Communicating political achievements: a semiotic analysis of political posters in the linguistic landscape of Tanzania
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Paschal Mdukula
Abstract
In Tanzania, political posters function as strategic communication tools within the linguistic landscape, showcasing leadership achievements and national progress. This study analysed 105 political posters from Dar es Salaam to explore how they communicate the accomplishments of the sixth phase government under President Samia. Guided by social semiotics and framing theories, the research examined how visuals, text, and symbols combine to construct narratives of progress, trust, and legitimacy. The posters employed bold colours, simplified Kiswahili messages, and symbolic imagery to make political achievements relatable and accessible. They highlighted milestones in infrastructure, agriculture, education, healthcare, energy, sports, and tourism, often featuring the President’s portrait to personalise and reinforce the connection between leadership and development. Positioned in high-traffic public areas, these posters saturated the urban landscape with ideologically driven narratives, distinguishing themselves from other forms of political communication such as rallies or television. The study underscores the role of political posters in shaping public perception and national identity through visual discourse. It also contributes to broader discussions on semiotics, political branding, and the linguistic landscape in Tanzania. Future research could investigate public reception and the evolution of political poster strategies in digital spaces.
Acknowledgments
In the development of this article, two artificial intelligence-based tools were employed: (1) ChatGPT-4.0, and Grammarly accessed via textual commands, utilised for spelling correction and language refinement to ensure greater clarity and coherence in the text.
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Conflict of interest: The author reported no potential conflict of interest.
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Research funding: This work was self-funded.
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Artikel in diesem Heft
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Research Articles
- Use of inscribed objects in roleplay training sessions at a Japanese insurance company
- Visual and multimodal literacies in secondary education in Spain: voices from English language teachers
- The marketization of higher education in China: a comparative multimodal genre analysis between top-public and international universities
- Sustainability as an element of corporate identity: multimodal analysis of an Italian coffee company’s website
- Communicating political achievements: a semiotic analysis of political posters in the linguistic landscape of Tanzania
- From aspiring to authentic engineers: prioritizing real people and real problems in engineering through service design methodology
- Whoosh! visual depictions of direction, speed, and temporality: a corpus analysis of motion events in global comics
- Sharing experience or selling service?: a multimodal critical discourse analysis of self-proclaimed Hong Kong female PhD student identity in Xiaohongshu (Little Red Book)
- Professors’ perception of body language in the aftermath of the Covid-19 online teaching period
