Disagree and you shall be valued: a semiotic examination of how photojournalism constructs “valuable” Iranian bodies across<i>Time</i>

Durrani, Sameera

doi:10.1080/10350330.2020.1779461

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Governments are also judged as to how they tolerate dissent. Time's narrative valorises dissent against the Iranian regime (see also Durrani 2020). Ten Iranian men make direct eye contact with the camera, a powerful cue for establishing pseudo-social bonds with viewers (Kress and van Leeuwen 2006).…”

Section: Indicator 1: Systems Of Governancementioning

confidence: 99%

What happens when a country bleeds soft power? Conceptualising ‘Negative Watch’: towards an epistemology for negative and adversarial place branding

Durrani

2023

Place Brand Public Dipl

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This article contends that the classic public diplomacy model prioritising scholarly research on maximising soft power in the eyes of foreign publics needs to be extended. It proposes a new concept, Negative Watch, which dyadically complements Nye’s in (Ann Am Acad Polit Soc Sci 616: 94–109, 2008) idea of soft power. By extending the epistemology surrounding negative place branding, this paper seeks to expand the debates around it. Where soft power is about accruing power via credibility, Negative Watch maps its loss, approaching it from a communicative dimension. Using a case study approach, the article presents the concept as a model with two key components (1) An index comprising a typology of unfavourable narratives connoting negative affect towards nation brands; (2) a heuristic model outlining a spectrum of outcomes precipitated by reputational decline. The index can be used as a self-assessment tool by a nation to track its reputational erosion, so that it may take measures before it progresses too far down the spectrum of consequences. It can also facilitate systemic assessment of external actors, including allies as well as adversaries, to facilitate strategic decision making within the realm of international relations and public diplomacy.

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Section: Indicator 1: Systems Of Governancementioning

confidence: 99%

What happens when a country bleeds soft power? Conceptualising ‘Negative Watch’: towards an epistemology for negative and adversarial place branding

Durrani

2023

Place Brand Public Dipl

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“…This paper examines how iterated visualizations of Pakistani and Iranian women in news narratives are intertwined with structures of political power impacting international place brands. To this end, this article draws on four different theorists from semiotics and critical studies: Anholt (2005), Judith Butler (1990, 1993), van Leeuwen (2008, Durrani (2020). It's worth noting here that there is precedent in place branding literature to conduct research from a primarily qualitative, critical perspective (see Kaneva 2011), which is where this research situates itself.…”

Section: Theoretical Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To quantify how visual news stories confer or detract 'value' from certain subjects, this paper draws on two complementary semiotic frameworks: van Leeuwen (2008) and Durrani (2020). van Leeuwen (2008) argues that visual narratives 'other' social subjects with the help of three kinds of visual cues mediating interaction between viewers and subjects: Distanciation, Disempowerment, Objectivation.…”

Section: Theoretical Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It then lays out an interdisciplinary theoretical and methodological framework for the study. To this end, this article seeks to integrate insights from several different theoretical approaches, including place marketing (Anholt 2005), semiotics (Van Leeuwen 2008;Durrani 2020), and critical theory (Butler 1990(Butler , 1993). Anholt's (2005) Nation Brand Hexagon comprises six elements: tourism, exports, people, culture and heritage, inward investments and immigration, foreign and domestic policy.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Damsels in distress: gender and negative place branding

Durrani

2022

Place Brand Public Dipl

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This article provides a historical perspective on how institutionalized articulations of gender in visual news narratives may contribute towards the erosion of a country’s soft power potential. It analyses thirty years of photographic coverage given by an elite western publication, Time magazine to women from two countries with problematic place brands: Iran and Pakistan. This study documents how iterative longitudinal patterns of visual grammar contribute towards the layered marginalization of women within narratives. Women are much less visible in terms of image frequency, with selective value placed on certain kinds of female subjects across the decades, choices often shaped by stereotypes as well as foreign policy preferences. For Iranian women, the visual discourse empowers women resisting conservative forces, and valorizes trailblazers redefining the public space. For Pakistani women, a narrative showcasing political activism devolves into one highlighting victims/activists in the context of gender-based discrimination. The choice of ‘valuable’ bodies in both instances, expressed with the help of quantifiable semiotic trends in camera angles, shot and gaze, is imbued with indirect judgment of the political leadership and cultural and socio-political systems of the countries themselves. In both cases, the overall narrative is of a system pre-disposed to oppress women, thus negatively juxtaposing the ‘people’ aspect of the Anholt Nation Brand Index against the elements of governance, culture and heritage, to the overall detriment of both place brands.

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Social media engagement with organization-generated content: Role of visuals in enhancing public engagement with organizations on Facebook and Instagram

Dhanesh

Duthler

Kang

2022

Public Relations Review

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Disagree and you shall be valued: a semiotic examination of how photojournalism constructs “valuable” Iranian bodies acrossTime

Cited by 4 publications

References 32 publications

What happens when a country bleeds soft power? Conceptualising ‘Negative Watch’: towards an epistemology for negative and adversarial place branding

What happens when a country bleeds soft power? Conceptualising ‘Negative Watch’: towards an epistemology for negative and adversarial place branding

Damsels in distress: gender and negative place branding

Social media engagement with organization-generated content: Role of visuals in enhancing public engagement with organizations on Facebook and Instagram

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