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Visual Semiotic Analysis Examples

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4.b.2. Visual Semiotic Analysis Visual semiotic analysis is the second qualitative research method that will be deployed in this study for the purpose of understanding and exploring the hidden meaning and the underlying message or ideology the photojournalists or photo-editors want to deliver to the audiences through ethically debatable news photos and how they are attempting to do this. Evidence of manipulation and also evidence of influence (or non-influence) by digital imaging technology and the ethical aspects such manipulations imply will be sought through analyzing ethically debatable news photos, published in Egyptian print media, during random periods. According to Cottle (1998, cited in Hansen et al, 1998, p.205), semiotics is a science that studies the role …show more content…

69) ‘‘confronts the question of how images make meanings head on. It is not simply descriptive nor does it rely on quantitative estimations of significance’’. Rose states that the semiotic analysis involves ‘‘taking an image apart and tracing how it works in relation to broader systems of meaning’’ (Ibid). In other words, semiotics primarily asks about the ways through which the meaning is generated instead of simply exploring what it is. My study will bring examples of manipulated debatable photos and semiotically analyze how a specific re-touch, cropping for example, made by photojournalist or photo-editor might alter the meaning of the photo. This comes in line with Cottle’s assertion that ‘”How images are cropped can also radically alter the meaning of visuals” cited in Hansen et al (1998, p.

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