‘Live’ to ‘survive’: women and digital political communication in Tunisia

ABSTRACT

This study examines how social media platforms can facilitate greater visibility of Tunisian women in political communication activism to survive male politicians’ domination and the conventional media's boycott. The authors chose to focus on the case of Tunisian activist Abir Moussi to investigate how she uses Facebook for political mobilization and self-branding purposes. A monographic approach to the content of the Facebook page was carried out, along with a semiotic analysis of the speech given by Moussi on the decisions announced by President Kais Said on 25 July 2021. The results revealed a Facebook-Live-based communication strategy to address audiences as well as a large number of photos and videos. Besides, The Tunisian political activist used several linguistic elements in her discourse to make her political discourse effective, such as contrast, intertextuality, metaphor, etc. Unlike President Said, who uses Standard Arabic, the Tunisian political activist speaks the Tunisian dialect; Abir’s tone ranges from humorous, enthusiastic, provocative, menacing and promising; she provides her propaganda speech with legal texts and arguments to convince her audience, claiming to enlighten minds by simplifying ordinances and complex political terms. Moreover, she revealed several political and economic ‘hot issues’ that led to the Tunisian crisis. The authors conclude that social media does not create new ways of activism but rather amplifies traditional ones; they suggest enhancing the political efficacy of social media to boost political activism and emphasizing the concept of ‘online political efficacy’ in future research.

KEYWORDS:

• Digital media
• social media activism
• political communication
• Facebook live
• metaphor
• female activism
• Tunisia

Acknowledgement

The authors would like to thank Reviewers for taking the time and effort necessary to review the manuscript. They sincerely appreciate all valuable comments and suggestions, which helped us to improve the quality of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Thouraya Snoussi

Thouraya Snoussi: Associate Professor, Assistant Dean and Acting Chair of Mass Communication Department in the College of Communication at the University of Sharjah. Her research focuses on new media uses and effects. Email: [email protected]

Kais Lassoued

Kais Lassoued: Associate Professor Associate Professor H-D-R in Management, IHEC Carthage (Tunisia). His research focuses on management information and control systems practices and human resource management practices in different contexts. Email: [email protected] - [email protected]

Sofien Abidi

Sofien Abidi is a Ph.D. student at the University Le Havre (France) and a digital Media Instructor at IPSI, University of Manouba (Tunisia); he is particularly interested in digital marketing, multimedia, and graphic design. Email: [email protected]