The topic of the present diploma work is the representation of the civil conflict in Lebanese cinema. The work is divided into two parts. The first one provides an overview of the historical and discursive contexts of the last two civil wars in Lebanon (1958 and 1975-1991) and describes how these events are reflected in the work of Lebanese filmmakers. The second part of the diploma work focuses on the war period cinematography, generally less known due to the long public unavailability of a large part of the film production of that time. Four feature fictions made between 1975 and 1985 are selected for a more detailed analysis, more precisely by those filmmakers that are considered to be the pioneers of a new auteur cinema in Lebanon: Mārūn Baġdādī, Burhān ˁAlawīya and Jocelyne Ṣaˁb. The chosen method is the semiotic analysis focusing on characterisation features of the film characters and on conflicting oppositions present in the films. Key words: civil war, civil conflict, Lebanese cinema, fiction film, semiotic analysis, connotation.

The topic of this diploma thesis is semiotic analysis of terms "refugee" and "migrant" in the context of the current migration crisis. The thesis deals with analyzing these terms as semiotic signs. It deals with the way in which selected media treat these terms. Three Czech media were chosen for the research, with 15 selected articles containing research terms from each of them. The sample includes serious news (Aktualne.cz), tabloid news (Blesk.cz) as well as a blog (Blog iDnes.cz) as a journalistic platform, to which anyone can contribute. The research deals with the influence of the media on the formation of concepts and is framed by the theory of social construction of reality presented by T. Luckmann and P. L. Berger. The thesis deals with analysis on the syntactic, semantic and pragmatic levels. In the theoretical part, the theory of social construction of reality is outlined first. Then the thesis briefly introduces the circumstances of the migration crisis and the basic differences in the meaning of the analyzed signifiers and finally introduces the analytical concepts, which are Morris classification of semiotics, Saussure's distinction between syntagmatic and paradigmatic relationships, as well as interrelationships in which individual words can appear in the text. The practical part then...

This thesis is focused on the topic of media use in a system of a communist totality. It provides an analysis of presentation of selected characters directly or indirectly involved in activities of the anti-communist, so called third resistance, in the Czechoslovak press media of that era. By using the interpretation of results of semiotic analysis of selected news and publicistic articles the author of the thesis attempts to answer the research questions and confirm or disconfirm the hypothesis that communist press media used the above mentioned cases particularly for the promotion of the official ideology. Political and medial contexts as well as brief life-stories of the chosen third resistance representatives are outlined in the theoretical part of the thesis, while the analysis with the interpretation of its results are discussed in the practical part. The conclusion of the analysis confirms that the communist press media associated those representatives with predominantly negative connotations and that the meanings of all the selected articles were strongly affected by propagandistic elements.

Background: Inclusion and diversity have been a frequently discussed subject within marketing for many years. In particular, marketing communication has to a large extent been criticized to not reflect the reality of society. Commercials present images that reflect and shape cultural norms as well as the individual’s attitudes regarding their own identity and their treatment of other people in society. Despite the great interest in diversity and inclusion in marketing communication, there is a lack of studies that connect deficiency of diversity in visual communication, consumers' self-concept, and socially conscious marketing in a Swedish context. Purpose: The purpose of the study was to get a deeper understanding of how sports brands include diversity in their visual communication through socially conscious marketing. Furthermore, the study aimed to contribute with deeper insights regarding marketing communication of visual character from the consumer perspective and how it influences the individual and its self-concept in the matter of diversity and inclusion. Method: This qualitative research applied an interpretive and inductive approach to achieve the purpose. The empirical data was collected through semiotic analysis as well as semistructured consumer interviews within generation Z. Moreover, two sports commercials were analyzed to gather information to answer the research questions. Conclusion: It was stated that sports brands work with the inclusion of diversity in various ways, by including one diverse element such as different people or by including it with a holistic approach including several diverse elements such as different people, objects, environments, and feelings. This means that one commercial does not have a unilateral effect 3on the consumer´s self-concept but that one image can induce multiple feelings. Therefore, the same commercial can make the consumer feel, insufficient, insecure, included, energized, and inspired all at the same time. The result of this study also shows that the consumers feel more included when their values and thoughts are reflected in a commercial than when their physical attributes are reflected.

The purpose of this essay is to find out through semiotic analysis and rhetorical tools how the music video “Svartskallar” performed by Swedish artist Stor is being mediated and perceived. The word svartskallar is a Swedish slur and derogatory term used towards immigrants and people of other descent than Scandinavian/Arian. Mostly people with dark attributes, hence the word “blackhead.” The song lyrics poke fun at mundane stereotypes and prejudices that people have towards certain ethnicities, especially minorities that there are a lot of in Sweden. The music video was quite controversial as it depicted a plantation where white people portrayed slaves whilst minorities played the slaveowners. As the video was released it caused a lot of debate online. The analysis has shown that there are many ambiguities in this video that have triggered a lot of reactions. This video has a lot more nuances to it than what is seen at first glance and portrays a lot of subliminal messages. Ultimately there are a lot of more aspects to consider in this debate than solely that of the plot.

The fashion industry's enormous environmental impact has received a lot of attention, but despite this it continues to grow, partly due to the emergence of the fast fashion segment. This fashion segment mass produces cheap, poor quality, disposable clothing at a high speed with major environmental and social impact. Due to an increased consumer awareness of sustainability most companies communicate their corporate social responsibility (CSR) to legitimize their business. The purpose of this essay is to study what linguistic and semiotic elements that the fast fashion companies H&M and NA-KD use to frame the sustainability discourse. The theoretical framework includes theories of CSR, Fairclough's perspective on critical discourse analysis (CDA) and Barthes's take on semiology. Fairclough's CDA and Barthes’s semiology were applied to the study methodologically as well. The analysis showed that the communication is perceived to be used primarily for the purpose of creating increased sales by building an attractive green(washed) image, and secondarily acting as a reporting of actual sustainability work. The two companies generally had a low interdiscursivity, which revealed the discursive practice’s aim to reproduce the prevailing discors order. In conclusion, the study shows that above all, the companies aim to maintain the hegemonic structures that shape the industry’s ideology and continue to capitalize on the commercial system Keywords: Fast Fashion, Corporate Social Responsibility, Greenwashing, Critical Discourse Analysis, Semiotic Analysis.

My intentions with this work are to clarify the author's the main characters' and the reader's role in and outside a poem and also to explain what a semiotic analysis consists in. Furthermore, I will perform such an anylis on the chapter Vedremo domenica in Milo De Angelis poetry collection Tema dell'addio. I will also discuss difficulties I have met in the course of translating the poems. Finally, I want to stress the importance of translating.

By use of qualitative, semiotic analysis of screenshots taken from Part I of the three-part anthologyfilm The House (2022), an adult stop-motion animation using puppets, the clothing of the charactersis analysed to examine how they convey class and power based on theory by Stuart Hall, PierreBourdieu, Beverly Skeggs and Marita Sturken & Lisa Cartwright. The text further uses fashionhistory to contextualise and interpret visual references to British monarchs Elizabeth I and Henry VIII. The study finds Part I of The House portrays the anxiety and exploitation of the working-classcharacters through the colour, number of layers, fabrics, references and changes in the characters’costumes in a way that lines up with the arguments presented by Bourdieu and Skeggs about culturalcapital and popular representation of the working class. Part I’s construction of class may not reflectthe diversity of class experiences found in the real world, but through further analysis including thetwo other parts of The House this reading may differ as those include other characters and settings.

Researchers have taken a particular interest in children’s drawings as a means of representing and communicating knowledge and perspectives but a review of literature reveals that researchers routinely use drawings as a way of obtaining data without considering their function or value. This ESRC-funded research aims to explore drawing as a method of accessing children's perspectives and has three central research objectives which consider methodological and analytical factors relating to the use of children’s drawings as a research tool. These are: to develop a principled approach to analysing and interpreting children’s drawings, to create guidelines for the use of drawing as a research tool, and to gather children’s perspectives on play through the method of drawing. The research objectives were achieved by asking the following three questions: How can children’s drawings be analysed using a principled approach? What are the major factors to be considered when using drawing as a research tool? What can drawings reveal about children's perspectives on play? The study involved two visits to the homes of eight preschool children aged four. The sample included four girls and four boys from central and north-east Scotland with half of the families being categorised as being of low socioeconomic status. Visits were flexible and unstructured allowing the child autonomy regarding our level of interaction and the types of activities (such as free play and conversation) with which they wished to engage. The second visit included a prompted drawing activity in which I invited children to express their perspectives on play. The topic of play was chosen (i) to offer children a meaningful research activity to investigate the issues surrounding the method, (ii) to explore the task of representing an abstract, yet familiar, concept and how this may influence children’s drawings and representations of play, and (iii) as an extension of the ESRC project Young Children Learning with Toys and Technology at Home (Plowman et al., 2012) by giving greater emphasis to children's own perspectives on play and exploring the ways in which this can be achieved. My theoretical approach is not to consider drawings as reproductions of reality, but to value and attempt to understand children’s drawings as a semiotic vehicle in which messages are created and conveyed during the drawing process through representation and signification. Informed by social semiotics (Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996) the research presents an innovative four-step approach to analysing children's drawings (4-SASA). The protocol, a key contribution of the research, was developed to promote a more systematic analysis, involving (i) isolating signs within drawings through manual annotation, (ii) documenting the child’s understanding of signs and the significance attributed to them, (iii) organising signs using specific categories of social semiotic analysis (mode, size, colour, salience) and identifying the child’s motivation and interest for specific sign production, and (iv) synthesis of the child’s perspectives from steps 1-3. Post hoc methodological examinations elucidated the following four key factors to be considered when using young children’s drawings: (i) contextual sensitivity of the drawing process, (ii) children’s perceptions of the research task, (iii) the complex task of representing an abstract and elusive concept such as play, and (iv) whether there is a fundamental difference between drawing spontaneously (non-commissioned) and drawing on request. Evidence from the study supports previous literature in demonstrating the potential of drawing as a method of accessing children’s perspectives. However, findings suggest that rather than routinely selecting drawing as a method for representing children’s perspectives, researchers need to be more thoughtful about the ways in which factors such as the social and contextual framing of drawing and approaches to data collection can affect research outcomes. The thesis concludes by discussing how these emerging issues impact research outcomes, along with implications for future implementation and analysis of drawings.

Den här uppsatsen undersökte hur medielogiken uttrycks i Rädda Barnens och Sverige för UNHCR:s videomaterial under flyktingkrisen september 2015. Då majoriteten av den medialiseringsrelaterade forskningen i Sverige har intresserat sig för partiledardebatter och politisk kommunikation finns det en kunskapslucka kring hur medielogiken formar andra sfärer i samhället. Denna studie avsåg att genom semiotisk analys och mulitmodal analys undersöka videomaterial i dessa två ideella organisationer, för att identifiera mediernas berättartekniker i dem. Sammanlagt analyserades fyra videoklipp i två ideella organisationers Facebook-sidor under september 2015 utifrån teorin om semiotik och medielogik. Två tydliga teman i videoklippen framträdde ur resultatet. Dessa benämnde vi som Flyktingkrisen som empati och Flyktingkrisen som verklighet. Ur dessa framkom fyra underteman. Dessa benämnde vi som dramatisering, dokumentering, reklamformat och nyhetsformat. Studiens resultat visade även att medielogiken personifiering förekommer starkt i samtliga av våra studieobjekt. Utifrån detta resultat kunde vi dra slutsatser kring genom vilka stereotyper personifieringen framkom i.   Vår studie bidrar därmed till forskningsfältet med kunskap om stereotyper av flyktingar. I tidigare forskning av Ylva Brune (1998) urskiljs två sorters stereotyper av flyktingar: offer eller hot. Vidare menar Urban Ericsson (2001) att stereotypen den duktige flyktingen tenderar att förekomma i media endast på individnivå. I vårt material fann vi att en flykting gestaltades annorlunda än de stereotyper vi fann i vår tidigare forskning. Vi valde att kalla den här kategorin flyktingen som målmedveten då denne är fast besluten att ta sig fram trots omständigheterna. Vi fann även en icke tidigare dokumenterad framställning av flyktingar som likartad publiken när det gäller välfärdsbakgrund. / The aim of this paper was to examine how media logic’s are expressed in Save the children’s and Sweden for UNHCR’s video material during the migrant crisis. Since the majority of the mediatization research in the Swedish context has focused on the party leaders and political communication, there is a lack of awareness regarding how media logic shapes other spheres in the community. This study’s objective was to examine video material through semiotic and multimodal analysis, to identify media logics. In total four videos from two nonprofit organizations, that were published in September 2015, were analyzed based on the understanding of media logics.  Two distinctive themes appeared in the results. These were titled migrant crisis as empathy and migrant crisis as reality.  From these, four subthemes appeared. These were titled dramatization, documentation, advertising formats and news format. The result shows that personalization occurs strongly in all of our study.  Our study contributes to the research field with knowledge about stereotypes of refugees. We found a new kind of stereotype that we have chosen to call the determined refugee. The choice of name for this category is based on our interpretation of a refugee as determined to survive. In addition to the study’s contribution of how the representation of refugees among nonprofit organizations now take a new form, we also found a not previously documented representation of refugees like the crowd when it comes to the welfare background.  Our study contributes to knowledge about how mediatization is expressed in strategic communication.