Visual strategies for the representation of frontier concept and the production of false antitheses

Baptista, Adriana

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.22/11069

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Baptista, Adriana

Abstract(s)

Currently the concept of "frontier" is the subject of interdisciplinary studies ranging from political science to the sociology of art. As a result of several events in the various continents, the significant increase in the issue of immigration and its political control in the media and in political discourses has shown a direction opposite to that of the annulment of the concept of the frontier into which Europe had immersed itself.The images that accompany this reality are supported in a very significant way in the rhetorical use of visual antitheses both when they defend and when they contradict the concept of frontier. This contrast strategy uses, in a dichotomous way, chromatic, iconic, symbolic items and the division of graphic space to promote the idea of difference and separation between interior/exterior; invader/invaded; enter/exit; inside/outside; here/there. These strategies require literal comprehension activities built on the fallacious concept of dichotomy, promote the concept of insurmountable difference, and stimulate the development of poor and prejudiced thinking about the "migrant."This study analyzes several images (posters, leaflets, sites) circulating in the last three years that use the rhetoric strategy of visual antithesis to convey the idea of territory, frontier and transposition and contrasts them with others with more complex rhetorical strategies such as synchisis or visual allegory, capable of promoting inferential comprehension strategies and eliciting a more elaborate thought about "migrant" and "migration" reality.