A Semiotic Analysis of Symbolism Used in Social Media Protest Images: A Comparative Analysis of #BLM and #EndSARS [THESIS]

The study examines images used shared by protesters against police abuse on Twitter. Two Twitter campaigns are specifically chosen for this purpose; Black Lives Matter which originated in the United States of America in 2013 and EndSARS which originated in Nigeria in 2017. Although both campaigns have distinct qualities, they are unified by their singular purpose for human rights which are alleged to be violated by the police departments of the respective nations. With SNSs, activists are able to converge and express dissatisfaction with conditions and even feel empowered to make collective plans as well as take collective action. Such collective action is evident in both BLM and EndSARS campaigns where protesters post/share and reshare images the hashtags that have been created for the campaigns on Twitter. As all media text communicate meaning, the use of images in Twitter protests therefore becomes significant for media scholars who are investigating symbolic interaction of protesters and society at large. This investigation therefore becomes a semiotic action. The subject of semiotics which is dedicated to understanding how we perceive things. The study therefore elicits and describes the similarities between BLM and EndSARS by asking three questions; What are the denotative similarities between images shared on Twitter in the BLM and EndSARS protests between 25 May 2020 and 31 October 2020? What are the similarities in physiognomic attributes in images shared in the BLM and EndSARS hashtags between25 May 2020 and 31 October 2020? What are the similarities in icon, index and symbols between images shared in the BLM and EndSARS hashtags between 25 May 2020 and 31 October 2020? Data for the study was manually retrieved from the BLM and EndSARS hashtags on Twitter and the visual attributes of each image collected for the study was assessed individually. The study concludes that protest-related images communicate meaning to consumers of media images in ways that can influence their reaction to the protest or social cause. This is because of the established fact that people are drawn to images in order to be adequately informed about important issues.