Abstract
Palestine is a name that still resists the nonstop efforts to efface it from world maps. For more than seventy years, narratives of suffering have been broadcast to audiences as a form of witnessing in the long path that Palestinians are still walking to freedom. As victims of a settler colonial project, Palestinians have been advocated for by civil society groups and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that continue to document their suffering. This thesis analyses the visual narratives (VNs) about human rights violations in Palestine from the work of activist organisations with a specific focus on the narratives of Al-Nakba and the Occupation. In its broad sense, the visual is taken as a powerful meaning carrier that is challenged in the context of a long record of human rights violations. Mindful of organisational agency at reporting human rights abuse, visual narrations range from photographic evidence to animated or imaginary scenarios that are built on true events. It is argued that visual narratives can be documentary of reality via the direct record of events or the construction of meaning using varied visual means. Since advocacy organisations abide by international law, they enjoy some power that enables them to name and shame violators of human rights. This study discusses how Palestine is visually narrated in the work of three organisations, namely B’Tselem, Visualising Palestine (VP) and Human Rights Watch (HRW), which claim their own narrative approach to human rights in the Palestinian context. To achieve this, it framed within principles from narratology and socio-narrative theory to explain how narrative can be understood from a human rights perspective. Visual narratives as semiosis is then taken as the frame of analysis to discuss human rights narratives in static, dynamic and interactive forms.Thesis is embargoed until 31 December 2028.
| Date of Award | Dec 2023 |
|---|---|
| Original language | English |
| Awarding Institution |
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| Supervisor | Neil Sadler (Supervisor) & Piotr Blumczynski (Supervisor) |
Keywords
- Visual narrative
- human rights
- NGO
- intersemiotic translation
- Palestine