, such as "human
rights" placed in a culture or within classes. In general, anchoring in
Antinomies relies on the ability to distinguish or speak across
opposition. Human reasoning depends on the ability to reject and
present an argument in exchange for agreement and criticism. This
generates social tensions and complications that can lead to change and
growth (Höijer 2011:7-10). In the context of protest, the antinomies are
mainly embodied in defending the in- group versus accusing the out-
group, thus attributing everything positive to the former versus
describing the latter with everything negative to justify the protest.

2.5.1.2.2 Objectification

29
 Objectification renders the unknown identifiable by turning it into
something tangible that we can interpret through our senses and
experience. It is a kind of materialization of abstract ideas by
representing them in the physical world as concrete phenomena existing
there. Objectification is a process much more active than anchoring
which occurs almost automatically every time we face new phenomena.
Thus, objectification takes considerable work to turn an unfamiliar idea
into concrete reality. Thereby, a new complex and abstract phenomenon
is realized into familiar frames of references and transformed into
common sense in everyday life. ((Höijer 2011:7-10)).

Drawing on social representation theory, we in this context further see

politicized humor visualized in protest posters as a means for protesters
to express the views and beliefs of their group against the controversial
agenda of other group represented by politicians. Protest, in this
context, is the stage in which the protesters present their abstract ideas
to be a tangible reality that assesses their social environment, justifies
the social validity of their different choices and beliefs, legalizes their
behavior, and finally reflects their unity against their persecutors.
Moscovici’s social representation theory is also close or neighboring to
social identity theory that justifies any protest as will be explained in the
following section.

2.5.1.3 social identity theory (SIT)

Emerged in the 1970s, the theory of social identity by Tajfel and

Turner 1979 could be considered as a framework for understanding
collective actions from a "social-psychological perspective" (Van
Zomeren et al. 2008:507). It refers to "an individual’s membership in a
social group that offers him/her pride and self-worth, and prescribes
what is acceptable behavior – as a group member – towards outgroups"
30
(Aghabi et al.2017:4). Furthermore, it depicts a critical social
comparison between in-group and out-group in a specific context.
(Hogg 2016:6). Therefore, this theory fits the context of the protest
because it reflects the protesters' attempt to defend their identity and
guarantee their in-group rights at the expense of the out group against
whom they went out to protest.

Social identity according to Tajfel (1978: 63) refers to "the part of an

individual's self-concept which derives from his knowledge of his
membership of a social group (or groups) together with the value and
emotional significance attached to that membership".

Tajfel and Turner (1979) proposed that there are two mental processes
involved in evaluating others as “us” or “them” (i.e. “in-group” and
“out-group”. These are "Social Categorizations" and Social
Comparison".

2.5.1.3.1 Social Categorizations

They are considered as "cognitive tools that segment, classify, and

order the social environment, and thus enable the individual to
undertake many forms of social action. They create the individual's
place in society" (Tajfel and Turner 1979:40). So they refer to the
process of recognizing certain individuals as having common traits.

One of the consequences of the categorization process is that it

transcends the individuals' privacy to see them through "the lens of the
prototype of the category you have placed them in". Therefore, we as
individuals reflect the distinctive features of our group as Muslims,
blacks, immigrants, and so on. Therefore, the "in-group prototypes"
resulting from the categorization process are important not only in
showing similarities within the group but also in highlighting the

31
differences between an in-group and a specific out-group. This is what
is called "the social identity model of deindividuation" where it is
stripped of the personal level of an individual to simulate the behavioral
standards of the group to which that individual belongs (Hogg 2016: 8-
13).

2.5.1.3.2 Social Comparison

Once individuals become part of one group, they try to compare it with
other groups. Competition bias may push them to ensure positive
comparison through rivalry and hostility between groups. Thus, the
competing identities stem from the desire of individuals to differentiate
their group at the expense of others. (McLeod 2008:3).

What is determined by social identity summarizes one's perception of

social identity within the group. Therefore, in social comparison, people
try to highlight their positive distinctiveness associated with their
groups (e.g. giving more rewards to the in-group than the out-group),
and hence prove their relative position. In this case, positively evaluated
groups try to maintain their superiority, while marginal groups may
struggle to change their position and gain positivity (Hogg 2016:6).

2.5.1.4 Negative Social Status (Unsatisfactory Identity)

According to SIT, individuals want to focus on the positivity of their

group compared to other groups. So they formulate some differences to
account for their group. Within the context of the existence of such
social comparisons, SIT attempts to decode some of the strategies that
can be used in terms of social identity. So, "When a social comparison
leads to appropriate social identities (positive and distinctive)",
individuals try to preserve this superiority. However, "when social
comparisons lead to insufficient social identities", They try to improve

32
their social identity in various strategies (Kawakami and Dion 1995:
554), What are they? and how to manage them? is our next topic.

2.5.1.5 Identity Improvement Strategies

Individuals in low-status groups face the challenges of staying or

leaving their group in order to achieve their social identity. To manage
this, social identity theory specifies three strategies to improve a
negatively evaluated group status: "permeability vs.im permeability
of group boundaries, stability vs. instability of status inferiority,
and legitimate vs. illegitimate of status inferiority " (Mummendey et
al.1999:231; De Weerd, and Klandermans 1999:1075; Van Zomeren et
al. 2008:507). The first strategy refers to individuals attempting to leave
their group and become members of another group characterized by
greater positive evaluation (Ibid). Therefore, individuals, in this case,
prefer to identify their identity outside their lower-status groups.
However, under conditions of complete impermeability "that intergroup
boundaries are in fact hard and difficult to cross" (Hogg 2016:7), or if
individuals adhere to their belonging to in-group, regardless of its bitter
reality, the departure of the group may be an impossibility, but it opens
up horizons to participate in a protest that turns the bitter reality and
recovers the social identity of the group and its members. The second
strategy refers to "the extent to which status positions are stable or
variable"(Shankar 2017:2), so, when individuals conceive their negative
status as unstable that can be changed for the better by resorting to
collective actions such as protest and fighting injustice. Similarly, the
last strategy can be interpreted in two directions: "legitimate vs. illegiti-
mate", but, of course, its negative form provides the desired meaning in
this study, because protesters' belief in the illegality of laws in their
country is the main motive for their participation in the demonstrations.

33
Legitimacy may manifest itself positively in their struggle against these
arbitrary laws and in their trying to change their group's position for the
better (Kawakami and Dion 1995:557-558). Thus, identity improvement
strategies serve to mobilize people for social creativity.

2.5.1.6 Social Creativity

Social creativity is the process of translating discontent or individual

rejection into intense group work. It is in various forms, such as
demonstrations, sit-ins, carnivals, or the like, where group members or
sympathizers are massively mobilized to fulfill legitimate demands for
example, "Equality" or "against perceived social diseases such as
oppression." Also in this context, we cannot forget the important role of
leadership in the collective mobilization process because it is
represented by a person who can be trusted by group members (Hogg
2016: 13).

We did not dwell on social creativity because we addressed the protest,

which is one of its forms previously, our focus here is limited to the
concept of social creativity as an inevitable outcome of managing
identity strategies.

By social creativity, individuals of the low-status group try to maintain

positive distinctiveness. So, they change or redefine comparative
elements depending on various strategies (Tajfel and Turner 1979:43):

first, comparing the in-group to the out-group on some new dimension,

for example, demonstrating the legitimacy of in-group values, and in
turn reflecting the illegality of out-group concerning some issues.

Second, changing the values assigned to the attributes of the group,

so that comparison which was previously negative are now perceived as
positive. For example, black is beautiful.

34
Third, selecting the outgroup with which the in-group is compered.

2.5.1.7 Disparagement Humor

Introducing the explanation of aspects and strategies of social identity

theory, and then applying disparagement humor as a complementary
solution to the strategies of social creativity, helps in understanding the
motives that drive people to protest. It also shows at the same time the
importance of using humor in protest (see fig. 2). Where humor helps to
promote positive distinction by using freely sarcastic expressions since
it is a double-edged sword. As it contributes to communicating what
the protesters seek in terms of ironic and ridiculous phrases and images,
but its implications and impact are much deeper than direct statements.
To the extent that the result of "Triumph" which ends the model in fig.
(2), reflects everything related to reform and the desired goals of each
protest and as such, disparagement humor could be considered as a
decisive reaction to negative identity and an effective means of
restoring positive distinctiveness.

35
 Social Identity Theory

Social Categorization Social Comparison

Positive Social Status (Status Superiority) Negative Social Status (Status Inferiority)

Negative Social Identity

(Unsatisfactory Identity)

Identity Improvement
Strategies

Impermeability of Group Instability of Status Illegitimacy of Status

Boundaries Inferiority
Inferiority

Social Creativity (Social Protest)

New Comparative
Dimensions Redefining Group Values Selection the out-group

Superiority Theory (Disparagement Humor)

Positive Distinctiveness

Positive Social Status (Status Superiority)

Triumph

Figure (1) Merging the two theories (Superiority Theory and Social
Identity Theory) in one model, (mine)

36
 As shown in fig. (2), the researcher sees that merging the two theories
in one model can result in a broad theoretical framework. We know that
the theory of superiority is social, and the theory of social identity is
social-psychological. Therefore, each of them is complementary to the
other, especially as we deal with protesters' posters that reflect their
thoughts as well as their psychological and social motives as
individuals. Superiority theory can benefit from the psychological
aspects covered by the theory of social identity, as well as the latter
enhances its social outcome from the previous. Thus, the new reinforces
the old and adjusts it to appear satisfactory. In presenting some initial
explorations of how identity processes relate to superiority
(disparagement humor), it is useful to see the schematic diagram of the
model.

The theory of social identity can be a real reflection to the social

corrective of humor especially if it is applied to superiority theory or
disparagement humor as complementary to one another to restore
identity and repair reality through protest. The individual’s self-concept
is his or her self-evaluation. The social status of the in-groups is
compared to other (out-) groups to reflect an individual’s self-concept.
Thus, forms of social identity theory can be exploited to suit protesters
in their protest against politicians. Humor can be more convincing to the
protesters especially being the shield that can be used as a tool to
challenge authority (Meyer, 2000: 322). It is politicized humor with
multiple modes in posters of angry protesters to highlight socio-political
disorder and discontent in different political settings. The researcher
sees superiority theory under the name of disparagement humor sits

37
well with this study because it reflects disparaging phrases and images
in anti-Trump protest posters (see Chapter Four).

2.5.2 Psychanalytical (Relief Theory)

The problematic nature of laughter was framed by Bain and Spencer in

the nineteenth century. They pursued a logical comprehension of humor
that would be built on biology which combined a broader interpretation
of human nature and the growth of human culture (Billig, 2005: 6-7).
However, relief theory attained its highest level by Sigmund Freud
described the ability of laughter to discharge moods of tension (Masaeli,
2016: 230) and release excessive “psychic energy” (Curcó 1997:11).
Freud explained the existence of “psychic energy” in our body to stop
expressing emotional states that are not accepted by society. Then by
freeing such energy we laugh. So humor results from "releases of
energy that subconsciously overcome sociocultural inhibitions" (Meyer,
2000: 312).

In this type of humor, speakers tell jokes to start their comments in

order to deactivate a possibly stressed situation. Habitually stress
outcomes from inconsistency people sustain after taking a decision or
recognizing the approach of conflicting and unfavorable views or
actions. In this context, people use humor as a joyful way to decrease
inconsistency and add flexibility, and those who are able to do that have
the ability to create humor (Ibid).

According to Freud (1960: 67-68), relief theory has two

characteristics. First, it gives the opportunity for accumulated tension to
be released, this reflects its healing value, "Anyone who has allowed the
truth to slip out in an unguarded moment is, in fact, glad to be free of
the pretense". Second, humor is an act of masked hostility and

38
authorized resistance. “The joke then represents a rebellion against that
authority, a liberation from its pressure”.

In his theory, Freud presents two forms of jokes: "innocent" and

"tendentious" jokes. He indicated the purity of the former, it puts "the
problem of jokes before us in its purest form, since with them we avoid
the danger of being confused by their purpose or having our judgment
misled by their good sense" (Freud 1960:61).

Tendentious jokes imitate ideas that are responsible for the joke's
relief of suppressed emotions. In this case enjoyment consequences
from the covert hostility, we feel against particular individuals who are
in a more controlling status than us. According to Freud, these comic
situations have two purposes; either they work for expressing "hostility
and aggressiveness or obscenity and exposure". Freud describes the
tendentious jokes as an alternative to hostility, and he offers three
different types of them: "exposing or obscene jokes, aggressive or
hostile jokes and cynical (critical, blasphemous) jokes" (Freud
1960:73). Therefore, it could argue that the politicized humor displayed
at the protest posters understudy is more like an outlet to protesters’
‘masked hostility’ and ‘resistance’. This is a kind of revolt against those
dominant figures depicted in the collected data. It also reflects a kind of
freedom from the oppressive strain.

As a matter of fact, tendentious jokes are used to overcome "the

obstacle to the aggressiveness" that is why they could be employed for
the purpose of attacking other persons to express hostility, vindication,
and ascendancy (1960:67). Freud clarifies this kind of evidence about
tendentious jokes and adds:

The prevention of invective or of insulting rejoinders by

external circumstances is such a common case that tendentious

39
 jokes are especially favoured in order to make aggressiveness
or criticism possible against persons in exalted positions who
claim to exercise authority. The joke then represents a
rebellion against that authority, a liberation from its pressure.
(Freud 1960:67).

Thus, the hidden intent of hostile humor is to strike an enemy by

making him low, weak, disgusting, or funny, and gaining the pleasure
of overcoming him indirectly.

Concerning "Obscene jokes", they show "exposure" due to the fact that
they are basically of sexual quality. They help to get over repression
and to satisfy disgraceful ideas that persons usually repress because
their tenor is normally looked at as inadmissible. Therefore, when a
joke is not an aim in itself, it is not an innocent one, it is either
tendentious or obscene joke. "Innocent jokes", as a term, refers to
laughter at strange events, illogicality, and silliness. Laughter here is
then more like a result of the incongruity principle in this nonsense
humor(Ibid:63).

So, in contrast to tendentious jokes which display hostility, innocent

jokes evolve pleasure of their content. This pleasure "is no doubt
correctly to be attributed to economy in psychical expenditure"
(1960:75). Humor in relief theory is therefore seen as a sort of liberation
from all that is prevented by standard socio-cultural norms.

2.5.3 Cognitive (Incongruity Theory)

Unlike relief theory that focuses on feelings, incongruity theories

concentrate on cognitive processes that recognize and resolve a text.
This theory has been clarified by many thinkers who claim that the
funniest nature of humor is due to the incongruous or surprising
elements presented by humorous materials, this is the core of congruity
40
theory which is originated by Kant, Schopenhauer, and Spencer. Kant
(1724–1804) sees incongruity as "[h]umour where the punchline or
resolution is inconsistent or incongruous with the set-up" (McCreaddie
and Wiggins, 2008: 585). Also, he explains that anything planned as a
source of laughter should be ridiculous and he refers to laughter as "an
affection arising from the sudden transformation of a strained
expectation into nothing" (Kant, 1914:133). He infers humor in light of
incongruity to be the result of perception or thought that disputes with
what is anticipated. However, Schopenhauer provides more about the
natural conflict between the sensual and abstract realization of people
concerning the same objects. He states that "the cause of laughter in
every case is simply the sudden perception of the incongruity between a
concept and the real objects which have been thought through it in some
relation, and laughter itself is just the expression of this
incongruity"(Morreall, 1983:17).

This necessitates the two contradictory meanings in the creation of

humor since the first two parts of the joke (the introduction and the
main part) could arouse particular anticipation, then this ends up with
the exposure of "the punch line" which offers unanticipated and
incompatible part of information makes our anticipation disappear.
This, in turn, creates a kind of inconsistency that provokes laughter and
surprise. Dynel (2013:5-14) specifies the importance of the punch line
in creating a surprised and unpredicted incongruity since, in the first
stage, the recipient relies on the text, then he/she is obliged to use "a
cognitive rule" in order to resolve it in the second stage. Therefore,
humor is produced through cooperation of two stages: the first that
provokes the incongruity; and the second that resolves this incongruity.

41
 Thus, incongruity mixes two different concepts in one situation to
reflect a kind of ambiguity that could be resolved by resolution. In
Shultz (1972: 469-74), the function of resolution is developing and has
two stages: an initial stage in which the appreciation is concerned with
"pure incongruity" only and an advanced stage to reflect an appreciation
of resolved incongruity. Rothbart and Pien (1977) also distinguish
between "possible and impossible incongruities" to show the possibility
of complete resolution for the former and impossibility of getting it in
the latter. This by itself could be a sufficient justification for Paulos's
claim that ‘incongruity theory’ is not "a sufficient condition for humor"
(1992: 9). Humor is basically a social phenomenon from the viewpoint
of incongruity theory because it relies on the infringement of perceived
social and cultural norms (Meyer, 2000: 313).

In the context of comparison, incongruity theorists do not ignore

superiority and relief theories of humor, but proposed that incongruity
humor depends on cognitive and intellectual ability to find a possible
"consistency within internal frames and external environment". instead
of a desire to feel ‘superior’ or ‘to release tension’ as shown in the
previously explained theories. In other words, humor according to this
theory could be achieved by finding the relationship between the
"perceived event and the expected norm". Moreover, they suggest that
incongruity theory differs from superiority in the fact that the latter
justifies the reason of using humor by the in-group in order to reflect its
superiority over the out-group and achieve "exclusive membership",
while the former offers another justification that is "to establish a values
set or ideology which can be interpreted and enforced in an incoherent
environment" (Lynch, 2002: 428).

42
 Based on that, humor theorists differed in their judgments about
which one of these theories is more applicable than others since
supporters of each theory claim that all examples of humor could be
explained by their theory but contemporary humor scholars consider
these theories as "complementary", because despite the fact that each
humor theory has its own emphasis, but many examples of humor could
be clarified by the combination of them (Meyer, 2000). Lynch (2002:
425), in turn, supported Meyer on this matter and reinforced that with a
figure below:

Figure (2): Humor as Overlapping Motivational Theories (Lynch

2002:430)

As shown in fig. (1), the researcher sees that each one of these three
theories adds to the comprehension of humor with something important,
but no one offers the complete explanation. This adds to the complexity
of humor which is not just one thing, but a term that has a close
connection with emotion, cognition, as well as social relationships in

43
small groups, and the society as a whole. As in Palmer (1994: 5), the
desire for one theory to describe all this seems impractical. The theory
of incongruity for example describes the cognitive process that must be
present to elicit humor. The theory of relief justifies why people use
humor in a certain situation or laugh at a specific joke. Superiority
theory reflects certain offensive types of humor. In view of this, the
overlapping nature of the theories of humor has been taken into account
in the process of data collection and analysis for a better understanding
of the research issue.

The relationship between humor theories and its functions is as

follows: the incongruity theory is associated with both the clarification
and the differentiation functions to establish a values set or ideology
which can be interpreted in a particular environment; the relief
psychological theory relates to the identification function in order to
reflect the in-group identity and the superiority theory relates to the
three functions of identification, enforcement, and differentiation
because it suggests that the in-group uses humor to separate itself from
the out-group and in this separation gains exclusive membership (i.e. a
sense of superiority). Therefore, the role of humor in communication is
not only limited to a humorous effect; it can also be generalized to
generate certain rhetorical functions found in communicative messages.
Hence the four rhetorical functions are known to be effect-based
functions that can either unify communicators and their audience or
separate them (Meyer 2000:317-323).

2.6 Humor in Politics

With an emphasis on PH, it is important to briefly illuminate how this

potentially works with what ‘political’ means. ‘Political’ is originated
from the Greek term "polis", to mean a specific type of "human
44
community". Previously, ‘Polis’ means the city castle, but later its
meaning expanded to include the whole inhabitants "who were active in
their business and politics" (Miller, 1980: 6). Kelshaw (2006) defines
"political" as whatever exists "in those innumerable interstices and
intersections of interpersonal and societal relating". He (Ibid) also states
that we could be “always participants in political relationships,
processes, and structures, all of which exceed formal jurisdictions”
(cited in Peifer 2012:266).

PH could function in two contradictory directions concerning

producers and their targets. On one hand, it is used by politicians in
political environments such as "parliaments, political debates,
interviews", etc., as they mix humor with their formal speeches in order
to expose their opponents' negative image and therefore, undermining
them. In doing that, politicians employ an exclusive role of humor.
Nevertheless, politicians' use of humor may also imply an inclusive
feature of humor by projecting a positive self-image to increase their
popularity. In this situation, politicians seek to prove that they share a
sense of humor with ordinary people that might increase the chance of
getting as many people as possible to support them (Tsakona and Popa,
2011: 5).

Humor in this case can help in the "personalization of politicians

through media". A politician who participates in a comic show on
television or through social media is looking to a greater number of
voters. In fact, this process affected the political reality as politicians
exploited that "visual medium" to their advantage. Therefore, "political
humor is the basis … [which is the] effective tool for politicians [that
would] either make themselves more accessible to the public or their
opponents less attractive" (Sánchez 2017: 5).

45
 Despite its exceeding growth of use in the speeches of politics, PH
can serve as a "powerful source of political information" which can
make a kind of political change among those who receive this
discourse" (Sánchez 2017: 8). It is said that the language that politicians
use in such discourses is of two types: public language and private
language. Public language is the language of "political institutions and
processes", which can be distinguished through politicians' use of the
pronouns "we" and "us". As for the second type, politicians may use it
when describing their "experiences and perspectives", using the
pronoun "I". (Sanchez, 2017: 17).

On other hand, PH could be produced by ordinary people through a

variety of genres such as "jokes, cartoons, TV or radio satirical shows,
humorous websites", etc. In such cases, humor is directed towards
politicians and the goal is to ridicule the inadequacy of their political
performances (Tsakona and Popa, 2011: 5). In such a socio-political
system, PH can be approached as a way of acting and the importance of
humor in the interplay between personality and political institutions
could be demonstrated by a variety of humor functions. For example, a)
expressing the social identity of in-group versus out-group, b)
enhancing "public control", and c) communicating what might not
usually be accepted (Genova 2014:2).

It is worth noting that the process of perceiving PH is determined by

an individual's knowledge of politics because the former is an important
tool among other tactics of the latter. Politics on one point, "is always a
struggle for power. Along with persuasion and lies, advice and flattery,
tokens of esteem and bribery, banishment and violence, obedience and
treachery". Thus, PH can be considered as a weapon whether it services
offensive or defensive purposes (Speier, 1998:1354).

46
Alison Dagnes justifies the recent use of PH saying that:

[p]eople increasingly seek out political humor because the news

today is bad. It is bad in the sense that we live in difficult times
with war, economic hardship, and an angry, polarized political
climate. In times of political dissatisfaction, humor is a powerful
salve; this helps to explain the burgeoning satire environment we
have today (2012: 3).

In this work, humor in politics will be studied from a different

perspective, it is PH in protest that is directed by ordinary people to
criticize politics and those in power such as presidents through their
targeted protest posters. From the perspective of this work, that PH is
one of the possible means for people to ‘express ’, ‘challenge’, ‘judge’,
‘criticize’ and ‘change’ ideologies, politicians and systems.

In particular, PH highlights contradictions and inadequacies in

government decisions and actions. Typically, it is focused on the reality
of politics, pointing out its incongruous nature since political affairs and
politicians are not what they are supposed to be. Political systems, on
the other hand, may create a historical reality based on their views,
principles, and judgments about what is valid and reasonable.
Therefore, PH is based on an idealized view of politics, the criticism
expressed exposes the tacit and common-sense opinions on how to
conduct politics (Tsakona and Popa, 2011: 6).

The use of PH as a strong weapon for criticism suggests its serious

role, which can lead to serious results. However, Gregor Benton
concludes his chapter on Soviet political jokes, with opposite statement,
that these jokes are not resistance forms because they cannot change
anything to the extent that the intelligent repressive regime allows the

47
mockers to make a joke about it as a smarter guarantee for the system
against more serious challenges. He claims that

The political joke will change nothing... It reflects no political

programme. It will mobilise no one. Like the Jewish joke in its time,
it is important for keeping society sane and stable.. It has the virtue
of momentarily freeing the lives of millions from the tensions and
frustrations to which even the best organised political opposition can
promise only longterm solutions, but its impact is a fleeting as the
laughter it produces (Benton 1988: 54).

Similarly, Tsakona and Popa (2011: 2) maintained that instead of

making radical changes in the political system, politicized humor may
only add to the mockery and resistance because its serious role is
limited to the encouragement of critical thinking about the usefulness of
government decisions and activities, "humor sometimes manages to
enhance commonsensical views on political affairs rather than to
promote radical thinking". Thus, they restrict the purpose of using
humor in political context into "two functions: it conveys criticism
against the political status quo and it recycles and reinforces dominant
values and views on politics".

Also, in her study on democracy, opinion formation, and political

satire, Popa (2011: 137) supports the statement that "humor can hardly
work as a corrective of poor political behavior and cannot inspire
reform. Subsequently, it can merely function as a medium for protest
and critique".

However, other scholars offer another perspective. For example, in

their study "Stripping the Boss: The Powerful Role of Humor in the
Egyptian Revolution 2011" Helmy and Frerichs show the exceptional
power of humor to be a "resource in power battles" (2013: 451). During

48
this Revolution, Egyptian use humor to attack the dictator in a hostile
but peaceful manner, in addition to its role as a relief of stress.
Furthermore, the authors even go so far as to conclude that without the
widespread use of President Mubarak's open mockery and other forms
of public humor, the demonstrators would not have been able to
accomplish their occupation of Tahrir Square for the 18 days that were
needed to bring Mubarak down (Helmy and Frerichs 2013: 469).

2.6.1 Political Humor: Previous Studies

Many scholars have contributed with insights through their studies

focusing on politicized humor in different directions, some of them
dealt with as an act of politicians, others dealt with in terms of people
resistance against those politicians, so they analyzed for example
political jokes and caricatures that embody this resistance, while others
made an inventory of political jokes in different contexts for the sake of
comparison. Therefore, it is important to discuss the previously
published scholarly studies, for more critical understanding.

There is a study by Antonin J. Obrdlik entitled "Gallows humor" in

Czechoslovakia under the Nazi regime. Obrdlik (1942) uses this term to
describe anti-Nazi jokes, ‘Gallows humor’ depends on the intended
meaning of the word because it seeks a specific goal rather than only
laughter. Obrdlik summarizes two social functions of gallows humor.
The first manifests itself in increasing the morale of the resistance
fighters in their struggle to prove their national existence. while the
second, displays humor as a force to break down the powers to which it
is driven. Obrdlik goes further than that to rely on ‘Gallows humor’ to
measure the actual strength of politicians because if they do not take it
seriously, this is evidence of their strength. But their disintegration and

49
disdain could be clear if they deal with those who adopt it with cruelty
and violence.

Another study in the context of PH is Don L. F. Nilsen's "The Social

Functions of Political Humor" (1990). Nilsen classifies the political
joke as per their social function when it is told by politicians or political
commentators. From the perspective of the "politician himself", the
function of humor is to " define political concepts, to disarm critics, to
establish detente, to establish a position or make a point, to in bond, to
relieve tension, and to provide a substitute for actual physical or
military confrontation. Humor also can be used from the political critic's
perspective to "expose chauvinism, to expose ineptitude, to expose
oppression, and to expose pretentiousness" (1990: 35).

There is also a study by Hans Speier's "Wit and Politics: An essay on

Laughter and Power (1998). Speier separates his content into groups
such as "The Diversionary and soothing Jokes," "The Healing Jokes,"
"The Cynical Political Jokes," etc. He focuses on the function of humor
in politics and power and sees it as another way to fight for power,
along with flattery, corruption, and aggression.

Another study by Alexander Rose, "When Politics Is a Laughing

Matter," (2002) is looking at political jokes. He discusses the variations
between jokes in democracy and jokes under dictatorial rule. In a
democracy, he notes that the attention is on individual leaders and their
private flaws, but not their policies. However, in authoritarian societies,
PH is directed towards the government and its leaders' policy rather
than individual politicians.

From a purely sociological point of view, Davis's book "Jokes and

their Relation to Society" examines political jokes and those about

50
stupidity in the previous Soviet Union. Davies points out that jokes
directed against a specific group are not an indication of the
marginalization of that group or the existence of a social conflict, and
this was proven through interviews quoted with people interested in
launching these jokes. After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the turmoil
that followed, especially in countries ruled by dictators who control the
smallest details of peoples' social life, in this time those jokes about
stupidity turned into political jokes directed against those in power or
politics, and despite the fact that these jokes show dissatisfaction and
system disruption, Davis argues that they do not help or prevent active
resistance.

In 2014, Deepa Anagondahalli and Sahar Khamis conducted a study

to analyze politicized humor against Mubarak before and during the
Egyptian Revolution. They see that before the revolution it was mainly
in the form of long tale jokes. While a new kind of humor arose during
the protest and with the aid of social media, it's more public, brief,
simple, and short tweets, which all capture the protesters ' serious intent
to make a change. That is why they argue that politicized humor is a
crucial element of social activism and a powerful weapon for political
rebellion.

Against this background, the present study takes a different direction

by dealing with politicized humor in protest context embodied in multi
semiotic protest posters to be employed for political reformation.

2.6.2 Political Humor in Protest

As a PH as concept has been explained earlier (section 2.6), this

section will start giving an overview on protest. As a term, the protest
has its roots in the Latin word "protestari" which means to assert

51
publically (Ravi 2017:1). Actually, all scholars agree that the term
"protest" refers to behavior. But there is a discrepancy among them
about the kind of that behavior. For example, activities that are
discussed by social movement scholars and categorized as protest
actions demand change to prevent government action, like antiwar
protests. In this sense, Lipsky (1968:1145) defines protest activity "as a
mode of political action oriented toward objection to one or more
policies or conditions, characterized by showmanship or display of an
unconventional nature, and undertaken to obtain rewards from political
or economic systems while working within the system".

On the other hand, for Turner (1969), the act of protest includes
subsequent elements:

The action expresses a grievance, a conviction of wrong or

injustice; the protestors are unable to correct the condition directly
by their own efforts; the action is intended to draw attention to the
grievances; the action is further meant to provoke ameliorative
steps by some target group; and the protestors depend upon some
combination of sympathy and fear to move the target group in
their behalf (cited in Opp, 2009: 35).

Similarly, Ravi 2017:1 defines Protest as "a phenomenon marked by

discomfort, disapproval, disagreement, and dissent, and triggered due to
the awareness and recognition of injustice, grievance, and a shared
sense of belongingness to a group".

The common features of these definitions reflect the meaning of

protest as an action or behavior done by a group of individuals. So it is
"a joint action […] (i.e. collective) action of individuals aimed at
achieving their goal or goals by influencing decisions of a target" (Opp,
2009: 38). This implies the fact that there is at least one common goal

52
that unites the actors or protesters that is why they "mobilize" resources
in order to establish a particular social movement to influence the
target's decision. Hence, social movements "are better defined as
collective challenges, based on common purposes and social
solidarities, in sustained interaction with elites, opponents, and
authorities" (Tarrow, 2011: 9).

Humor found its way into the language of the protests through
posters and graphics and other participants produced placards, crop
images, and memes. Humor can also be used as a powerful means of
socio-political protests. It is the weapon of the weak. It helps in getting
the message across, assists to put the finger on salient points, and
attracts attention to adverse social conditions. It is known that political
protests are no more than a result of tensions running high of which
laughter is a possible way to relieve. Discussing political discontent via
utilizing a comic approach assists protesters to express their beliefs and
horror, which is in a way that is cathartic and healing. This is how the
conversation about the ‘absurdity’ of politics of less tense become
easier with the use of humor, but without sacrificing its meaning (Hart
2007).

Knowing the roles of humor may help explain the reason for using
humor by some protests while others are not. According to Hart (Ibid:
8), the use of humor as a real strategy that relies on (a) the framing
which refers to "how a situation is interpreted by those engaged in
social protest", (b) the creation of a collective identity of 'us' versus
'them' and (c) the need to counteract the negative emotions connected
with protest groups and exploit the advantages of humor as a motivation
for participants of a social movement.

53
 Successful framing is of vital significance to social movements as it
fosters resource recruitment processes. In addition to framing, more
attention has been paid to the idea of "collective identity in social
movements" over the past decades. During the 19th century, For
example, British protesters defined themselves as "supporters of [::],
opponents of […], leaders of […]", they determined their position with
regard to behavior by elected authorities'. Collective identities also refer
to "protest style, action repertoires, organizational styles, level of
moderation or radicalism, tactics and statements", and other
characteristics that separate ''us'' from ''them" (Hart 2007: 9,10).

In her study of the Serbian Movement Resistance, Sorensen (2008:

175) claims that humor can be a powerful nonviolent resistance strategy
to oppression, it renders three functions: (a) "[f]acilitating outreach and
mobilization concerning the relationship with people outside the
movement;"(b) "[f]acilitating a culture of resistance "within the
resistance movement— building solidarity and strengthening the
individual’s capacity for participating in resistance"; and (c) "[t]urning
oppression upside down". Thus humor can be used as a powerful
weapon in the hands of the oppressed to resist the oppressor and change
reality for the better.

As Sorensen (2008:180-1) states that humor helps in decreasing fear

inside the resistance group, while at the same time reducing "the
oppressor’s options for reacting in a way he can later justify". Humor
may thus peacefully undermine oppression and violence, taunt the
oppressor, and deprive him of the ability to use his normal violent
confrontational means. such "provocation" has been experienced by
many movements, including the Serbian movement, that is why
Sorensen interprets humor as a device that "turns the world upside

54
down". As Febrer's claim "political humor can open up the space for
critics by bringing down the first layer of fear" (Febrer 2012: 46).
Accordingly, humor could be seen as one of the tactics to protest
against power by "hijacking the regime’s narrative and reverse its
meaning, to expose the absurdity or the inconsistency of the discourse
with the deeds and reality" (Ibid: 32).

Within the context of socio-psychological effects Moalla (2013: 6)

indicates two forms of humor that enabled Tunisian protesters to deal
with fear, and misunderstanding caused by Ben Ali's fall and the
subsequent actions, the first form is "third party insult", since using
humor against Ben Ali enabled them to build unity, convey hostility and
critique while the second type is the "creating alternate reality" which
also offers people the opportunity to acquire a sort of relief and freedom
from the injustice of their ruler in previous years.

Mascha examined the function of PH in opposing Mussolini

authoritarian fascist government from 1919 to 1925. She states that
during this period, several attempts were directed in order to censor the
press and control the media (2011:193). In her conclusion, Mascha
(Ibid:211) argues that PH used by "the Italian counter-hegemony
movement of the 1920s" contributed a lot in terms of "politically
educating the illiterate masses through laughter", leading indirectly to
the fall of the dictatorship in the mid-1930s. Thus, through its direct role
in enhancing the publics' awareness and subsequently their involvement
in the movement of resistance, PH may lead indirectly to the overthrow
of the fascist dictatorship. Humor is therefore a mild way to express
criticism of the government, and avoid any potential threat, that is why
it may be one of the most important means of the protest.

55
 Depending on the results of these studies and due to the importance of
humor in protest context, the researcher sees humor in politics as a
"process" that protesters exploit to achieve their desired goals. They are
intentionally politicizing it in order to correct wrong practices and
decisions. The gaining of politicized humor with its reformist tendency
can go back to 1923 with the founding of critical theory, our next
section.

2.6.3 Critical Theory

In 1923, a diverse group of philosophers, cultural critics, and

sociologists formed the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt,
Germany. Known as the Frankfurt School, it is a philosophical social
and political movement of thought located in Frankfurt, Germany. It is
the original source of what is known as critical theory. A group of stars
was left-wing theorists, including Walter Benjamin, Theodore Adorno,
Eric Fromm, Habermas, Max Horkheimer, and Herbert Marcuse who
sought to diagnose and treat community diseases. The Frankfurt school
consisted mostly of neo-Marxists who had hoped for a socialist
revolution in Germany, but instead, they had fascism in the form of the
Nazi Party and in 1933 forced it to close and move to the United States,
where it found hospitality at Columbia University, New York. Concepts
such as style and agency, alienation and monotheism, culture industry,
repressive tolerance, non-identity, and utopia are explained and
discussed through this theory. It became the first non-official institute of
Marxists in Europe. Under its most influential director Max
Florkheimer, its members tried to review both Marxist criticism of
capitalism and the theory of revolution in order to confront those new
social and political conditions that had evolved since Marx's death. In
this process, a critical theory of "society" emerged to deal with those

56
aspects of social reality which Marx and his Orthodox followers had
neglected or underestimated (Bronner 2009:1).

The critical theory promotes a non-linguistic viewpoint that is driven

by a belief in liberation from all types of oppression, as well as a
commitment to democracy, prosperity, and a fair social structure.
Avoiding distinctions between humanities and social sciences, as it
provides a standard social theory that aims to contribute to empirical
studies of the contemporary world. As a member, Habermas
summarizes the central concepts of critical theory. This includes the
necessity for "analyze 1) the new mechanisms of political integration
within post-liberal societies; 2) the forms of familial socialization and
ego-development; 3) the role of mass media and mass culture; and 4)
the potential for crisis and the contemporary possibilities for protest
especially with respect to the “new social movements” which have
assumed such political importance" (Bronner and Kellner 1989:2-21).

The interest of critical theory in mankind's emancipation links it to

some ancient facts. It is one of the philosophies of preserving that
individual should be more than just a subject that can be exploited in the
class society development process. An individual's position that
determines his ideological acceptance is his membership in groups of
socio-professional, fraternal, religious, and the like. Those groups
choose and advertise various types of ideas for social and historical
purposes, whether formal or informal. There is reason to believe that
individuals, through their desire for unity, belonging and belief and by
mechanisms such as imitation and conditioning, almost always follow
the distinct views, behaviors, and values of communities from which
they are members (Adorno et al.1989: 229-230).

57
 In this sense, the dialectic of liberation that the founders of this theory
care about is building a free society that relies primarily on the spread
of the vital need to abolish the existing slavery systems at that time;
secondly, it depends on vital commitment, effort, awareness, conscious
and subconscious, for values the qualitative quality of free human
existence. Marcuse 1989 stresses the importance of these two demands,
saying:

Without the emergence of such new needs and satisfactions,

the needs and satisfactions of free men, all change in the social
institutions, no matter how great, would only replace one
system of servitude by another system of servitude... The
development of the new institutions must already be carried
out and carried through by men with the new needs (Marcuse
1989: 278).

Thus, critical theory can be described as the way in which knowledge

can be employed in ideology critique and social liberation to become a
social critique of transforming reality. These are the basic
responsibilities that critical social theory must do in order to define it as
"critical." It is crucial in this sense to understand and criticize the
concept of "ideology". In this context, politicized humor is an attempt to
do that since it can be used as a form of revolutionary action or a
weapon against the dominant ideologies.

Following the principles of critical theory, politicized humor should

not by any means be framed in contrast to ‘seriousness’. where it is
seriously intended. It is a reform based not only on diagnosing ill-
formed practices, but also on remedying them to ensure a better future
and build a free society. In light of this, humor is a weapon in the hands
of revolutionaries (the protesters in this work) to criticize and correct
58
Trump's controversial agenda and change the status quo (see Chapter
Four).

2.6.4 Politicized Humor in Multimodal Protest Posters

On January 21, 2017, just one day after Donald Trump was
inaugurated, the ‘Women March’ took place in Washington. While the
protesters tried to include everything they believed would condemn
Trump and question the legitimacy of his victory. They touched upon
important and fateful issues in the socio-political arena (see Chapter
Four). The slogans they use, sum up the barbarity of Trump's policy,
which he announced during his election campaign, and reflect
protesters' negative impression towards him.

What women respond to their identity threat (embodied in Trump's

insulting terms of women) is mirrored in multimodal posters that use
disparagement humor to produce a positive distinctiveness for their in-
group (as women) at the expense of the outgroup (Trump), so their
representation reflects elevation, superiority, and triumph as opposed to
who is less, inferior, and defeated. Politicized humor has come to be
exploited as ideas and practices to establish an intended multimodal
poster which works as a "code" allowing protesters to name and classify
their values, change the position of their group for the better, and
reinforce a sense of unity among in-group members. Thus, different
semiotic modes contribute well to conveying important ideological
issues within a socio-political context as a concrete means of positive
social identity.

In this context, tendentious protest posters give way to the protesters

to express their hostility against Trump or criticize his brutal policy,
their verbal and non-verbal slogans represent a rebellion against his

59
authority and a liberation from its pressures (see Freud 1960). Thus the
intent of these posters is to strike Trump by making him inferior, weak,
disgusting, or funny, and to gain the pleasure of defeating him
indirectly.

Besides, approaching politicized humor via the irony and surprise of

humor content assists the protesters to demystify the viewer, and reveal
facts, it further simulates the incongruous nature of those in power.
Protesters in ‘Women March’ deliberately shed light on how Trump
contradicts his reality regarding certain decisions and statements that
pervaded his election campaign, and they responded with the same
incongruity to clarify the facts and surprise the viewers with his naked
truth. The small hands they attributed to him in a parody representation
contradict his alleged ability to build a wall between America and
Mexico. They also sarcastically predicted his damage from the
immigration ban, to imply a purposeful incongruity, as two of his wives
(Ivana and Melania) are immigrants (Frates 2015). Thus, multimodal
humor can be politicized to expose, resist and fight ill-formed practices
and decisions of authorities

2.6.5 Humor in Multimodal Politicized Protest Posters

2.6.5.1 Humor: A Linguistic Perspective

Given that verbal humor is a Linguistic behavior of human beings, it

has become the core of research in linguistics. Both Raskin's script-
based semantic theory of humor (1985) and Attardo and Raskin's
General Theory of Verbal Humor (1991) mirror the central role humor
has in linguistics. Beginning with Raskin (1985), he outlines the first
formal semantic theory of jokes that became known as the Semantic
Script Theory of Humor (SSTH) due to its reliance on the concept of

60
"script" (a structured chunk of information about lexemes and/or parts
of the world). The SSTH can be described as two necessary and
sufficient conditions for a text to be funny: (1) the text is compatible,
fully or in part, with two distinct scripts; and (2) the two distinct scripts
are opposite (i.e., the negation of each other, if only for the purpose of a
given text), according to a list of basic oppositions, such as real/unreal,
possible/ impossible, etc. (Raskin, 1985: 99 and Ruch, 2008: 25).

In addition, this theory involves only verbal humor: written and

spoken words used in jokes that end with a punch line "(Raskin, 1985:
99). A script represents a word's lexical meaning, in his definition of the
scripts, Raskin maintains that they are directly related and triggered by
lexical items. Each script will therefore have a lexemic hold that causes
it to be activated at the end of the joke, the punch line, makes the
listeners or readers shift their awareness from the primary or more
obvious script to oppositional or secondary script, here, humor is
aroused (Masaeli, 2016: 222). As an example, Raskin practices the
following joke:

("Is the doctor at home?” the patient asked in his bronchial whisper.
"No", the doctor's young and pretty wife whispered in reply. "Come
right in.")

It is compatible with the two scripts "doctor" and "lover" and the scripts
are opposite on the sex vs. non-sex basis" (Raskin, 1985: 104).

Raskin reinforced his theory with an applied part in which he chose

three thematic categories of jokes to illustrate how the proposed
analysis could be made: racial, sexual, and political jokes. Regarding
the political jokes, the subject of our study, Raskin collected his data
(which are jokes from the 1890s) from different languages and cultures

61
such as the former Soviet Union, Germany, Central Europe, etc. in an
attempt to make his theory comprehensive and able to explain jokes
from different contexts. These jokes have been translated by Raskin into
English, and they relate to prominent political figures such as Hitler,
Mussolini, as well as people within well-known institutions such as
Nazism, liberalism, etc.

The application of his theory to political jokes led him to classify them
into two classes: Denigration jokes and Exposure jokes. The first
class targeting "a person, a group, an idea, or the whole society"; It
denigrates politicians by showing them as stupid, hated, and unknown.
Denigration is also directed at their members, slogans, and institutions.
The other class is targeted at “a political regime as a whole and contain
[ed] a reference to an event or series of events, which are not widely
publicized, and quite often actively suppressed by the regime". It
includes jokes that highlight hidden or censored facts, such as political
repression (i.e. killings, arrests, and lack of freedom of speech (Raskin
1985: 222).

Being limited to the semantic concepts of humor, "Raskin's script-

based semantic theory of humor" (1985) is revised in Attardo and
Raskin’s (1991) "general theory of verbal Humor" (GTVH). GTVH is
considered a broad linguistic theory to encompass other parts of
linguistics, in particular, "textual linguistics, the theory of narrativity,
and pragmatics". Such expansions are accomplished by adding five
knowledge resources (KR), which, in addition to the SSTH script
opposition, must be used when generating a joke, the KRs are the script
opposition (SO), the logical mechanism (LM), the target (TA), the
narrative strategy (NS), the language (LA), and the situation (SI)
(Attardo, 1994: 223).

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 To explain, the script opposition, from the original SSTH; language is
the precise expression of a joke in terms of the linguistic choices of the
text; the LM is "the genre" of the joke or how the text is systematized
where it covers the incongruity solution introduced in the opposition
script. it also shows the manner in which both scripts are combined.; the
situation is the surroundings of the joke. TA selects the butt of the joke.
For example, jokes that are not offensive (i.e., don't insult anyone or
anything) have an empty meaning. The NS embodies the fact that any
joke must flow into a particular form of narrative organization as a
framed dialogue or novel method. The primary argument of GTVH is
that the six KRs are "hierarchically" organized, so choices in the lower
knowledge resources are influenced by abstract, higher knowledge
resources. Similar differences are mirrored in the speaker's similar
assessments, with jokes being viewed as more distinct based on higher
information resources. For example, two jokes with different script
oppositions (such as stupid versus sex joke) would be more different
than two jokes with different targets (Polish and Belgian jokes, Attardo
and Raskin, 1991: 204-297).

2.6.5.2 Humor: Multimodal Perspective

Some studies in PH depend on Raskin’s SSTH and its revised version

GTVH (i.e. Hassaine 2014; Anagondahalli and Khamis 2014; Hatab
2016), because their study addresses verbal humor from a purely
linguistic perspective, they search for the linguistic reasons behind
verbal humor in jokes or comedy shows within the framework of
traditional literacy for reading and writing. However, what this study
deals with goes further than that to include also the "visual literacy" of
individuals within the so-called multimodal discourse that adopts
discourse design by exploring representations of different semiotic tools

63
such as "expression, gestures, and images" circulated through different
modalities as well as their application in the formation of a multi-media
coherent text. (Lim 2004: 220-221). It aims to explore and discuss the
multimodal representation of politicized humor in protest as the
protesters seek to exploit all modes of knowledge (i.e. verbal and non-
verbal) in their protest posters to be persuasive enough to criticize and
address the negative practices of politicians so that each mode
reinforces the other Within a collaborative framework (see Chapter
Three).

In this regard, protesters use their image-word posters to critically

question the socio-political reality surrounds them. It is one of the
possible means for them to deliver their messages to different audiences
and reform what they consider politically wrong. Thus, these posters
could be in more than one mode to be able to fulfill the purpose. This in
itself justifies dealing with these posters as a multimodal discourse
integrating both images and language. With the use of multimodal
analysis, the research will be assisted to consider verbal and non-verbal
modes of expression. This would help to better understand knowledge
with regard to politicized humor in its different forms and shapes (see
Kress, 2003 and Gee, 2008).

As to the probability of calling the protest poster a "discourse," with

multimodal representation, it depends on certain scholars. For example,
Bloor and Bloor (2013: 6-7) refers to six various meanings of discourse,
most of them allow it to be used in this context. First: It is human
interaction through any means, verbal and non-verbal. Second: It is a
spoken interaction only. Third: It represents the whole communicative
event with reference to production and comprehension. Fourth: it refers
to the communication in a situational context in a certain domain, such

64
as the discourse of politics or education. Fifth: it is a text that is spoken
or written. Sixth: it is a multi-modal which depends on different modes
of communication. For instance, it combines words with images at the
same time.

Based on that, discourse in this context is defined as the non-verbal

multimodal use of language in the socio-political context for protest-
related meanings. A definition like this helps to reflect the particular
role protesters understudy pretend to have through the use of language
and other modes to mirror their thinking, beliefs, values, and actions
towards what they consider as ‘politically ill-formed practices’. In this,
discourse is a reflection of the protesters’ identity as a whole (e.g. Gee,
1989). As in Gill (2000:175), discourse in this context is considered as a
social practice expressing protesters’ ‘negative’, or ‘critical’, against a
particular political event. So, it is an action for certain social functions.
This can be taken further to consider other sorts of communication
under the label of multimodality.

Linked to multimodality, discourse in Kress and van Leeuwen (2001:

21) is defined as “socially situated forms of knowledge about aspects of
reality". This involves awareness of the events that create the reality for
example, "who is involved, what takes place, where and when it takes
place as well as a set of related evaluations, purposes, interpretations,
and legitimations". In Fairclough (2005: 166-68), multimodality is more
linked to ‘orders of discourse’ as “a set of discursive practices
associated with an institution or social domain, and the particular
relationships and boundaries which obtain between these practices".
Linked to this, ‘multimodal discourse’, as a term, is more preferred to
Bateman, Wildfeuer, and Hiippala (2017) to indicate ‘multimodal text’
with reference to the different modes used in communication and what

65
roles these different modes have in communication. So, it seems
reasonable to deal with the protest posters in the collected data for this
work as multimodal discourses, composed of either words or images or
both, but all working together to do politicized humor. Hence, the
researcher is able to move through the modes of meaning within 'the
dynamic movements of orders of discourse"(see Chapter Four).

66
 CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
The present chapter is devoted to presenting the research approach
adopted in this work, criteria for data selection, collection and analysis
to answer the research questions.

3.2 Research Approach

Sampling a model refers to the research design. It is the researcher's

overall plan of study through which the researcher can answer the
questions of the study. The qualitative approach provides a deep
explanation of the social contexts of various activities in a specific
society because of its importance in analyzing the views, behaviors, and
social norms that connects members of society and distinguishes them
from others (Mack 2005:1-2).

The researcher in this context has found the qualitative approach fits
well with the aim and focus of this study which in this sense, depends
on observation and description in data collection and in the analysis.
Qualitative approach is suitable for research in MDA and in dealing
with a subject such as politicized humor where the researcher relies on
observation and description critically, drawing meaning not only from
verbal but also non-verbal units such as image, colors and page layout
(see section 3.6). This, in turn, is sufficient to answer the research
questions (see section 1.1).

3.3 Data Selection

With its main aim and focus on political protest poster-based

multimodal discourses, this work is qualitative in nature where it

67
attempts to investigate and explore how humor can be adopted and
adapted to reflect individuals’ socio-political phenomena experiences as
part of their life phenomena.

For this end, the researcher in this context tried to select the kind of
data that is as close as possible to what the protesters intended to mirror
their anger, resistance, solidarity, and power of words and images
against what they think politically incorrect. As the analyzing
discourses of political protest posters would potentially lead to knowing
more about how humor can be used as a corrective means against
political disorder, ideology, and ‘unfair’ political environments, the
researcher collected protest posters against Trump from the internet by
entering keywords, such as ‘Anti-Donald Trump Protest Posters’, ‘signs
from ‘Women March’ on Washington’, ‘Funniest ‘Women March’
signs’ into the search engines such as Google, Pinterest, Instagram, and
Twitter. The search revealed a variety of posters. To meet the aim of
this work, the researcher was selective in choosing the examined
materials. This selectivity was mandatory because the subject of this
study included only humorous protest posters for political ends. In light
of this, protest posters (35) across different internet sites have been
chosen as representative examples for analysis. The data set is for the
public use as part of media discourse related to ‘Women March’ 2017
protest.

‘Women March’ was used as a point of departure to explore,

investigate and understand how humor, as a popular social reformative
means, possibly works to criticize political status quo and affairs by
selecting the outgroup and proving the legitimacy of in-group values as
part of the protester’s roles in a socio-political context. Furthermore,
‘Women March’ is an event that provides an adequate data sample to

68
answer the research questions. As a qualitative work, this research does
not by any means attempt to generalize or verify its findings, but to
approach and discover the social scenario of those involved in the
collected data set in its different means of expression and meanings. As
a kind of data, the posters are different in forms (image-only posters’,
word- only poster, and ‘word-image posters). Therefore, they are
categorized according to compositional (structural) units.

3.4 Context of Study

This study examined anti-Trump protest posters, particularly in

‘Women March’. It took place in Washington, on January 21, 2017, just
one day after Donald Trump's inauguration. ‘Women March’ was the
biggest protest in the United States, where about 500,000 people
participated in Washington alone and between "3.3 and 4.6 million in
the entire United States." And up to 5 million around the world agreed
with the ideology of the Women March movement, that is why they
(especially women) organized protests in their own countries (Brezovec
2019:8). ‘Women March’ called for a new policy regarding women’s
rights in the first place, in addition to other issues such as immigration
law, climate change, freedom, workers ’rights, and other topics (Bore et
al 2018:529).

During his election campaign, Trump disclosed the signs of his

controversial policy, as his vulgar rhetoric reveals hatred of women and
transmits racism and discrimination. This led to the formation of a
widespread opposition against him. He was openly calling women
disparaging names, for example, "dogs, fat pigs, and disgusting
animals" (Lusher, 2016). Moreover, he insultingly pointed out to
"Republican Primary debate moderator Megyn Kelly" by saying "You
could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of
69
her wherever" (Lusher, 2016, para. 8); in addition to the popular video
leaked from 2005 that was released during the Fall 2017 campaign
season, Trump was filmed saying "When you're a superstar, let it do it.
You can do anything ... seize it by pussy. ... You can do anything."
(Locher, 2016, Paragraph 25).

Trump had other controversial decisions that mobilized the masses

against him and made his impeachment a demand that must be fulfilled.
Take, for example, his negative attitude towards Mexican immigrants
and his suggestion to build a wall on the border between the United
States and Mexico where he described the migrants as drug dealers and
rapists "When Mexico sends its people, … They’re sending people that
have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us.
They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists" (Lee
2015: para 1). Thus, the protest was a denunciation of Trump's barbarity
regarding human rights, legal norms, and his sarcastic attitude toward
immigrants, Muslims, and blacks, which have given the green light to
extremist governments to do so as they like to discriminate, it then
transcends the personal and trivial tone to include dimensions that
attempt to show real political complications.

3.5 Research Ethics

What distinguishes qualitative research from quantitative is that the

data of the former are open-ended, as long as they are related to the
subject of the study and serve its theoretical side. For the quality of
data analysis, the researcher should collect his/her data early if allowed
to do so. The internet archive is the most relevant and readily accessible
which represents a key form of storage and collection for documents
and data. Thus, this data is completely accessible and the researcher can
collect his/her data from the first day of the study. Benfield and
70
Szlemko (2006:2) summarize some of the positives of data collection
via the Internet saying that, "it promises increased sample size, greater
sample diversity, easier access, and convenience, lower costs and time
investment, and many other appealing features".

However, in addition to the importance of dealing with the data

critically, there are ethics for collecting internet data. For example,
getting the permission, knowing the required number of data to address
the topic, documenting the data collected by mentioning its sources,
knowing the appropriate analytical modal that suits it (Silverman,
2013:57). In this context, such ethics-related procedures and concerns
were all given considerable attention.

The data of visual protest can be collected while watching a protest

and taking photos for the protesters' posters (Philipps 2011:5-6),
however, because of the distance of the study area spatially and
temporally, the researcher in this work relied on the internet websites
for collecting study data. Another point that can be pointed out here is
the contents of some data that show bold and shameful pictures or
words, such as a display or reference to the female genital organs or
posters depicting Trump's harassment of women, but they were closely
related to the subject of the study. So the researcher had to include it in
the study data.

3.6 Data Analysis: A Multimodal Approach

It has become a fact that communication is currently not limited to the

use of spoken or written linguistic units or symbols. It is rather more
complicated than that to include a combination of an unlimited number
of semiotic tools, visually hybrid interplay with the use of elements,
colors, images, words, and the like, to end up with a particular function

71
for a specific situation. In the 1990s or so, MDA has come to be a more
specific approach to interpret such an intricate kind of communication
in virtue of taking a further step from analyzing word-based discourses,
as static use of language forms, to include other dynamic features like
sound, image and other modes of our currently intricate kinds of
interaction (Bedi 2019: 159). In O’Halloran (2011), MDA paves the
way to take a shift from language analysis to that which involves other
non-language resources, which by itself positively serves
multidisciplinary research works.

MDA is built entirely on a "semiotic social perspective, describes

communication in the widest sense, including gesture, oral, and written
performance, drawings, digital and electronic content, graphs and
illustrations, and objects" (Ibrahim 2017:220-221). Multimedia texts are
a reflection of the joint collaboration of multiple semiotic patterns that
carry meaning within a specific social and cultural context (Kress, 2010,
p. 8). MDA is, for O’Halloran, (2011: 2), an evolving pattern in
discourse analysis referred to as ‘multimodality’, ‘multimodal analysis’,
‘multimodal semiotics’, and ‘multimodal studies’. It is more linked to
‘semiotic resources’ in multimodal discourses and in what possible
way(s) they together work in multimodal phenomena, as part of ‘inter-
semiosis’ relationships. What is more is that MDA also considers
"design, production and distribution of multimodal resources in social
environments, as well as the "resemiotization of multimodal
phenomena" as the "discourse shifts between different resources and
across different contexts as social practices unfold"
(O’Halloran 2011:121).

In Kress and van Leuween (2001: 20), multimodality is defined as

72
 The use of several semiotic modes in the design of a semiotic
product or event, together with the particular way in which these
modes are combined –they may for instance reinforce each other
(say the same thing in different ways), fulfil complementary roles,
(…), or be hierarchically ordered, as in action films, where action is
dominant, with music adding a touch of emotive colour and sync
sound a touch of realistic presence”.

The multimodal approach works in a way that helps the researcher to

analyze protest discourse with a clear focus on the integration and
interaction of different modes for a certain meaning reflected on posters
as visual signs (e.g. Lim, 2013). It examines how the purposes of the
text, the spectators, and the setting are fulfilled in various modes and
how these modes work together in the management and production of
ideas and knowledge (Lim 2013:52).

The essential characteristic of multimodal analysis is that it

emphasizes a multitude of modes and their interaction at the same time.
Actually, multimodality isn't new, but increased exposure of digital
media in recent years has led to expanded scholarly attention to it
(Horsbøl 2006:155). According to Teo (2004:210), semiotic analysis
"concerns the communication of meaning as a dynamic and fluid
process which transcends the linguistic sign, bringing together the
agency, process, reception, and effect of meaning. "

For Kress and van Leeuwen (2006: 35), each semiotic mode, whether
verbal or not, is limited and "shaped both by the intrinsic characteristics
and potentialities of the medium and by the requirements, histories, and
values of societies and their cultures". Thus, contrary to old literacy
where the emphasis on the language of words, new literacy approaches

73
communication in relation to its intricate composition of both words and
images.

Earlier to this, Kress (2003) explains the distinction between language

mode and image mode, arguing that they actually support two
distinctive forms of "logic"(Kress 2003:2). In a like manner, Stockl
(2004) argues that images have meanings only when they are
accompanied by words. For the author (Ibid), words and images are
inseparable in communication. In this sense, understanding language
basically depends on how different modes mix and overlap.
Nevertheless, it could be argued that both forms of the poster (image-
only posters’, and ‘word-image posters) are central to the protesters'
discourses in their resistance and revolt against politically ill-formed
acts, they could be viewed as a radical and uniting tool with the aim of
criticizing authorities and reflecting a group identity.

The researcher has found Kress and van Leeuwen’s (2006) MDA
approach sits well with the aim and focus of the present project. Based
on Halliday’s (1994) Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL),
multimodality helps the research to consider how the text (protest
posters in this case) is composed of different modes in the meaning
making process. It is a ‘multimodal semiotic analysis’
(O’Halloran:2011). Multimodality in this sense does not prioritise
words over images but shows how both work, as linguistic units, to get
a particular meaning across. The multimodal approach works in a way
that helps the researcher to analyse the meaning of multiple semiotic
modes that are adopted in the protest poster taking into account the
interaction that links these modes. It also explores socio-political
dimensions of humorous protest posters, rather than understanding these
humorous posters merely.

74
 Drawing on Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (1978),
Kress and van Leeuwen (2006) have come to emphasize the role of
multimodality in communication. The authors (Ibid) reinterpreted
Hallidays’ metafunctions, "ideational, interpersonal, and textual" in
visual communication to respectively using them as representational,
interactional, and compositional.

3.6.1 The Representational Dimension

Representations demonstrate a connection between "the participants",

the actions they are performing or not, and the environment they are put
in. The image's representational meaning is expressed by "action,
reactional, speech and mental processes". Within this aspect there seem
to be two processes: Narrative processes and conceptual processes as
shown below in fig. (3).

Figure (3) Main types of visual representational structure (Kress. and

van Leeuwen, 2006:59).

Narrative patterns are defined by Kress and van Leeuwen as

"dynamic" and serve to "present unfolding actions and events, processes
of change, transitory spatial arrangements", while conceptual patterns
reflect "static" and "represent participants in terms of their class,
structure or meaning" (Kress. and van Leeuwen, 2006:59). In their
work, the authors describe two categories of participants, "represented

75
participants" and "interactive participants", the former refers to "people,
places, and things" depicted in texts and images; while the latter refers
to persons who ‘view’, and ‘read’ those images and texts.

3.6.1.1 Narrative process:

In the narrative process, when connected by ‘vectors’ (actions), or

‘eyelines’ (reaction), participants are represented as performing an
action for someone or for each other. The distinction of different types
of narrative process depends on the type of vector, the number and type
of participants. To explain, an action processes in which the participant
creating the vector is called the 'Actor' and the participant receiving the
vector is the 'Goal.' Another type occurs in the images resulting from
the formation of the eye line as a vector to produce a reaction instead of
an action, and then it is called "interactive processes". The participants
in this type are named according to their role, as the one who looks is
"Reacter" and the one who receives the look is "the phenomenon." A
reaction in an image may either be ‘transactional’ by the presence of
both the "Reactor and the Phenomena", or only the ‘Reactor in the ‘non
transactional’ presentation (Kress. and van Leeuwen, 2006:63).

Narrative processes may encompass "secondary participants", whose

association with the "main participants" is through aspects other than
vectors called "Circumstances". This demands a difference between
foregrounded participants and backgrounded ones "which could be in
three different areas: first, ‘Setting’, that shows the overlap existence
among foregrounded participants and thus partly becloud it because it is
drawn in less detail in painting or a soft focus in photography and
because of "contrasts in color saturation and overall darkness or
lightness between foreground and background". Second ‘The Means’
that is also an important device for the implementation of the action
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process, such a device works as a vector. The third form is an
‘Accompaniment’, "a participant in a narrative structure which has no
vectorial relation with other participants and cannot be interpreted as a
Symbolic Attribute"(Kress. and van Leeuwen, 2006:75).

3.6.1.2 Conceptual process:

Conceptual dimensions characterize participants through their "class,

or structure or meaning". They could deal with classifying the
participants by relating them "in terms of a ‘kind of’ relation", so we
find, for example, the "superordinate" and the "subordinate". Analytical
processes, on the other hand, put the participants within a part-whole
framework, they represent visual elements since they include two types
of participants: one Carrier (the whole) and any number of Possessive
Attributes (the parts).

As for symbolic processes, they are concerned with clarifying the

representative participants. The role of the carrier as a represented
participant in an image represents the denotation or identity itself.
symbolic features can be seen with sharp focus and more accurate
details or overrated lighting and color. The process of 'pointing out the
symbolic attribute to the viewer also includes the arrows that can link a
participant's visual realizations with the same participant's verbal
realizations or vice versa.

3.6.2 The Interactive Dimension

This dimension 'points out the possibility for analyzing the visual
content represented in terms of the interrelationships between that
content and the viewer' (interactive participants). it is proposed by Kress
and van Leeuwen, that visual characteristics such as the participant's
gaze direction, the participant's distance from the viewer and the

77
camera's relative angle create particular social relationships concerning
relative power and interaction or attraction (see fig. 4).

Figure (4) Interactive meanings in images (Kress and van Leeuwen,

2006:149).

3.6.2.1 The gaze:

In this aspect, Vectors are created between the participants and the
viewer when the participants who are depicted look at the viewer,
forming an imaginary connection. Such pictures have been labeled as
"demands" because "The participant’s gaze demands something from
the viewer, demands that the viewer enters into some kind of imaginary
relation with him or her” (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:118) as if the
represented participant addresses the viewer in a direct way (see fig. 5).

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https://assets.teenvogue.com/photos/588511385cd1193a662d03c0/1:1/w_600,c_limit/0
05.jpg

Figure (5) participant's viewer-oriented gaze

In other cases, however, the participant depicted indirectly addresses

the viewer. In such a case, the latter is the subject of the look, while the
former is the object of inspection of the viewer. The role of the viewer
is one of a hidden viewer. These types of images called 'offer' as they
show " the represented participants to the viewer as items of
information, objects of contemplation, impersonally, as though they
were specimens in a display case " (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:119).
Most often, "diagrams, maps, and charts are found in contexts which
offer some kind of knowledge"(Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:121).

3.6.2.2 Social distance

Different relationships between the represented participant and the

viewer could be suggested by Social distance. In order to explain the

79
ability of various areas of vision in deciding social relations, the authors
point to the work of "Edward T. Hall" called "Silent assumptions in
social communication," According to him, shortening the distance
between the participant and the viewer results in a more "intimate"
relationship. For instance, only the face or head appears when the
distance is intimate. When it is a near personal visual range, the head
and shoulders should appear. It can also stretch by a personal distance
from the waist up. The nearby social distance, however, helps us to see
the entire figure, and go further to include the space around it a far-
reaching social distance and lastly the body of at least four or five
people could be seen at public distance (Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:124).

3.6.2.3 Angle

The angle or point of view also plays an important role in determining

the relationship between the represented participants and the viewer.
According to Kress and van Leeuwen, there are two angles: horizontal
and vertical. They define the first as “a function of the relation between
the frontal plane of the image-producer and the frontal plane of the
represented participants” (Kress and van Leeuwen,2006:134). The
horizontal angle will convey whether or not the viewer is engaged with
the participants represented in the image; a "frontal" angle, for example,
invites the viewer to be involved with the represented participants "
What you see here is part of our world, something we are involved
with" " while the oblique angle (see fig. 6) suggests distance or
"detachment". "What you see here is not part of our world; it is their
world, something we are not involved with"(Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:136).

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https://www.irishnews.com/picturesarchive/irishnews/irishnews/2017/01/30/213005
700-3e978598-192c-4097-9ae7-def1de3d9c40.jpg

Figure (6) Detachment in the horizontal oblique angle

The vertical angle, on the other hand, can be connected to strength or

power, a low angle, for example, perceives the represented participant
as superior and the viewer as inferior. However, If the viewer views a
depicted participant from a high angle, then the former is perceived as
being more superior than the latter. But, at eye level (as shown in fig.7),
the relationship of superiority or inferiority disappeared to be replaced
by equality.

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https://politicalpunchline.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/trump-threat-level-
orange.jpg

Figure (7) vertical eye level angle

3.6.2.4 Modality

This structure is linked to how viewers evaluate images concerning

the idea of reality or truthfulness. It is just like judgment because
sometimes images can depict persons or things as if they are real. The
authors describe judgments of "modality" as "individual and based on
what is considered true in a social category for which representation is
intended primarily" (Kress and van Leeuwen,2006:156).

The achievement of high modality is accomplished by markers

of modality that make an image appear ‘more than real’ (e.g. Colour
saturation, Colour modulation, Colour differentiation,
Contextualization, Representation, Depth, Brightness, Illumination) The
degree of saturation of colors, for example, determines the reality of
image as "we judge an image real when, for instance, its colours are
approximately as saturated as those in the standard, the most widely
used photographic technology" (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:159).

82
 However, the modality of an image differs from one context to another
according to its specific coding patterns within each context. For
example, the natural domain considers blue colorless prints as having a
low method, yet it is getting a high modality in technological coding

3.6.3 The Compositional Dimension

This third dimension contributes well to integrating the

representational and interactive meaning of the image into a coherent
whole depending on three areas. First: Information value which is
concerned with the process of placing elements in specific places of the
image. In this context, Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006 present the
information values of "Left, and Right, Top, and Bottom, and Center,
and Margin". According to them, the arrangement of the elements,
whether in a picture or combined within a visual and verbal
composition, can further explain what the participants represent, in
addition to determining the role of both the text and the image within
the poster itself. As a means of meaning, the horizontal Given-New
position connects the left side with ‘generic’, ‘previous’, and ‘familiar’
representation to be as ‘given’. It also relates the right to ‘specific",
‘current", and ‘unfamiliar’, representation to be 'new'. Thus, the
direction progresses from given information to new ones to solve the
interwoven threads of meaning.

As a vertical dimension, Ideal-Real position refers to the placement

of information from top to bottom, from ‘generic’, ‘upper’, ‘unearthly’
information at the top to the ‘specific’, ‘lower’, ‘earthly’ information at
the bottom. The former gives "a complete or general essence" hence it is
perceived as "ideal", while the latter presents a subordinate role,
however, "it is important in its own way, such as specifications,
evidence, practical results, etc.” (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006: 187),
83
hence, it is perceived as "real". Furthermore, the information value of
"center and margins", shows "the central figure is surrounded by a circle
of subordinates"(Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006: 194). However, the
authors note its less commonality in contemporary visual
representations, as it is combined with other positions (Given-New and
Ideal-Real) to form a "triptych" shape as shown in fig. (8). The second
area within the compositional dimensions is "Salience" which shows the
extent to which the elements attract the attention depending on some
features such as "placement in the foreground or background, relative
size, contrasts in colour, and differences in sharpness". The last area is
linked to the process of connecting or separating image elements to
display the boundaries of their association or not such as actual frame
lines or dividing lines, it's called "Framing"(Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:177).

Figure (8) model of visual space (Kress and Leeuwen’s 2006:197)

84
 In response to that, MDA allows the researcher to understand how, in
the context of image-word protest posters, the visual and written modes
support each other to form a complete discourse. Therefore, through an
interplay of both textual and visual elements, the poster creates meaning
and conveys the protest intent. To know this overlap, the visual
representation in protest posters matters more than what it apparently
means where this goes beyond the aesthetic nature of design and
content to further decipher certain sociopolitical issues (Kress and Van
Leeuwen, 2006). It is "much like verbal texts, can function as framing
devices inasmuch as they make use of various rhetorical tools –
metaphors, depictions, symbols – that claim to capture the essence of an
issue or event graphically" (Rodriguez and Dimitrova 2011:51). The
visual grammar of the protest poster will be evaluated according to the
semiotic analysis to make its meaning potential through combining
different elements of representational, interactive and textual meanings
that contribute in knowing the manner in which the participant is
represented; the implied relationships between the audience and the
participant represented; and how those relationships contribute to poster
purposes.

Based on several previous studies, the researcher examined the data

collected from ‘Women March’ and tried to classify these humorous
protest posters by giving them different labels. What was noticed in this
step is the diversity of the data designs as there are ‘image-only
posters’, word-only posters’, and ‘word-image posters, hence, the
researcher suggested that the main phase in knowing how meaning is
created in protest poster is to deal with word-image posters due to the
multiplicity of their modes, that is why they constituted (21) posters.

85
In order not to ignore the other type of humorous forms, the subsidiary
phase could be the analysis of ‘image-only posters’ and word-only
posters, taking into account the choice of posters that contain modes
other than the word, such as colors, page layout, etc. in order not to
deviate from the framework of the multimodal based analysis. Their
number was (9) ‘image-only posters’ and (5) word-only posters.

Thus, each poster was viewed separately, then arranged according to

its design, whether it contains words only or image only or both, and
this is considered a major classification. After that, I also tried to assign
a topic for each sign, and with this step, I tried to cover most of the
protest topics that the protesters went out for, with the exception of
posters that support homosexuals and denounce homophobia (which
cover a good proportion of protest data) because the researcher is not
convinced of their presence even within the context of a non-Islamic
society. Furthermore, I wanted to restrict the sum of classifications by
examining the likenesses between posters regarding their topics hence
more signs could be adequate into one set.

The main focus was on posters in which the seriousness of humor and
its theories is intentional by the use of surprising elements as a violation
of what is normally expected (incongruity), highlighting the positive
identity of the protesters and insulting their opponent (superiority), as
well as allowing them to invite their supporters to laugh at him (relief).

3.7 Significance of this work

In the context of the protests, humor can be invested in protest posters

to highlight socio-political disorder and discontent in different political
settings. It is, metaphorically, more like a weapon at the hand of the
weak against individuals in power to challenge and change what is

86
normally being conceived incorrect. As in Hart (2007), politicized
humor is not and should not be considered a meaningless process, but
rather it helps in getting the message across, assists to put the finger on
salient points, and attracts attention to adverse social conditions, and
thus strengthen protest for political reformation.

While humor has been identified as a sociopolitical phenomenon

across the world (e.g. Sorensen 2008 and Mascha 2011) however, it has
been poured into a purely linguistic range. There is not that much on
politicized humor through visualizing political issues in multimodal
protest posters. Hence, this work optimally focuses on a set of crucial
socio-political issues in the ‘Women March’ 2017 against Trump.
Protesters highlight these issues by using posters that combine words,
images, and other factors such as color and page layout. This gives the
researcher the opportunity to apply a modern approach (MDA) that
keeps pace with the progress in communication. It is an effective way to
analyze the repressed feelings of the protesters, who translated Trump's
contradictory policy into words and pictures that contradict our
expectations for the head of a great state like America and make us
acknowledge his inferiority in exchange for the superiority of the
protesters.

Moreover, this work has a theoretical and practical significance since

its findings can support the fields of humor and social semiotics in
explaining different modes of protest posters. In practical terms, it
highlights how these visual posters are structured and perceived by
viewers. Also, it could shed lights on the impact of social, psychological
and cognitive theories of humor on designing the visual representation
of these posters. Findings also can be helpful for researchers and

87
scholars who show an interest in studies of PH as well as multimodal
studies.

While the present chapter has given more details about the research
methodology adopted in the present study (e.g. its research approach,
criteria for selecting, collecting and analyzing data), the researcher now
move into the following chapter to classify, describe and analyze the
collected data.

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 CHAPTER FOUR
DATA ANALYSIS
4.1 Introduction

In this chapter, classification and description of collected data have

been presented, followed by findings, and then, it is followed by a
discussion of the results arrived at.

4.2 Data classification

It is worth noting that humorous protest posters are not written for fun
only, but rather to convey a specific message or to bring to the surface
the incongruous reality of politics and politicians' incompetent decisions
and actions. Moreover, the interpretation of humor in these posters must
be accompanied by a full knowledge of the different modes that they
include. In this study, Verbal and non-verbal elements will be analyzed
since they are equally important in a multimodal text as "the linguistic
element for the image is as important as the mental image for language"
(Stöckl 2004: 18). Their presence does not reflect the randomness in the
text but rather a "sense of unity, of cooperation, and of consistency in
terms of the total message it is to convey,", and therefore harmony
brings together the different semiotic elements (Royce 2007: 73).

Depending on that and for the sake of knowing under which linguistic
mode (verbal/ non-verbal, or both) humor serves protesters in the
contexts understudy, a total of 35 protest posters against Trump’s policy
are classified according to their designs: ‘image-only posters’, word-
only posters’, and ‘word-image posters (see tables: 3, 4, and 5). Then,
posters will be classified according to their prominent themes. For

89
example, Russia-Trump posters, toilet– based posters, wall – policy
posters, posters of feminine body organs, etc.

The collected datasets can be approached with the use of MDA

approach to explore how humor is ‘effectively’ represented in protest
posters in accordance with the cultural and socio-political conditions of
the protesters. Then, the researcher considers the meaning of that in
relation to the theories of humor and their function in order to see how
politicized humor is represented in the content (images and words or
either), and find out the significance of using humor by demonstrators
who intend to address political and social issues.

Table (2) Image-only posters

N Theme
1. Toilet– based posters
2.
Trump as a humiliating object
3.
4.
5. Russia-Trump posters
6.
7.
8. Defeat Trump poster
9.

Table (3) word-image posters

N Theme

10 Ridicule of Trump’s outward appearance

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11

12 Bad peach president

13
Wall policy
14
Obama-Trump comparison
15

16 Women self confidence

The struggle of women against their oppressor

17

18

19 Russian-Collusion

20

21

22 Feminine body organs

23

24 The ironic use of Trump words

25

26
Defeat Trump posters
27

28

29
Liberty statue and Trump
30

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 Table (4) word-only posters

N Theme

Posters of Trump's threat by women

31

32
Posters of expanding historical contexts of protest
33
34 Ridicule of Trump's slogan
35 Trump fired in all colors

4.2.1 word-image posters

Figure (9) Toilet– based poster

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 https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/5cf6596624000053008571ef.jpeg?ops=scalef
it_720_noupscale

This poster looks like a toilet paper, each square is printed with a black
and grey portrait of US President Trump. So in its form, this poster is
somewhat different from the usual protest posters. It is longitudinally
extended to include four photos of Trump. The poster-carrying girl tries
to imitate Trump's facial features in the photo in an attempt to disparage
him in a humorous way.

In terms of representational meaning, Trump is the only represented

participant in this poster. His facial expressions look strange (eyes
staring without a target and an exaggerated mouth). He does not directly
look at the viewer. This means that the image is not a demand, but an
offer, since such type of images shows " the represented participants to
the viewer as items of information, objects of contemplation,
impersonally, as though they were specimens in a display case " (Kress
and van Leuween 2006:119). The analytical process, on the other hand,
relates represented participants within a part-whole structure. So, it
could deal with this toilet paper poster as "the carrier" which acts as the
whole and Trump's four images that contribute to the composition of it
as "possessive attributes".

In terms of interactive meaning, the participants in the image are

represented for the viewers, by the so-called social distance. The shot in
this picture is close since the head and the shoulders are visible. This
close distance helps the viewer to plunge into the represented
participant's world trying to understand the mystery surrounding him.
The angle is another tool to establish an objective relationship between
the participant and the viewer. It is divided into a horizontal angle and a
vertical angle. The front angle of Trump image integrates the audience
93
into it naturally. Vertically, it shows "an eye-level angle" to designate
equivalence between the viewer and the participants represented, this
strips Trump of the presidency on the second day of his inauguration, or
rather, placing him on a lower level than the ordinary citizen, as his
picture is placed on toilet paper. Also, this image contains a low
modality, it is free of colors, to indicate the refusal of the American
people (especially women) to include Trump as president in the present
and even future of America, to show his affiliation with the past that
passed through the black and white colors, refusing to recognize him in
the second day of his inauguration as president.

After the employment of visual grammar in analyzing this poster, it

seems that disparagement humor, incongruity, and comic relief pervade
this image. Ironically, Trump's image on the toilet paper reveals
incongruity between Trump's humiliating image in women's eyes as
protesters and our expectations for the "President of America". This
reflects their psychological defense (relief) against Trump's
controversial views about women. There is a kind of disparagement and
criticism that highlights their superiority. They (women as protesters)
disparage of others (Trump) because, by contrast, they feel good about
themselves, so, disparagement humor promotes "self-esteem" that
comes as a result of a "downward social comparison with the target"
(Ferguson and Ford 2008:289). This by itself speculates that protesters
engage in disparagement humor as a way of restoring positive
distinctiveness They take advantage of Trump's exaggerated body
language during his campaign, and his unusual ways of using his face,
especially his mouth, to decorate toilet paper. It is a smart way to
underestimate him and put him in the gutter.

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 https://i.pinimg.com/236x/f5/64/31/f5643108dafdf43af29b38054e48229a.jpg
A10

https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/eMCx3gIXse8FBnmNGgrcppP6LlA=/900x0/filters:no_upscale():
max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(webp)/trump-bite-back-sign-5881bf933df78c2ccd109e73.jpg

B10

Figure (10) Trump as a humiliating object

95
The apparent disparagement humor against Trump in the ‘Women
March’ posters is also marked by displaying him in the form of
humiliating objects. It is obvious that the above two posters are
represented in the same manner: they include Trump as represented
participant, however, he is embodied by different objects, poster (A10)
for example denigrates Trump who is given the face of a raging pig and
a human body. Through his facial expressions (his mouth openly
exaggerated), he appears as if shouting. This comparison process would
deprive Trump of his humanity, and focus on his sinister personality,
which is more closely aligned with the character of terror than our
expectations of a US president. Then in poster (B10), the hatred of
Trump reaches its climax since he is greatly diminished to appear as
feces. The narrative meaning in this image is embedded in an action
process in which "flies" around the participant forms an obvious vector,
they draw viewers’ attention to Trump (the goal of this vector) in his
disgusting body.

The interactive meaning of these two posters shows that Trump is

looking straight at viewers, it is an obvious way to interact with them
and ask for a reply. This kind of images is called a "demand image"
(Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006), which contrasts with the image given
in the previous poster.The colors dominating the posters are orange and
yellow corresponding to the colors of Trump's skin and hair, with
background colors ranging from white in poster (B10) to dark blue in
poster (A10). Based on the size of the frame and social distance, the
producers make use of the close shot, the posters share also the same
angle, horizontally, the angle is not oblique but frontal which indicates
involvement rather than detachment, especially for those who elected
Trump and contributed to his victory, to see what disgusting

96
representation he could have in the posters of the protesting women. For
the same reason, an eye-level angle dominates these posters.

Therefore, these posters combine forms of irony and horror to indicate

that Trump is funny, terrifying, and disgusting at the same time. This
incongruity serves the protesters in providing temporary relief via
laughing at the hateful figure of the authority and to be free from the
current political pressures. They (protesting women) try to show the
inferiority of their enemy (Trump) in order to gain their superiority.
This is why they use humor in their march to be one way of conveying
hostility and critique, as it contributes to communicating what the
protesters seek in terms of ironic and ridiculous phrases and images, it
also offers them the opportunity to acquire a sort of relief and freedom
from the injustice of their ruler.

https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/jjuyaD5GaXabHMU8IQRoaoKmkVY=/860x0/filters:no_ups
cale

A:11

97
 https:/
/img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/5cf6711f210000690de69409.jpeg?ops=scalefit_720_noupscale

B:11

https://twistedsifter.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/best-funny-creative-signs-from-womens-march-
2017-11.jpg?w=600&h=450

C:11

Figure (11) Russia-Trump posters

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Politicized humor could also be used as a critical tool for expressing
protesters' rejection of the conspiracies of authority by exposing them in
an influential comic representation. In this context, the relationship
between Trump and the Russian government dominates ‘Women
March’ posters as information leaked about a clear intervention by the
Russians in the 2016 US presidential elections to support the
Republican Candidate Trump at the expense of Democratic candidate
Hillary Clinton because they believed that the former is better for their
interests than the latter. Thus, "a Russian entity carried out a social
media campaign that favored presidential candidate Donald J. Trump
and underestimated presidential candidate Hillary Clinton". Moreover,
Russian intelligence agencies hacked into the accounts of the Clinton
campaign and then published documents stolen through fake accounts,
and this played a big role in Clinton's loss of this election (Mueller
2019:1). Trump also added fuel to the fire by repeatedly expressing his
admiration for Putin and rejecting concerns about human rights and
freedom of the press in Russia.

According to visual semiotics, the above three posters include the

winning candidate in the US elections Donald Trump and Russian
President Vladimir Putin as represented participants, however, their
actions differ from one poster to another. Poster (A11) depicts them
kissing each other passionately. It is a bidirectional transactional action
where their lips form strong and dominant vectors, they connect the two
participants as an actor and a goal interchangeably. Symbolically, it
could be an indication of the cooperation that unites them secretly, in
addition to the mutual praise between them publicly. Their hands
revolving around each other to make them linked in a more reciprocal
way to be interactors. There are also vectors consisting of white lines on

99
their chin to complete such transactional action. Their outfits are similar
in color and design, however analytical processes suggest that each
participant is a carrier in relation to a number of prototypical possessive
attributes, Trump has orange skin and yellow hair while Putin has white
skin and grey hair, this reflects their different ethnicities.

Whereas, poster (B11) portrays Trump as a funny baby because whose

head is attached to the body of a child. His face appears with a zipped
smile and a puckered chin that reflects his weakness. According to
action process, Putin could be considered as a superordinate actor and
Trump as a goal (Putin carries Trump the child in the air), the whole
angle of Putin's moving arms forms a strong vector between the two
represented participants. Trump could also be a subordinate actor in
relation to the action of holding and waving a flag (goal) and the flag
holder forms a vector between them. Symbolically, the color of the flag
reminds us of the Russian red flag before 1991, of course with a
different inscription, where the letter P (the first letter of Putin) appears
inside the letter T (the first letter of Trump) to reflect the bond between
them. Also, as a sign of this friendship, Trump holds a white bouquet.

Like the previous poster, action process in poster (C11) shows both
Putin and Trump as represented participants, they are riding one horse
together with naked chests. As a major actor, Putin puts his arms which
serve as vectors around lean Trump to reach the bridle (the goal).
Symbolically, their shirtless representation reveals Putin's masculinity
as an external threat, while Trump's lean and flabby body reflects his
weakness as well as his dependence on others, this is fair enough to
delegitimize his authority.

The interactive meaning of these posters is established more between

the participants rather than directly between the participants and

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viewers. For example, the visual contact in poster (A11) shows closed
eyes for both participants, they are neither looking to the viewer nor to
any phenomenon around them. This symbolizes the fact that they are
protecting a certain secret. The idea of detachment from the viewer is
also reinforced by choosing an oblique angle, this confirms woven plots
between Trump and the Russian government concerning the elections.
An eye-level angle, on the other hand, urges the viewer to search for
that secret. The gaze of a proud-looking Putin in poster (B11) are
directed at the viewer as an invitation to see his dominance. The same
goal is accomplished by both the horizontal oblique angle and vertical
low angle since they make him look powerful. The two participants in
poster (C11) offer themselves to the viewer as an object of
contemplation since they are looking at something outside the image
frame. Moreover, the selection of long shot and oblique angle reinforces
the same idea of detachment. The colors varied in these three posters,
but they are generally used to reflect the salience of Putin at the expense
of Trump (we will explain this in a composition process). The dark
color dominates poster (A11) reflects the secrecy of the shot, while the
natural background of poster (C11) reflects the reality of this image
(high modality) and the sunbeam falling on their bodies forms a
contributing factor.

The placement of participants in terms of the compositional process

shows certain points, Putin for instance, is placed on the left as Given to
mean "something the viewer already knows" (Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:187), and Trump on the right as New which means that he is
"presented as something which is not yet known, or perhaps not yet
agreed upon by the viewer"(Ibid). Another point, Putin especially in
poster (B11) and (C11) is the most salient and the most striking

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component because he forms the largest element. His outfits in (B11) as
he wears a brown -colored military uniform against a light background
helps to his saliency, in addition to glamorous military ranks adorning
his shoulders and attracting attention. Unlike Trump, who occupies a
small portion as a funny child in white clothes, it is difficult to
distinguish him with such a background. Even with their bare breasts in
(C11), Putin's prominence is gained from his white skin and his muscles
in contrast to Trump's lean body. However, pictorial elements in (A11)
receive an equal share of prominence because both participants are in
the same size, their black clothes are virtually indistinguishable from
the background that is also colored black. But as an aid, the white lines
around their outer shape distinguish one participant from the other.

It is observable that incongruities which dominate the posters above

intensify the effect of humor as a way of exposing and fighting the
controversial political agendas such as Trump's relationship with
Russia. Poster (A11) for instance, reflects the incongruity between what
we expect and what we experience, as the viewer did not expect to see
"Trump" in such a snapshot with someone similar to his gender "Putin".
Such incongruity makes Trump a target for ridicule and laughter
(relief), and therefore protesters' superiority is achieved. The same
applies to (B11) and (C11), where humor is created through apparent
incongruity between Putin and Trump which makes the latter funny
(relief). Such disparagement humor is helpful in creating a positive
identity for protesters and justifying their demands that Trump has no
right in U.S. administration.

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 1- https://i.pinimg.com/564x/1d/1b/b8/1d1bb8c834d308de0bd90442338b66db.jpg
A12

https://gramho.com/media/2224919306965944118
B12

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 https://politicalpunchline.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/mlk-trump-poster.jpg

C12

Figure (12) Defeat Trump poster

By joining together to face their opponent, protesters in ‘women

March’ use politicized humor to be a sparkle of hope for Trump's
inevitable defeat. According to the first dimension of representational
dimension, fig. A12 shows many participants, a group of women
wearing "pussy hat", against Trump's statue, trying to bring it down
from its base by dragging the rope wrapped around it, and other women
chanting victory and carrying US flag. Such action process shows those
women as one represented participant especially concerning their goal
(Trump's statue). The rope around the neck of the statue extends to be in
women's hands, that is why, it is the vector of such process.
It is worth noting that Trump's statue provides an example of
intertextuality because it derived from quoting the event of toppling the
famous statue of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in central
Baghdad, particularly on April 9, 2003, after the invasion of Iraq. The
body of the statue belongs to Saddam Hussein, even the raised hand,
however, the producer added Trump's head to imply that he will suffer
the same as the fate of Saddam.
Fig. B12 on the other hand, displays a huge hand in the starting
position to hit Trump by sticking the middle and thumb fingers. There
are two represented participants: the hand as an Actor, and Trump as the
Goal for that hand. In terms of symbolic attributive process, this hand
symbolizes the national unity or feminism that unites protesting women
as their goals are similar and their opponent is Trump. Fig. C12 shows

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the activist Martin Luther King Jr1 trying to hush a tweeting President
Donald Trump. He's extending his hand out to cover the mouth of
president while he's tweeting away, this reflects action process in which
Martin Luther is the Actor while Trump's mouth is the Goal. Also, there
is a tendency for this image to be reactional through their eye line which
forms a vector, symbolically, Trump's eyes reflect weakness,
subservience, and guilt, while the denotations of strength, responsibility,
and leadership are reflected in Martin Luther's eyes. The two
represented participants both serve as the reactors and the phenomena
interchangeably.
As far as "interactive dimension" as concern, the visual contact of
Trump's statue as well as its frontal angle in fig. A12 imply the idea of
involvement, as an invitation for the viewer to see the tragic end of
Trump, and the courage on the part of the women who turn their backs
to signify "a measure of trust" with the viewer (Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:138). however, long shot (as many participants appear in frame
image) reduces such idea of involvement. figs. B12 and C12, on the
other hand, are dominated by the absence of visual contact with the
viewer as Trump's eyes are not clear in fig. B12, then he exchanges the
gaze with Martin in fig. C12, the goal of detachment is also
accomplished by the horizontal oblique angle. However, the vertical eye
-level angle, and close shot add some familiarity.
The compositional process reflects Trump's apparent marginalization
in all three posters. In fig. A12 for instance, the "top-down layout"
which indicates "ideal-real information" is mirrored in the process of
bringing down the statue by women since it reflects their rejection of its
1
Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 - 1968) was an African American minister and activist who became a
prominent leader in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. He had
great credit for developing civil rights through nonviolence and civil disobedience inspired by his
Christian beliefs. Since 1986, Americans have celebrated Martin Luther King's Day annually as an
official holiday (Adi, and Sherwood 2003:105)

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ideal location (in the top) so that its fall on the ground becomes a
reality. Information value also suggests that despite their small size in
the image, women could be the most prominent, they are placed in the
foreground, in addition to their large number, which reflects the union
against the enemy. While Trump statue is placed in the background. its
grey color which is nearly the same as the color behind it reinforces its
marginalization. In fig. B12, the same idea is manifested through the
centrality of the hand which is about to hit Trump, while he is standing
in the margin with a size much smaller than the hand behind him,
nevertheless, he appears with a fat body that reflects an imperfect
weight. In fig. C12, Trump is placed to the left as "Given" to reflect
"something the reader is assumed to know already" (Kress and van
Leeuwen, 2006:18o), especially concerning his tweets that attack
women and provoke racism, while Martin Luther is placed to the right
as "New" in the context of his ideas that could be suitable and renewed
to suit generations that came after him for nearly fifty years. Why not?
if racism and deprivation of women's rights still prevail in developed
and civilized societies.

Based on what was analyzed from the posters above, humor

incongruity lies in depicting Trump's defeat at the hands of women, this
in itself changes the norms that believe in women's passivity, the "pussy
hat" they wear in fig. A12, for example, reflects the determination of
women to improve their social identity and to fight whoever doubts
their capabilities or degrades them in any way. It also offers them the
opportunity to acquire a sort of relief and freedom, and thus superiority
over their authority. ‘Women March’ also goes beyond gender-only
reform, to include everything related to race, class, and other factors.
Thus, it could be argued that women in this protest believe in the

106
illegitimacy of their status inferiority that is why they redefine their
group values through disparagement humor to achieve positive
distinctiveness.

4.2.2 word-image posters

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn%3AANd9GcTVyg
g1ZL_QkhOhFQNu5asyufmysQP5DVWhw&usqp=CAU

A13

The informative value of this multimodal poster shows both verbal and
nonverbal modes of communication. The portrait of Trump occupies the
top, that is why, plays an ideal or lead role (Kress and van Leeuwen,
2006:187). It shows Trump with a weird hairstyle and weirdest facial
features, this makes him a figure that raises fear and panic. The shot of
this image is close since the head and the shoulders are visible, such a
close distance helps the viewer to plunge into the represented
participant's world trying to understand the mystery surrounding him.
Trump's gaze is directed at the viewer suggesting a demanding image,
however, his dark eyes make him closer to an evil figure than to the
president of a great country like America. Furthermore, horizontal front
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and vertical eye-level angles of Trump image integrate the viewers into
it naturally and indicate equality between the viewer and the represented
participant, this would undermine Trump's status as president or call
into question the legitimacy of his inauguration.

The slogan, on the other hand, appears at the bottom " WE SHALL
OVERCOMB", hence, introduces a dependent role, however, "it is
important in its own way, as specification, evidence, practical
consequence, and so on" (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:187). It
connotes the use of pun reflecting two levels of meanings: a) to mock
Trump and make his hairstyle a subject of humor and mockery, since
"overcomb" signals the term “comb-over,” which describes the hairstyle
that helps hide the baldness at the front of the head, as Trump does, and
b) it was taken from Martin Luther's famous political speeches, which
he always repeated in his defense of civil rights as an activist. That is
why, such slogan serves to mobilize the public against Trump and his
policy, for that, it is written in big font for all the letters with a focus on
the word "OVERCOMB", which is written in red, undermining its
dependent role compared to the image that has a dark background
causing a blurry look. Thus, it could be argued that both (image and
slogan) are complementary to each other as if the protesters are
deliberately trying to reflect Trump's controversial policies, with its
hatred and racism, on his image, while the slogan with its white
background, size and the message it conveys, determines the best way
to confront such politician, which is to protest, using humor with its
tendentious contradictions. Hence, the different connotations of the
slogan, in addition to the incongruity raised by the image (fear and
laughter at the same time), help the demonstrators to free themselves
from the pressures resulting from the oppression of their authority, and

108
work to strengthen their superiority against the inferiority of their
enemy. That is why protesters resort to use humor in such contexts.

https://www.thewrap.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Protest-sign-17.jpg

B:13

Figure (13) Ridicule of Trump’s outward appearance

The composition of this poster differs from the previous one because
the slogan appears at the top of the poster in small letters, but the image
is the most prominent element due to the large space it occupies. The
protest verbal sign features an economically worded slogan "Love
trumps hate" which despite its brevity, reflects the protesters' values,
and is communicated in an intelligent way. Such a democratic slogan
that the demonstrators use, is based on a pun that offers a double
interpretation of the word "Trump". The first level of meaning takes
"Trump" as a verb, which means "beat", conveying "Love beats hate."
which describes Love that (protesters practice) will always win over
hate (which Trump practices). The second level takes "Trump" as a

109
noun (Donald Trump's last name) conveys the meaning that protesters
love " things/people/ideas" Donald Trump hates." Like immigration,
women, and religious tolerance.

Trump appears in the foreground as a woman, wearing so much

makeup, his face was completely covered with a foundation mask, in
addition to lipstick, eye shadow, and blush that covered the features of
his face. He is the only actor in the image, the interactive meaning of
this poster shows that Trump is looking straight at viewers, it is an
obvious way to interact with them and ask for a reply. This kind of
images is called a "demand image" (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006).
Trump wears a red dress matching the color of the word "Trump" in the
logo, indicating harmony between the verbal and non-verbal component
within the poster. The producer also makes use of the close shot, and
the angle is not oblique but frontal which indicates involvement rather
than detachment, especially for those who elected Trump and
contributed to his victory, to see what representation Trump could be in
the posters of protesting women. For the same reason, an eye-level
angle dominates this poster.

Using white as a background is important to the overall message of the

text, as it becomes easily readable. In fact, it can be said that the red
color of Trump's dress and what corresponds to it in the verbal
discourse, reinforces the danger of what Trump practices (hate). White
color, on the other hand, reflects the purity and legality of
demonstrating against this danger. In other words, this message (both
verbal and nonverbal) indicates the purity of love and its victory over
hatred and its danger. Hence, as a multimodal resource, color
contributes well in decoding the intended meaning of the text.

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 The conclusion produced by this multimodal poster shows a clear
incongruity between love and hate. "Love" that protesters believe in and
seek to exist through their revolution against oppression, and "Hate"
which Trump practices through his negative attitude towards women
and his unfair decisions regarding immigrants and other religions).
Definitely, the outcome of this conflict is clear in our poster, as the
verbal phrase with its multiple meanings confirms the victory of love
over hate. That is why the image celebrates such victory by likening
Trump to what he hates or despises (women), this makes him the focus
of laughter and mockery (relief), and at the same time enhances the
values of the demonstrators and the legitimacy of their demands by
showing the weaknesses of their opponent and comparing them with
their strengths, thus achieving the desired victory (superiority).

https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/UAnDnAr_OPuLcgGRTfL7g40vD6k=/640x0/filters:no_u
pscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(webp)/impeach-protest-sign-
588140e33df78c2ccd34e081.jpg
Figure (14) Bad Peach President

In figure above, Trump is compared to a peach which reflects his

orange skin, and his facial features were drawn on it to look like Trump.
In this context, analytical process can be recognized in which Trump is

111
"the carrier" in relation to his prototypical, possessive attributes
represented by skin color, narrow eyes and beneath them clear white
halos and an open mouth, in addition to three-dimensional hair that
reflects the well-known Trump hairstyle. Moreover, the ironic use of
peach by putting Trump's traits on it, with a focus on the color of his
skin and hair fits " symbolic attributive process " that sums up what the
participant stands for. It is an indication of his racism since he has a
history of speech and actions that have been widely viewed as racist or
racially charged (Connor and Marans 2017), or it could be the same
racism on the part of the demonstrators as if they want to deal with him
in the same racist manner. In this case, this poster is considered more
politicized by using humor to refer to socio-politically incorrect acts by
Trump.

The interactive meaning of this poster shows Trump's direct gaze

towards the viewers, producing a kind of ‘demand’ image, the colors
dominating the poster are orange and brown corresponding to the colors
of Trump's skin and hair, and even the verbal text, with light blue in the
background. Based on the size of the frame and social distance, the
producer makes use of the close shot, the angle is not oblique but frontal
which indicates involvement rather than detachment, especially for
those who elected Trump and contributed to his victory, to see what his
representation in the posters of the protesting women. For the same
reason, an eye-level angle dominates this poster.

The information value of this poster suggests something completely

different, the verbal text represented by a one-word caption "Impeach"
makes the reader start reading from bottom to top, as if saying the
following sentence: "Impeach the peach", it is the demand that most of
the protesters are asking for. This, in turn, enhances the cooperation

112
between verbal and visual elements in communicating the significance
of the poster, as the former represents the verb of the imperative
sentence (Impeach), while the latter represents the object of it (the
peach). Such apparent disparagement humor against Trump
communicates ironic and ridiculous phrases and images, it reflects
Trump's inferiority, and offers the opportunity for the protesters to
acquire a sort of relief.

https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/VK26Q_ixv38_LElmpPxJMWaRqI=/960x0/filters:no_ups
cale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(webp)/trump-cant-build-wall-sign-
5881b76e5f9b58bdb3d98b52.jpg

A15

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https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/5883cc041200002d00ad8ef8.jpeg?ops=scalefit
_600_noupscale

B15

Figure (15) Wall policy poster

What distinguishes ‘Women's March’ 2017 is its simulation of several

topics within a socio-political framework to shed light on everything
that would condemn Trump and limit the implementation of his
controversial electoral program. Among those topics is the rejection of
Trump's proposal to build a wall at the border between the United States
and Mexico, under the pretext of stopping illegal immigration (see
Demata, 2017). Protesters showed their support for minorities,
immigrants, and other marginalized people in the United States. Hence,
they carried slogans denouncing the construction of this wall and
denying Trump's accusations of immigrants with crime and terrorism.

The picture of Trump, in Fig. A15, is framed from the top by a written
text, and there is also a comment by Trump from the left side of his
114
picture, directly in front of his mouth. As regards the slogan: "Can't
Build Wall, Hands Too Small", many of " ellipsis " are found to make
the logo easy to chant during the protest. The sentence can be: He Can't
Build a Wall, Because His Hands Are Too Small. Despite such ellipses,
the intended meaning is not affected. The cause and effect are clear, as
the latter declares Trump's inability to build the wall, while the former
explains a funny and ironic reason for that, which is his small hands.
Besides ellipses, rhyme also plays an important role in turning this
slogan into a hymn. Whereas in fig. B15, Trump is depicted surrounded
by a wall under construction. In her verbal slogan above the image, the
protester, sarcastically, declares her intention to finance that wall.

In fig. A15, the deficiency attributed to Trump in the verbal text is also
reinforced by the nonverbal, since the image portrays Trump as a funny
character, whose hands are too small that they prevent him from
building the wall, leading to a reaction with a comment that ends with
an exclamation mark expressing the difficulty or impossibility of such a
task: It is a disaster! Trump in both posters is not looking directly at
the viewer. This means that these images are not a demand, but an offer
for the viewer to laugh at Trump's deficiency. Horizontally, these two
posters share the same oblique angle to reinforce the idea of detachment
from such racism, however, the vertical angle perspective shows Trump
in A15 from an "eye-level" which indicates equality between the viewer
and the participant, disregarding the latter's position as president. While
the B15 photographed Trump from a high angle to emphasize his
inferiority versus the dominance of the viewer or rather the protester
who is looking at him from a high angle. Social distance, on the other
hand, specifies a personal visual range in A15, allowing the head,
shoulder, and the hands (as an important symbol) to be entirely seen.

115
While in B15, the impersonal distance completes the intended meaning
of sidelining Trump and making him a target of ridicule and laughter.

In these two posters, the information value of both verbal and

nonverbal representations proves equal significance. In A15, for
example, the black background helps to clarify the verbal text written in
a contrasting bold white color. making it notable. At the same time, it
does not affect the clarity of the image which occupies a larger area and
is dominated by light gray, yellow, and white. Complementing the
meaning of the slogan, the image also provides visual evidence of
Trump's impotence and inability to build the wall due to his small,
clearly visible hands. In B15, the photo is meaningful enough, as Trump
is portrayed as small and surrounded by a wall made by the protesters
who try to turn the tables on him because he is the one who deserves the
accusation of crime and terrorism. The oral text also adds a purposeful
humor touch explaining the protesters’ funding to build this wall to
restrict Trump and his racist projects instead of being between the
United States and Mexico.

The humorous incongruity shown by these two posters reflects critical

socio-political dimensions, since the wall that Trump intends to build,
fights oppressed minorities forced to emigrate due to the wars afflicting
their countries. Therefore, protesters are trying to express their
discontent with that decision by mocking its owner and showing him
ridiculous. Trump's hands differ from reality, to reflect his racist intent
concerning immigrants, hence, as much as the incongruities between his
gray hair and his small hands in the A15 poster, and that between his
wall and the protesters' wall in the B15 poster there is comfort for the
demonstrators to laugh at their opponent and reinforce their superiority
at the expense of his inferiority.

116
https://i0.wp.com/www.ifitshipitshere.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Screen-Shot-
2017-01-21-at-1.57.34-PM.png?resize=800%2C1008
Figure (16) Obama –Trump comparison

Protesters may compare Trump to his predecessors in an attempt to

ridicule him and show the lack of his supporters. The figure above, for
example, contains two posters with the same information value, the first
is on the right and closest to the camera, it includes a picture of Obama
and the word "HOPE" at the bottom, while the poster on the left
includes a picture of Trump with the word "NOPE". In fact, Obama's
photograph is the original. It was his 2008 campaign poster, drawn by
the graffiti artist, "Shepard Fairey" (Terrell-Curtis 2014:2), but in the
context of ‘Women March’, it goes beyond its previous purpose, to
communicate protesters' rejection of Trump and his inauguration. Thus,
it is contrasted to a parody version of Trump's image with the word
"NOPE" instead of "HOPE". Symbolically, it could be an indication of
the incongruity between Obama and Trump, since the former is
associated with HOPE to represent hopefulness, while the latter is
associated with NOPE to represent hopelessness.

117
 In terms of representational meaning, the "HOPE" and "NOPE"
posters show Obama and Trump as represented participants, their suits
are similar in color and design, regardless of the pin on Obama's jacket
which reflects "rising sun" as his campaign slogan (Terrell-Curtis
2014:2). By analytical processes, each participant represents a carrier in
relation to a number of prototypical possessive attributes, Trump has
orange skin and yellow hair while Obama has black skin and hair, this
reflects their different ethnicities.

In terms of interactive meaning, both posters share the same close

distance since only the head and shoulders are clear, however, visual
contact reveals some difference, as Obama's gaze is directed away from
the viewer to offer a contemplative look that reflects embodied hope,
while Trump is looking at the viewer to suggest a demanding image.
The angle also indicates another difference; Obama's portrait shows a
horizontal oblique angle since his shoulders and head tilted slightly to
the left, this removes the idea of involvement for the viewer and
reinforces the idea of contemplation for Obama. It is also taken from a
low vertical angle to reflect the power and dominance of the one who
represents hope for his supporters. Whereas Trump' portrait shows a
horizontal frontal and a vertical eye level angles to allow the viewer to
enter the world of the represented participant who, in turn, is stripped of
his power. The predominant colors for both posters are blue, black and
red. The upper corner of both is divided into blocks of red and blue,
which appear to be associated with political parties in America, the red
color for the Republicans, and blue for the Democrats.

The verbal text, on the other hand, is written in bold, light blue to be
visible against its dark background. It basically includes one word on
the underside of each poster: "HOPE" for Obama's picture, and "NOPE"

118
for Trump's, with all letters capitalized, reflecting the producer's
emphasis on it. What the verbal text presents here is indispensable,
regardless of its limitation to one word, that it is considered the basis for
reading the image above it. The word "NOPE" for example, puts Trump
in a negative frame, which makes him a failed politician, while "HOPE"
puts Obama in a positive frame, reflecting the hope derived from his
policy. Such incongruity helps deliver the protesters' message and
justifies the use of humor in protest.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a4/57/41/a457413e0dcb1f1385521ad2ade5dd55.jpg
Figure (17) Women's self-confidence

In fact, this poster dates from WWII, late in 1942, and was designed
by J. Howard Miller for the "Westinghouse Electric Corporation". Its
purpose was to encourage American women to join their female
colleagues in those factories to replace the men who had been recruited
for the war. It symbolizes "Rosie the Riveter," which was a cultural
symbol of the working woman during that war. The heroic character
that inspired Miller was the American war worker: Naomi Parker Fraley

119
(Kimble and Olson 2006: 534). With the passage of time, this poster
became an icon of the feminist movement, that is why, protesters in
‘Women March’ recall this poster with some modification by adding
Trump to be like a pig trapped under the pressure of Rosie's strong
muscles. Here, in such a context, its purpose is to demonstrate the
power of women and justify their ability to confront Trump and defeat
him. Because women who replaced their husbands and worked in
occupations requiring strength, are able to defeat the misogynist Trump.

The poster features Rosie as a pretty girl, in a blue uniform, with

sleeves folded to reveal prominent arm muscles, its big fist evokes
willpower and determination. She wears also a red and white polka dot
bandana. However, with Trump's addition, the girl's left hand is covered
as she raises the sleeves of her right hand to reveal her muscles, but the
poster gets funny, since Trump is likened to a pig (pig's nose and body)
trapped between the folds of Rosie's arm, this suggests an action process
in which Rosie is the Actor, and Trump as the Goal, the whole angle of
her arm forms a strong vector between the two represented participants.
In reaction, Trump's face appears with signs of anger - the eyes are
narrow, the eyebrows are taut, and the upper teeth painfully pressing the
lower lip. This particular comparison demeans Trump and makes him
an object of ridicule, as he is just a defeated pig. Also, verbal process,
shows Rosie as Sayer since she represents the participant from whom
the dialogue balloon "We Can Do It!" comes. Her declarative statement
is placed inside a blue balloon, on top of the poster. It is directed from
Rosie to women, but the purpose varies depending on the context. The
old was an incentive for women to work in factories, but now, by
adding Trump, it becomes an incentive for them to confront Trump and

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defeat him. Thus, Rosie's audience, both old and new, is fully aware of
that mission (it) in the logo.

Interactive meaning, on the other hand, depicts Rosie staring at the

viewer, as if she is intent on persuading the women of their limitless
power. You and I (We) are able to do that, since with union, the
difficulties are underestimated and the goals achieved. The close
distance of both Rosie and Trump helps to see their details, however,
the oblique angle excludes the idea of involvement, or rather invites
only women who did not elect Trump and are now objecting his
inauguration, so the slogan is directed at them. Also, the vertical eye
level angle suggests equality between those women and Rosie through
their common goals. The predominant colors in this poster are red,
blue, pink and brown, while the background has differed in the same
poster, the top section that includes the logo is dark blue, while the
image background is yellow, this helped to clarify what was drawn on
it. The information value of this poster is based on the idea that the
image and verbal expressions have a mutual relationship, each adds to
the other, the image, for example, determines what the task is, while the
verbal text confidently asserts the success of that task through the
Women's Union to confront Trump and thwart his racist project.

This poster contains a number of incongruities that serve the purpose of

humor in protest, for example, the difference between the old and new
poster causes a great contradiction in terms of the goal, and also adds a
humorous element, as Trump is dehumanized to be a defeated pig at the
hands of a woman who represents a female icon. The woman herself
reflects what could be included in the discrepancies of the poster,
combining masculine and feminine characteristics at the same time. Her
performance movement, the work shirt she wears, her muscles that

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convey strength, and the phrase she says reflects a purely masculine
role, while her makeup (mascara, eyeliner and lipstick) emphasizes her
femininity. Trump's analogy with a defeated pig creates an atmosphere
of laughter and relieves the demonstrators from the pressure they are in,
and in return strengthens their identity which Trump tries repeatedly to
undermine, as women here respond to Trump what he used to describe
during his election campaign.

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/56/84/24/568424d4b643a7bf06ec4133cacfe971.jpg

Figure (18) The struggle of women against their oppressors

The information value of this poster shows it divided into two pieces:
the written text appears at the top, while the photo at the bottom, it
depicts a woman holding a machine with which she sucks waste. What
is surprising here is the waste itself, since it goes out of the ordinary to
contain a group of politicians (including Trump) who have been scaled
down to fit that machine. This visual metaphor symbolizes the positive
representation of the in-group (woman who cleanses America of the
mess) versus the negative representation of the out-group (the mess

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itself). Moreover, the narrative meaning suggests an action process in
which the machine forms a clear vector, it extends from the right corner
and crosses the center towards the left in order to connect the Actor (the
woman) with the Goal (the mess). Analytical processes, on the other
hand, concentrate on some biological features like Trump's orange skin,
hairstyles, etc.

In terms of interactive meaning, the woman is portrayed from an

oblique, personal distance showing below her waist up to her head. The
oblique angle removes the idea of involvement for the viewer and
reinforces the work continuing for the women. Her gaze is not directed
at the viewer which is read as an offering look to see women’s reformist
tendency. Also, a vertical "eye-level angle" suggests equality between
the reformist woman depicted and the viewers (among them these
women protesting) through their common goals.

The white background unites the poster, both verbal and non-verbal,
but what is on is varied greatly, as the image is divided into the left and
the right. The color saturation of politicians suggests to the viewer the
reality of what they represent in this photo, for they are the mess that
prevails in the country, while the black and white on the right side,
reflects the efforts of woman over the years to fight politicians who
tried to rob her rights, so the depicted woman here wears a white dress
to celebrate her glory. The verbal text also varies in color, as the phrase
(bring in the) is written in black, but the words that followed, except
(to) raised the alarm for those politicians, especially Trump, by coloring
it in red. Moreover, the word "woman" is written in italics to confirm its
importance in this context. Also, the phrase "CLEAN UP THE MESS"
is all capitalized to explain the role of women in the struggle against
their oppressors, and this is what we see metaphorically in the picture.

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The position of politicians on the left, and the woman on the right
indicates the "known and unknown" information, as viewers realize the
mess represented by the politicians, but they do not know the name of
the woman who cleans this mess. Furthermore, the location of the
verbal text at the top and the picture at the bottom refer to "ideal and
real" information, because the former presents "the mess" as an idea,
while the latter confirms its real meaning.

It can be said that the incongruity is embodied in the relationship

between the verbal and visual elements of this poster because what the
viewer expects from the imperative sentence above is to seek the help of
women in cleaning the place from the mess, since the dirty place should
be cleaned, and this task is for women. But the picture surprises the
viewer with the essence of that mess. In other words, the verbal text
arouses particular anticipation which ends up with the exposure of "the
punch line" in the image. This, in turn, creates a kind of inconsistency
that provokes laughter and surprise. Also, it justifies the reason for
using humor by the in-group in order to reflect its superiority over the
out-group inferiority.

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https://www.instagram.com/p/BPl1grvANA5/?utm_source=ig_embed

A19

http://www.irishnews.com/picturesarchive/irishnews/irishnews/2017/01/30/213005700-
3e978598-192c-4097-9ae7-def1de3d9c40.jpg
B19

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https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/best-protest-signs-womens-march-
washington-donald-trump-57-5884ad6117986__700.jpg

C19

Figure (19) Russian – Trump posters

Russia Trump collusion also dominates word - image posters, since the
protesters intend to reinforce the image with words to highlight such a
controversial topic. According to multimodal analysis, the above three
posters depict Trump's subordination and weakness because he allowed
a foreign country to interfere in the affairs of his country, Fig. A19
shows Putin with a naked chest holding a rope, its other end is wrapped
around a poodle's neck. The interesting thing here is the idea of giving
Trump's face to that depicted dog, as it conveys exactly what the
protesters aim to highlight. Generally speaking, Poodle is the name for
a type of long curly-haired dog known for obedience and passivity
(Online Etymology Dictionary), but politically speaking, this word is
used to insult a certain politician as a result of his obedience or
submission to another political figure. It has been used by critics of
former British Prime Minister Tony Blair in the past as a result of his
relentless support for former US President Bush, especially in
connection with his involvement in the war against Iraq (Watson 2003).

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Therefore, it could be said that the conceptual symbolic process depicts
Trump as a poodle to justify his blind obedience to Putin, while the
narrative action process makes the rope as a vector that connects
between the superior (Putin) and the subordinate (Trump).

In Fig. B19, the analytical structure shows Trump as a maidservant (the

carrier) in terms of his outfit (possessive attributes), the wide red robe,
and the headdress he wears serves also the conceptual symbolic process
which reflects Trump's appropriate role as an obedient maidservant to
Putin who is sovereign over her.

While Fig. C19 depicts him merging with Putin to reflect the secret
cooperation between them. Apparently, this poster shows only one
represented participant, but symbolically that participant is a
combination of two persons, Trump and Putin under the name
‘TRUMPsPUTIN’. By looking at his face, it seems that Putin’s features
have overshadowed Trump’s because whoever looks at him at first
glance suggests Putin's name, this symbolizes Putin's control of Trump
or his attempt to rule America indirectly through Trump. What was
taken from Trump is the yellow hair, the orange skin, and the white
halos. In such a context, the analytical process relates represented
participants within a part-whole structure. So, it could deal with this
Portrait as "the carrier" which acts as the whole, while Trump's and
Putin's features that contribute to the formation of it as "possessive
attributes."

The interactive meaning of these three posters suggests certain ideas,

for example, the visual contact in Fig. A19 shows Trump (as a poodle)
looks directly at the viewer, to impose viewers' involvement, but Putin
on his part reduces this through his far-right contemplative gaze. This
idea of detachment is also reinforced by choosing an oblique angle for

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the same participants, it confirms a woven plot between them. The
nearby social distance, on the other hand, reinforces all that precedes it.
The gaze of Trump (as a maidservant) in fig. B19 is directed at
something the viewer does not see. This could be an offer for the viewer
to search for undeclared Trump’s controversial agenda, however, the
oblique angle aims to detach the viewer from doing so. The personal
visual distance, on the other hand, allows us to see the participant's head
and shoulders. Interactive meaning in fig. C19 shows Trump's direct
gaze towards the viewers, producing a kind of ‘demand’ images, the
shot also is personal and reinforced by a close distance, this helps the
viewer to plunge into the represented participant's world trying to
understand the mystery surrounding him. The front angle of the portrait
integrates the audience into it naturally. Vertically, it shows "an eye-
level angle" to allow the viewer to enter the world of the represented
participant.

The information value of these three posters reflects the clear harmony
between verbal and visual elements since they both aim at exposing the
relationship between Trump and Putin by portraying the former as a
powerless figure in the latter's hand. Such harmony between those units
may extend beyond the meaning to include their compositional design.
The verbal text in fig. A19, for example, occupies roughly the
remainder of the poster to interpret this pictorial relationship as
possessive (Putin's poodle). Such bitter truth is followed by a number
of dots as a pause before the word sad, which comes in response to what
precedes it as if the protesters are trying to turn the table on Trump
using his own words, as he always likes to use the word "sad" to
describe anything he hates. This is why its color (white) matches that of

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who said it, while the red color of Putin's name is associated with the
seriousness of the upcoming external threat.

For the same reason, Putin's name in fig. B19 is colored in red,
matching his maid's robe in the image. The verbal text completes what
the image started as if combining them implies the noun phrase that
summarizes Trump's role: the maidservant of Putin". Such
representation could be considered as a strong argument against Trump.
Furthermore, the compositional process in fig. C19 shows Putin's facial
features dominate the portrait, but the exaggeration of color helps
Trump's skin and hair stand out.

The way Trump has represented contrasts sharply that of Putin, where
hegemony and power prevailed over the latter, while weakness and
dependency dominated the former, making him a subject of ridicule (a
poodle, or maidservant). These incongruities summarize the protesters'
view of that relationship and illustrate the effective role of humor in
exposing the alleged Russian interference.

https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wpcontent/uploads/2017/01/822866384220749824-
png__700.jpg

A20

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This widespread feminist opposition against Trump did not arise out of
a vacuum but rather was a reaction to his vulgar anti-women speeches
during his election campaign, such as insulting female journalists, his
tweets, as well as his sexual comments in leaked videos. Hence,
women's posters are nothing but a direct response to these violations,
and the poster above is an example. It depicts a girl on a pair of ovaries
and a uterus (reproductive system), saying an interrogative sentence:
"Why are you so obsessed with me?". Actually, the picture of the girl
(with no reproductive system) and the verbal phrase under it taken from
a 2004 American teen comedy film “Mean Girls” in which Regina
George, played by Rachel McAdams, asks Lindsay Lohan’s character,
“Why are you so obsessed with me? The film was directed by Mark
Waters and written by Tina Fey.

The representational meaning of this poster shows the blonde girl

mediating her reproductive system fitting " symbolic attributive
process" that sums up what the participant stands for since such a girl
represents the women in general, while her reproductive system
represents her gender, or what distinguishes her from man. The
analytical process, on the other hand, can be recognized in which the
girl is "the carrier" in relation to her prototypical, possessive attributes
represented by the reproductive system. Furthermore, the girl’s view of
something outside the scope of the image and her phrase that needs an
answer or justification from the person to whom this question is
directed, suggests her role as a Reactor in the "Reactional process". It
lets the viewers conceive what the Reactor is staring at or thinking
about, " this can create a powerful sense of empathy or identification
with the represented participants" (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2006:68).

130
 The girl's gaze is not directed at the viewer, suggesting an "offer"
image, while the shot is close to indicate a close relationship with the
viewer who plunges into the girl's world trying to understand the
mystery surrounding her. Furthermore, the horizontal front angle of the
image integrates the viewer into it naturally, the vertical "an eye-level
angle", on the other hand designates equivalence between the viewer
and the participants represented.

Despite the black background of the poster, word and image create
another white background for the sake of clarity, takes the form of the
space they occupy. For example, the beige colors of the reproductive
system, the girl’s face, and her blond hair are clear on such a
background. The same applies to the slogan, which reflects a striking
contrast. The information value of this poster deals with verbal and
nonverbal elements as if they are one linguistic unit since in addition to
their unification in the background, they are merging to the extent that
the lower part of the image hacks off the verbal phrase and becomes
part of it. This interconnectedness also stems from the realization that
the verbal phrase was actually spoken by the girl pictured, thus
displaying what is real to reinforce what is ideal. The word "obsessed"
in the verbal phrase is applied to persons who lose control of their
feelings about the topic of their obsession (Vocabulary.com Dictionary).
In the context of our study, this could be applied to Trump in his
controversial views on women, as the girl here addresses him using the
pronoun (you) with an emphasis on (obsessed with me) that was written
in bold to attract his attention. Thus, it could be argued that the use of
such popular cultural images and phrases in protest posters puts the
insult in the context of a joke, but this does not diminish its seriousness,

131
as it is tendentious humor that reliefs the protesting women, in addition,
to be a dangerous public statement.

https://dumptrumpdumptrump.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/womans-bodies-
more-regulated-than-guns.jpg
B20

https://compote.slate.com/images/0fb847c6-9c8b-4d25-9b24-2f232d11e75b.jpg
C20

Figure (20) Feminine body organs

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 As we see, there is a clear focus on the visual representation of the
female anatomy, as there are colorful images of the uterus, vagina, and
fallopian tubes with different verbal slogans. Poster B20, for example
depends on image-word cooperation, saying " My uterus is more
regulated than guns", to convey the intended message that getting
reproductive health services is more difficult than getting bullets. This
logo attacks Trump's anti-women agenda during his campaign. It
conveys the deterioration that women's health will reach after Trump's
winning due to his selection of candidates opposed to reproductive
freedom, like "Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Supreme Court
nominee Neil Gorsuch", and his intention to ban abortion, except in rare
cases. He also intends to repeal the "Affordable Care Act", and other
unfair decisions that terrify women and strike their identity to the core.
Poster C20 also deals with the same biological organ as a participant,
but with the phrase that metaphorically proves its value as a machine in
combating fascism, this serves the Symbolic Attributive process. On the
other hand, the Analytical process can be recognized to relate the
represented participants within a part-whole structure (the reproductive
system in both posters as a possessive attribute for the women who
carry it). In addition, this reproductive system seems to be the most
salient element in the composition of these posters, its bright red color
(in B20 poster) and bright purple (in C20) contrast strongly with the
white background. Also, it occupies much space. Furthermore, the
relationship between the image and the word reflects the
interconnectedness and harmony to the extent that the image does not
visually repeat what has been represented linguistically, but rather
replaces the word or performs its linguistic function.

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It could be argued that by social creativity (protest), women try to
maintain positive distinctiveness. So, they redefine some comparative
elements (Tajfel and Turner 1979:43) by displaying women's
reproductive organs and using them in reformulating some anti-women
decisions. They call for pride and strength instead of weakness and
shame so that comparison which was previously negative are now
perceived as positive. This would enhance the social identity of the
women who are now able to defend their stolen rights even if the need
arises to make the internal anatomy of their bodies, external using bold
images and phrases.

https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wpcontent/uploads/2017/01/822852294014222336-
png__700.jpg
Figure (21) Ridicule of Trump's words

What is also noticeable in this protest is the reclamation of misogynistic

phrases that had previously been said by Donald Trump, or the attempt
to respond to in a way that reflects confidence and empowerment. The
poster above, for example, shows the candidate in the 2016 election
(Trump's opponent), Hillary Clinton giving thumbs-up which is a

134
common hand gesture used for approval. Her facial expressions reflect
confidence and encouragement. Symbolic Attributive Processes display
her as a representative of women in addition to being Trump's opponent.
Her gaze is directed at the viewers (women) to invite them to see her
gesture and verbal phrase. The close shot indicates a close relationship
with the viewer Furthermore, the horizontal oblique angle of the image
imposes the idea of detachment, the vertical an eye-level angle, on the
other hand designates equivalence between the viewer and the
participants represented.

The verbal text also clarifies the intended meaning of the poster, as it
is considered a response to Trump's phrase "Nasty Woman" that he used
to refer to Hillary Clinton when she interrupted his speech during a
presidential debate. Thus, the approval visualized by Hillary's gesture
and her supportive phrase removes the negative characteristic of that
word (nasty) and replaces it with what is positive or confidence-
inspiring, thus transforming it into a word of empowerment that reflects
challenge and confrontation. Therefore, the phrase "Stay Nasty"
conveys the following message: stay as you are "nasty", as Trump
described you, to argue and interrupt everything that threatens your
identity and freedom.

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https://i0.wp.com/www.ifitshipitshere.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Screen-Shot-
2017-01-21-at-2.03.30-PM.png?resize=800%2C799
A:22

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/30/e6/f0/30e6f03c91503ce7372f5326a5e25f13.jpg

B:22

136
https://media.glamour.com/photos/5883c2fb5d5aebbc313a97d0/master/w_1600%2
Cc_limit/Unknown-35.jpeg

C:22

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/02/f9/63/02f96368e20cc518f36f9af3ba30a704.jpg
D:22

Figure (22) Defeat Trump posters

137
 The supremacy or disparagement humor is manifested in ‘Women
March’ to express negative or hostile attitudes that women have against
Trump. According to the first dimension of representational meaning,
fig. A22 shows three participants: a woman and a cat, on one hand, and
Trump on the other. The three are flying in the air in a combat posture
that shows the victory of the woman kicking Trump hard. This Action
process shows a woman and cat as Actors especially in relation to their
Goal (Trump). The woman's leg extends to reach Trump's body, that is
why it is a vector for this process. The blow is clear on Trump through
his shocking reaction. The verbal logo, on the other hand, justifies this
painful blow, or judo, as for the sake of justice and retribution from the
perpetrator.

Fig. B22 on the other hand, displays Two participants, a girl riding a
monster and trying to pull a rope wrapped around it. This monster is
Trump, appearing to be subordinate to that girl. Primitivism prevails in
this image through the outfit of the girl, who is shown by the Action
process as the Actor in relation to her Goal (the brutal Trump). The rope
around his neck is a vector for this process. The Symbolic attributive
process, on the other hand, depicts Trump as a monster to reflect his
barbaric policy and unfair view of women. Therefore, he is called a
misogynist in verbal text.

Fig. C22 shows Wonder Woman who is an iconic superhero punches

Trump aggressively, this reflects an Action process in which the woman
is the Actor while Trump's body is the Goal. The force of the blow is
evident in the lines around the word pow, Symbolically, Trump's
backward body and his flying tie reflect weakness, submission, and
guilt, while connotations of strength, responsibility, and leadership are
reflected in the woman's movement. The analytical process, on the other

138
hand, can be recognized in which Wonder Woman is "the carrier" in
relation to her prototypical, possessive attributes represented by her red
shirt and blue skirt dotted with white stars (the colors of the American
flag), in addition to her tiara and bracelets. Also, the verbal process
shows both as Sayers since they represent the participants from whom
the dialogue balloon comes.

Extraordinarily, the woman who holds up poster D22 forces the

researcher to include her as a participant, since she plays an essential
role in determining the meaning of that poster. This woman represents
herself as a cat by certain details such as the fur, tail, ears, and claws.
Her visible claws cut Trump's portrait longitudinally, that is why she
(Cat Woman) could be the Actor in relation to her Goal (Trump). The
analytical process, on the other hand, can be recognized in which she is
"the carrier" in relation to her possessive attributes that distinguish her
as a cat. Furthermore. The Symbolic process shows the cat as a symbol
of a woman as she counteracts Trump's crude statements about women.

As far as "interactive dimension" as concerned, the visual contact of the

represented participants in A22 does not reflect a demanding image, but
rather is an offer for the viewer to see the crushing defeat of Trump, and
the remarkable courage of the woman depicted. The oblique angle also
reinforces the idea of detachment. Furthermore, close social distance
dominates the image as the whole figures are visible in the frame image.
Figs. B22 and C22, on the other hand, are dominated by the absence of
visual contact with the viewer as a woman's eyes are directed towards
Trump. The goal of detachment is also accomplished by the horizontal
oblique angle. However, the vertical eye-level angle and close social
distance add some familiarity. The vectors between the represented
participants and the viewer in fig. D22 reflect a "demand" image. The

139
Woman Cat, for example, asks the viewer to see the fate of the one who
upsets the woman. Her facial expressions i.e. her open mouth and
visible tusks depict a woman's anger, which is why her reaction was
violent, savage, and vengeful.

The information value of these posters shows what enhances the

status of women and proves their ability to confront Trump and defeat
him. The central and marginalized layout in A22 reflects the dominance
of the woman depicted by occupying the center of the image at the
expense of the marginalized Trump, to the extent that her shadow
covers a large part of his body. Even the colors contribute to this
representation since the background and verbal text unite with the color
of her sportswear, but with a lighter degree to enhance her distinction.
Trump as a monster in B22 seems big, but the portrayal of the girl
holding his bridle and controlling him proves his smallness of mind and
his lack of resourcefulness. He is foregrounded in a beige color that is
identical to the backgrounded verbal text to whom it provides an
adequate description. In addition, Wonder Woman in fig. C22 is the
most salient element in the picture, although she occupies the right side
as New, but with her painful blow to Trump, she tilts her body towards
him and expands the space she occupies trying to push him from his
position in the left as Given. Furthermore, the colors of her uniform that
resemble the colors of the American flag draw attention to her. Her pink
verbal phrase "Not on my watch!" suggests that she heard or touched
something that she rejects and will not let that happen while she is
around. This is likely to be a critical response to Trump's claim that
women allowed him to do immoral things while he was a superstar.
Therefore, the verbal text here justifies the Action process embodied in
the image. Whereas in fig. D22, the influence of woman's claws on

140
Trump's centralized image gives her supremacy and prominence. Also,
the verbal text "These paws have claws" in the margin reinforces what
we see. Thus Trump's defeat at the hands of women in the posters above
reflects a humorous contradiction that removes tension and reinforces
the social identity of women.

https://dumptrumpdumptrump.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/dont-even-think-
about-it.jpg

A23

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https://www.reddit.com/r/TheHandmaidsTale/comments/8yu6r8/no_spoilers_hmmmm/?st=
JKCYE941&sh=eca4431f

B23
Figure (23) Ridicule of Trump's actions

A quick look at these two posters together shows action and reaction
between the represented participants (Trump and the Statue of Liberty),
since Trump's harassment against the Statue of Liberty in the first poster
is answered with what is stronger, violent, and more deserving in the
second poster. They (both posters) denounce Trump's win in the 2016
election and his impunity despite the bad words about women in his
leaked video. According to the representational dimension, fig. A23
shows the Statue of Liberty with angry facial expressions, in response to
Trump and his immoral hand movement. This action classifies Trump
as an Actor while the statue is a Goal. On the other hand, the
personification of the Statue of Liberty here serves the symbolic
attribution process, because it symbolizes the freedom of women, their
political right, and the necessity of their equality with men (Bold, 2006:
95). Also, the verbal process shows the Statue of Liberty as Sayer since
she represents the participant from whom the dialogue balloon "Don't
Even Think About It" comes. Fig. B23 shows the Statue of Liberty
retaliating with a fist that grabs Trump's lower body, thus the Action
process proves her role as an Actor. The visual representation also
depicts Trump in a very small size (little man) compared to the statue,
despite the convergence between them in the first poster, this reflects
his weakness and defeat. Also, as a reaction, his strange facial features
reflect fear and panic as a result of his shock.

As far as the "interactive dimension" as concerned, the social distance

of represented participants in fig. A23 shows them completely visible,

142
indicating familiarity with the viewer. Also, Trump's visual contact is
directed at the viewer to impose viewers' involvement, while the angry
gaze of the statue towards Trump reduces that and offers for the viewer
the naked truth. Furthermore, the front and eye level angles reinforce
the idea of involvement. On the other hand, in fig. B23, the statue's
view of Trump being crushed conveys the thrill of revenge against
Trump, who offended her. This reaction exposes the viewer to what
proves the strength of a woman and her ability to resist, as forgiveness
and acceptance of insult make the aggressor persist in harm and
injustice.

The idea of detachment from the viewer is also reinforced by choosing

an oblique angle for Trump. On the other hand, an eye-level angle urges
the viewer (especially women) to follow the example of the Statue and
resist injustice as it lives in silence. Furthermore, the incongruity
between Trump in the first poster and Trump in the second one makes
him a source of laughing and mockery and this is what the protesters
aim at. Also, the decisive response of the Statue of Liberty in the second
poster reflects women's ability to confront their persecutors and retaliate
against them, and thus enhance their superiority.

4.2.3 word- only posters

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https://www.google.com/search?q=meow+pussy+grabs+back+poster+%3Ewomen+
march

Figure (24) Posters of Trump's threat by women

Trump’s misogynistic speech forms a strong incentive for women to

participate in this protest, so most of their posters represent an offensive
and decisive reaction, whether by word, image, or both, using humor to
attain this goal. The poster above "MEOW, PUSSY GRABS BACK"
plays on the multiple meanings of the word "pussy", as it can refer to a
cat, especially with the existence of the word "Meow" at the top of the
poster in a bright white color. It also likely refers to a woman's genitals
(similar to what was previously analyzed in word-image posters), so, we
can link this term to a woman because even a cat is associated with her
in this protest. Furthermore, the rest of the sentence reveals the
incongruity of humor, since neither cat nor woman's genitals can grab
back, it is also embodied in the attempt of women to regain their status
by using their body organs as elements of resistance and power instead
of shame and weakness. The color of the poster also contradicts its
content, i.e. the bright pink color reflects tenderness and femininity,

144
while the content reveals a warning from the woman to Trump as her
pussy grabs back.

https://media.glamour.com/photos/5883d98a1e5076de31e8b375/master/w_1600%2Cc_limit/Unkno
wn-13.jpeg

A25

https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/best-protest-signs-
womens-march-washington-donald-trump-87-5884b3eb4a462__700.jpg

B25

145
 Figure (25) Expansion the scope of the protest

There are also signs that broaden the scope of the protest
chronologically or compare what happens to ancient historical contexts,
poster A25 for example, is introduced by three women wearing antique
costumes and straw hats with ribbons that read "VOTES FOR
WOMEN", colored in white, green and purple linked to the ancient
suffragette movement. The ridiculous link between the 2017 protest and
the suffrage movement in the previous century, whether by fashion or
the sign that reads: "SAME SHIT. DIFFERENT CENTURY" conveys
the feeling among protesters that they are part of a long history of
women's protests, and creates a humorous incongruity based on the
temporal clash between the ancient and modern context. This
contradiction is also reinforced by the use of "SHIT" as a modern vulgar
word to express protesters' anger at Trump's demeaning policies that
contradict contemporary expectations.

The women in the B25 poster also wear old dresses and hats, just
looking at them takes us to old centuries, in which women used to wear
such costumes. However, the poster takes us back to the present and
reminds us that it is 2017, not 1817. It can be said that the incongruity
here is between the past and the present, as the past is what the viewer
expects by looking at the fashion of the women who present the poster,
but the poster surprises the viewer with the real-time we are in. In other
words, women's costumes raise special anticipation that ends with the
exposure of "the punch line" in the poster.

This, in turn, creates a kind of paradox that is both laughter and

surprise. It also justifies the use of humor in protest context, since the
intended meaning here is, that despite this incongruity, women today

146
still suffer from injustice, persecution, and deprivation of their
legitimate rights. Thus, recalling the past (through women's costumes)
and reminding that we passed it (in the poster) could be a very
important message that reflects the legitimacy of the protest against
Trump's policy which brings to mind the slavery of past times. The
colors of these two posters correspond to the clothes of these women, as
the first poster is written in a dark green color on a white background
and in capital letters for the purpose of emphasis. The second poster, on
the other hand, is framed in pink to match the woman’s scarf on the
right, and despite the black background of the poster, the text has
created another white background for the sake of clarity, takes the form
of the space it occupies. Moreover, the focus has been given to "2017"
which is written in dark black and is larger than the rest of the text to
emphasize the fact that at such a time, women are still protesting for
their legitimate rights!

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/16/ea/9f/16ea9f60199bb73233af635097fc3756.jpg

Figure (26) Ridicule of Trump's slogan

147
 Trump has adopted his campaign slogan "Make America Great Again"
but the signs of his brutal policy made his opponents use the slogan
"Make America Hate Again." The ironic use of the word "Hate" instead
of "Great" translates the reactions of the protesters toward his policy as
he chose to wage a battle with everyone, such as neighboring countries
(i. e Mexico), minorities (i. e immigrants), in addition to women, blacks
of African descent, etc, it also creates a kind of purposeful humor, since
the apparent incongruity between "Great" and "Hate" serves the
demonstrators' intention in highlighting the consequences of Trump
aggressive policy and its danger to the future of America, that is why
his name is written in bold red to indicate that danger, also, all letters
are capitalized and take a large space. The white background of the
poster makes what is written on it clear, and its blue frame unites with
the red and white to form the colors of the American flag, as this slogan
reflects the protesters' concern about the future of America.

https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/GfqFdsxoxHDVz8S4ACZdRkd_r8=/700x0/filters:no_ups
cale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(webp)/trump-sign-mr-hate-leave-state
56e9bd143df78cb4b97b97db.jpg
Figure (27) Trump fired in all colors

148
 As is evident above, some posters address the winning candidate,
Trump directly, using sarcastic and insulting nicknames, "MR. HATE"
for example, refers to him since according to protesters, who makes
America hate again, could be a symbol of hate and fear, that is why he
is ordered to leave the state. Also, the use of the possessive determiner
"MY" conveys the idea that the protesters are the ones who own the
state, hence they are able to expel Trump and thwart his racist plots.
The determination of the protesters towards their state is also
manifested through the colors that support the implicit meaning of the
slogan, , as the basic colors, blue, red, and yellow were chosen to expel
Trump and reject his barbaric policy in the sense that he is dismissed by
the language of the colors: the blue color for "MR. HATE", the
imperative verb "LEAVE" emanating from the protesters and the
possessive attribute "MY" that reflects their authority, are colored in
red, while yellow is chosen to represent America. Furthermore, Trump
is addressed "MR. HATE" that ends with sound t which rhymes with
the word "STATE", this plays an important role in adding humorous
effects to the slogan, and transforming it into a song that young and old
repeat so that its reverberates reach Trump's ears in his castle.

In conclusion, it can be said that all the proposed forms of the protest
poster (‘image-only posters’, word-only posters’, and ‘word-image
posters) have clearly contributed to the use of humor to achieve the
goals for which the protesters went out. But the combination of image
and word collaboration in one poster contributed greatly in this regard
(see Chapter Five). The above analysis is part of the descriptive feature
of the data and the next section will conclude with the results of that
analysis.

149
 CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
This chapter reveals the final findings of the current study and how this
helps to answer its research questions to end up with the conclusions,
implications and suggestions for further research in this field.

5.1 Findings: A brief Look

It is noticeable that politicized Humor in a protest context could be the
weapon of the protesters to demonstrate their resistance’ and revolt
against their oppressors. It is a disparagement approach where the focus
on the ways in which negative or hostile attitudes against the ‘target’ are
expressed through ironic and ridiculous phrases and images, as in
chapter four, putting Trump down by witty words and images to achieve
triumph over him. They (women as protesters) play with words and
images and find unexpected connections between Trump's humiliating
representation and our expectations for the "President of America"
(incongruity) to reassure themselves (relief) and to restore positive
distinctiveness (superiority) under hard circumstances.
In response to the aim and focus of this thesis, Kress and van
Leeuwen’s (2006) visual grammar would significantly reveal the
potentially politicized meanings of humor depicted in the protest posters
under study. This will inevitably be through considering multiple
elements of representational, interactive, and textual meanings that
denote: a) the way in which the participants are represented, b) the
implied relationships between the viewer and the represented
participants, and c) how these relationships contribute to the posters’

150
purposes, which respectively help to answer the research questions.
There are also other factors that help in the analysis process, such as the
colors, location of the information (right, left, top, bottom), the size of
the letters (upper and lower), and so on. This is to say that image is no
longer simply an illustration of the verbal text because its "visual
grammar" gives the poster the potential to mean (see Kress and van
Leeuwen, 2006).
In answering RQ1, In what way(s) are the participants (in-group and
outgroup) represented? this work demonstrates Trump's ironic
representation whether he is alone or in comparison to a competitor. In
his solitary representation, he is likened to a raging animal to reflect the
contradictions of fear and laughter, or to disgusting things that make
him the object of mockery. Accompanied by a competitor, he is
represented as ‘goal’, ‘weak’, and ‘hypocrite. Compared to his looking-
opponent, Russian Putin, for example, he appears as a ‘new: not yet
agreed upon’, ‘poodle’, ‘inferior’, ‘doll’, and ‘babyish’ US-political
figure. His representation also reflects a negative framework that
translates the failure of his policy and the lack of his supporters
compared to his positive-framed predecessor, Obama who appears as a
symbol of hope, strength, and hegemony. Furthermore, the combination
of him and woman in one poster also reveals an opposite representation,
as the latter is represented as a superheroine, wonder woman, and a cat
with claws, while the former is represented as a weak opponent,
defeated goal, and marginalized out-group. Such a kind of visually
politicized humor in protest posters symbolically serves to communicate
different messages between Trump as a Goal and protesters as the
Actors in their ongoing struggle to prove their social identity and gain
positive distinctiveness.

151
https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/best-protest-signs-
womens-march-washington-donald-trump-50-5884ad5269ef1__700.jpg
A28

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPij9JljYAj/?utm_source=ig_embed

B28

152
https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2017/01/822770167671357440-png__700.jpg

C28

https://politicalpunchline.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/trump-separate-
home.jpg

D28

Figure (28) Trump's solitary representation

153
https://i.pinimg.com/564x/37/8a/da/378adab9fb653342278ee6d753238131.jpg

A29

https://assets.nst.com.my/images/articles/Protest_1484931404.jpg

B29

https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wpcontent/uploads/2018/01/27072307_1021354804
5129105_4396530935963910466_n1-5a64aea1d63d7__700.jpg
C29
Figure (29) Trump accompanied by a competitor

154
 As for RQ2, What kind of relationship is suggested to exist between
the represented participants and that with the viewer as well? Such
humorous representations provide unchallenged evidence of the
seriousness of humor in the context of the protest, as the posters that
gathered Trump with Putin, for example, suggest the existence of a
hidden, intimate, unacceptable, and illegal relationship between the two
represented participants on one side, and protester’s ‘superiority’ over
the ridiculously targeted Trump on the other. As for posters that bring
Trump together with reputable US presidents like Obama undermines
Trump's status as president or questions the legitimacy of his
inauguration, it also justifies the protest against him. The posters that
women (to whom this protest attributed) share with Trump summed up
precisely the purpose of the protest and justified the use of humor in
such a context. They reflect decisive retaliatory confrontations between
the ‘oppressed’, ‘raped’, and ‘aggrieved’ woman who yearns for
revenge from her ‘oppressor’, ‘exploiter’ and ‘rapist’, so they often
depict narrative action processes to convey the meaning of revenge, in
which the woman is represented as a ‘victorious’, ‘dominant’, and
‘superordinate’ Actor, while Trump as a ‘defeated’, ‘marginalized’,
‘punished’ and ‘subordinate’ Goal. That is why these posters represent
the appropriate response for women to Trump's misogynic statements
through his election campaign and his claims that women allowed him
to do immoral things while he was a superstar.

Other anti-Trump posters avoid displaying Trump or referring to him

verbally, but rather chose to show colorful images of females' body
organs such as uterus, and fallopian tubes with bold humorous phrases
conveying the importance of these organs as tools for resistance and
social change in an effort to redefine women's comparative elements

155
and gain positive distinctiveness of their social identity (see Tajfel and
Turner 1979:43). Thus, what was once a shame becomes a pride
embroidering feminist protest posters as a critical response to negative
identity and an effective means of restoring positive distinctiveness.

https://images1.miaminewtimes.com/imager/u/original/9083855/img_6639.jpg

Figure (30) Redefine feminine body organs

Some posters were also distinguished by their sarcastic use of phrases
or words that Trump had previously used during his election campaign.
Such as the cynical use of his election campaign slogan, "Make
America Great Again" by replacing the word “Great” with "Hate" or
"Think" in an attempt to turn the tables on him by using his words in
their mockery. In fig. (31), for example, the word "SAD" that Trump
used to end his tweets with when commenting on people's accusations
of his suspicious relationship with Putin or arguing with him for his
racism.

156
https://www.liveabout.com/thmb/vCmO1XhFk8OwjkZmZ2PAguj7bs=/800x534/filters:no_upscale()
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/trump-sad-sign-5884f6fc5f9b58bdb33577c2.jpg

Figure (31) The ironic use of Trump's words

Regarding RQ3, How can visual analysis help clarify the importance
of using humor in protest posters? we affirm that Kress and van
Leeuwen’s (2006) visual social semiotics as a framework in this context
is pertinent to unveil the complexity of our contemporary
communication. With its different interrelated dimensions, the
framework paves the way to dig deep to better understand and present
the open nature of expression and criticism against politically ill-formed
practices through visualized humor protest posters. Through visual
analysis, we see visual and verbal-based humor posters significantly
work as an inclusive strategy for protesters to expel their anger against
Trump policy. Thus, humor could be a serious communicative strategy
to set up the difference between Trump’s ‘reality’ and ‘appearance’
(political incongruity). It further serves as a disparagement tool at the
hand of the protesters to express their socially positive and collective
identity (in-group) to threaten Trump’s ‘right’ in the US administration.

157
Humor, then, is an indispensable strategy to demonstrate the opponent's
weaknesses and to exploit them in the context of protest to establish a
positive social identity.

As far as RQ3, Under what linguistic mode (verbal/ non-verbal) does

humor serve protesters in the contexts under study? As mentioned in
Chapter Four, using verbal and non-verbal modes or combining them to
create a sense of humor in protest posters helps the protesters
communicate their message in a comically satirical manner to
demonstrate the actual need for future reform. The protest poster creates
humor and builds meaning through image - word cooperation. A
combination of these two modes is responsible for conveying the
reformist humor of the protesters' message. Therefore, it can be said that
the image becomes complete when viewed with respect to the text and
vice versa. Examining the fig. (32) next, humor is embodied in the
relationship between them since the verbal text arouses particular
anticipation about the nature of the mess which ends up with the
exposure of "the punch line" in the image by knowing the essence of
that mess! This, in turn, creates a kind of incongruity that provokes
laughter and surprise. But it does reflect a purposeful sense of humor
that addresses critical issues at the core of American society.

158
https://i.pinimg.com/564x/56/84/24/568424d4b643a7bf06ec4133cacfe971.jpg

Figure (32) Create humor through word- image cooperation

Some posters go beyond the familiar harmony between these two

modes (verbal and non-verbal) to become permissible for the word to be
replaced by an image in a purely linguistic context, since in MDA,
image can be read as text. "No" in the (A33) next poster, for example
despite being a single word, but it includes both modes, because instead
of completing it with the letter "O", it is replaced by an image of Trump
with a face that is funny and frightening to reflect the contradiction of
his policy and its danger to the future of America. Thus, the image here
completes the meaning of rejection and at the same time justified it.
Also, in fig. (B33), the image completes what the word started as if
combining them implies the phrase that summarizes the protesters'
demands: "Impeach the peach".

159
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/gallery/2017/jan/31/signs-of-the-times-the-best-
anti-trump-placards-from-across-the-uk-in-pictures#img-11
A33

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/f1/b4/1a/f1b41a01105542e29ef310e8892695df.jpg

B33

160
https://politicalpunchline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/trump-real-shithole-sign.jpg
C33
Figure (33) Create humor by word - image combination

Even in word - only posters, politicized humor is based on a

combination of the verbal slogan and the image of the women holding
the poster. For example, the contribution of the old woman carrying
poster A34 below has an important role in creating humor through the
consistency between the verbal slogan and the age of the woman
carrying it. If a girl in her twenties carried the same poster, it would not
be humorous. The same applies to the other poster B34, because the
image of the women in front of the poster, dressed in old-fashioned
clothes, offers a humorous touch. This demonstrates the importance of
word-image cooperation in creating the purposeful humor that
protesters employ in the context of the protest.

161
https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/best-protest-signs-womens-march-
washington-donald-trump-90-5884b3f0d50f0__700.jpg

A34

https://media.glamour.com/photos/5883d98a1e5076de31e8b375/master/w_1600%2Cc_limit/Unkno
wn-13.jpeg

B34

Figure (34) Create humor through word- poster carrier image

combination

162
Concerning RQ5: How does humor strengthen protest for political
reformation? The collected data have come to demonstrate that humor
can be politicized in the context of protest in order to highlights
contradictions and inadequacies in government decisions and actions,
and as we have seen, most of socio political problems have been
addressed in a purposeful comic framework that contributes to social
change and the preservation of the protesters' social identity.

5. 2 Conclusion

This work comes to shed light on the fact that politicized humor in
protest context could be a serious strategy used by the protesters to
address socio political issues. As politicized humor by nature works for
criticism, it brings to the surface the incongruous reality of politicians
(Trump in this study), and enhance the superiority of the protesters. in
addition to its role as a relief of stress.

With its multimodal analysis of humorous protest posters, this work

concludes that the ironic representation of Trump shows his naked truth
regarding his controversial policy away from his big bucks and famous
hotels. Overall, the researcher managed to identify the most exciting
topics in the protest on the socio-political level such as ‘A categorical
rejection of Trump's misogyny’, ‘Russian-Collusion and the illegality of
Trump's winning’, ‘wall policy and immigrant rights’, Women's
reproductive rights in terms of safe abortion and birth and at an
affordable cost’, as main trends of the analysis. It should be emphasized
here that the protest poster of ‘Women March’ may show other issues,
but these are the most dominant and recurrent features. They, as we see,
touch the lives of the citizens and reflect their aspiration for a better
future, that is why this work explores the possibility of politicized

163
humor to be a powerful weapon of criticism in the context of protest,
making it more serious and reforming.

5.3 Suggestions for Extra Research

This study proposes:

1- Conducting a multimodal analytical study to examine politicized

humor in protest posters of October's demonstrations in Iraq to shed
light on politicized humor and its role in Iraq.

2- Conducting a comparative study of politicized humor in protest

posters of open and oppressive societies to find out how it differs
according to different socio and cultural contexts.

3- Conducting a multimodal study of presidential election posters for

one or several parties in Iraq to find out what the politicians of these
parties aspire to by analysing verbal and nonverbal semiotic expressions
of these posters.

4- Conducting a multimodal study of the communicative acts used to

create posters for COVID-19 by the World Health Organization in its
attempt to raise awareness of this recent disease.

5- Conducting a linguistic analysis of humor in satirical political shows

such as "Al-Bashir Show" using verbal humor theory GTVH to find out
the socio-political role that these programs play, are they reform
programs or for entertainment and gain followers only?

164
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175
 ‫المستخلص‬
‫الفكاهة هي وسيلة سياسية قيّمة تُستخدم لتحديد وإبراز وحتى مهاجمة التناقضات في الخطاب‬

‫السياسي والعمل‪ .‬إنه يبرز إلى السطح الواقع غير المتناسق للسياسة وقرارات وأفعال السياسيين‬

‫غير الكفؤة‪ .‬تهدف هذه الدراسة إلى التحقيق في الفكاهة المسيسة (من اآلن فصاعدًا ‪(PH‬في‬

‫ملصقات االحتجاج المناهضة لترامب تحديدًا في "مسيرة المرأة"‪ .‬إنه يكشف عن وجهات النظر‬

‫الضمنية والمهيمنة للمحتجين في سياق اجتماعي سياسي‪ .‬بالنظر إلى حقيقة أن النقد هو الوظيفة‬

‫الرئيسية لـ ‪ ،PH‬فمن المعتاد أن يستخدمه المتظاهرون كمصدر للمقاومة لمهاجمة قرارات‬

‫السياسيين ونزع الشرعية عن ممارساتهم السياسية من أجل تحقيق اإلصالح السياسي‪ .‬تتكون‬

‫البيانات من (‪ )35‬ملصق احتجاجي تم جمعها من أرشيف اإلنترنت الخاص بـ "مسيرة المرأة"‪ .‬تم‬

‫استخدام طريقة كرس وفان لوين لقراءة الصور من بين أوضاع أخرى للتعامل مع البيانات التي تم‬

‫جمعها‪ ،‬وهي توضح كيف يمكن أن تتكون خطابات ‪ PH‬من صور أو كلمات فقط أو كليهما لتعزيز‬

‫تضامن المحتجين ضد سياسة ترامب المثيرة للجدل كجزء من تجربة مشتركة‪.‬‬

‫يمكن تحليل أنماط التعبير اللفظي وغير اللفظي إلظهار الوظائف الرمزية لـ ‪ PH‬مسترشدة‬

‫بالنظريات االجتماعية والنفسية والمعرفية للفكاهة‪ .‬تتعاون هذه األنماط المختلفة لتمثيل‬

‫الموضوعات والرسائل المهمة‪ ،‬وهي تصور مقارنة اجتماعية حرجة بين داخل المجموعة‬

‫وخارجها في سياق معين‪ .‬تستكشف نتائج هذه الدراسة أهمية ‪ PH‬في سياق االحتجاج‪ ،‬فهي أشبه‬

‫بـ "عملية" يستغلها المحتجون لتحقيق أهدافهم المرجوة‪ .‬وبالتالي‪ ،‬فهو سالح قوي للنقد واإلصالح‪.‬‬
 ‫جمهورية العراق‬

‫وزارة التعليم العالي والبحث العلمي‬

‫جامعة القادسية‬

‫كلية التربية‬

‫قسم اللغة اإلنكليزية‬

‫تحليل الخطاب متعدد الوسائط للفكاهة السياسية في ملصقات احتجاجية‬

‫مختارة‬
‫رسالة تقدمت بها الطالبة‬

‫رجاء مزهر راضي‬

‫الى‬

‫عمادة كلية التربية ‪-‬جامعة القادسية‬

‫كجزء من متطلبات نيل شهادة الماجستير تربية في اللغة اإلنكليزية وعلم اللغة‬

‫بإشراف‬

‫األستاذ المساعد الدكتور ‪:‬سامي بشير الحسناوي‬

‫جمادى اآلخرة ‪1442‬‬ ‫كانون الثاني ‪2021‬‬