Critical Multimodal Analysis of the Representation of Rape in Pornographic Novels Published Between 1970-1990

Bibliographic Data

ID19538136
AuthorsCarmen Gregori Signes (0000-0002-5735-5633, Universitat de València, corresponding author), Carmen Gregori-Signes
Year2024
Volume17
Issue2
Publication date2024-12-05
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueDiscourse and Interaction (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1802-9930 • E-ISSN: 1805-952X
PublisherMasaryk University Press (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.5817/di2024-2-72
OpenAlexW4405190414
LanguageEN
References cited30

Rape remains a current and frequent topic in media products such as advertisements, films and television series, in social networks such as Twitter, Instagram and in new virtual spaces such as the metaverse. As Brownmiller (1975: 13) claimed, examining thehistory of rape may help us “learn what we need to know about our current condition”. Doing so may entail the study of representations of rape in pornographic novels published between 1970-1990, a period that partly coincided with the Second Wave of Feminism (1960-1980s) and the Golden Age of Porn (1969-1984). In such a context, book cover design was not merely an art, but a crucial factor in attracting potential customers. Building up upon Brownmiller’s assertion, this paper provides a multimodal analysis of 51 covers which contain the lemma RAPE, published between 1976 and 1990. The analysis adopted a social semiotic approach (Kress & van Leeuwen 2006) in conjunction with the principles of Feminist critical film analysis (Mulvey 1975) to document how rape scene fantasies were portrayed in the covers. Exploring these representations can help us understand many of the still prevalent myths surrounding rape nowadays, which perpetuate violent misogynistic behavior as a form of entertainment for their audience

Aesthetics · Art · Assertion · Entertainment · Epistemology · Feminism · Literature · Media studies · Mythology · Political science · Semiotics · Sociology · Visual arts · Computer Science · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · History · Media, Gender, and Advertising · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology

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