Social Sciences

Discourse Analysis of some Political Activists on Persian-Language Instagram

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Zahra Ebrahimiazar 1
Mohammadsalar Kasraie 2

1 M.A Student of Allameh Tabataba’i University , Tehran, Iran

2 Faculty Member, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University

https://doi.org/10.22054/qjss.2025.80088.2850
Abstract
By the emergence of the Web 2.0, internet users gain opportunities for interaction and participation, enabling agency and, consequently, struggle over the establishment of meanings and discursive struggles. This study centers on the Instagram social network, aiming to examine how semantic frameworks of political activist discourses are constructed within this platform. For this purpose, the discourse analysis approach by Laclau and Mouffe was employed. The study's population comprised posts from activists published in 1401 (2022-2023), selected through non-random, purposive sampling. The sample included ten activists claiming activism in a specified field within their Instagram biographies and participating in a targeted political campaign. The research’s text consisted of activists' posts and captions, analyzed by categorizing data and employing meta-textual articulation. The results of the research indicated that two major discourses—Constitutionalism and Republicanism—prevailed among Iranian Instagram activists, with the nodal points of "constitutional government" and "secular republic." Which are bridged by two sub-discourses of “unity” and “transformation” with "union" and "development" as their nodal point. The political activism among them is in struggle over the meanings of “freedom”, “democracy”, “women's issue”, “alternative governance system”, “uniformity” versus “plurality”, "unity", "transformation and reforms".

Keywords

Political Activism
Instagram
Discourse Analysis
Struggle of meanings
Meaning Articulation
Subjects
Cammaerts, B. (2015). Social media and activism (Vol. 3rd). Wiley-Blackwell.
Cammaerts, B., & Carpentier, N. (2007). Reclaiming the Media; Communication Rights and Democratic Media Roles (1st ed.) [3]. intellect books.
Howarth, D. R. (2000). Discourse. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Ravanoglu, S. Yilmaz. (2017). The role of social media activism in new social movements. International Journal of Social Inquiry, 10(1): 141-164.

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