Image and discourse: constructing meaning in the covers of the magazines semana and cambio

Abstract

This work tries to emphasize the factual enunciation that all images stand up as social facts in themselves in an effort to repeal the dominant idea that texts are the only vehicle for logical speech. In order to do so, Content Analysis and the Pragmatics of Image are applied to the covers of Cambio and Semana (1998-2004), which are taken as enunciations or discourse events that in fact constitute specific types of sense production and collective imaginaries; despite their apparent testimonial interest, these do not really show the complexity of Colombian reality but rather cover it up through a non-disruptive rhetoric, by using daily images that stray away from conflict and create their own actors based on stereotypes.