“The soro-soke [speak up] generation”: multimodality and appraisal choices in selected #EndSars civil protest-related memes in Nigeria

Abstract

Abstract This paper explores the deployment of multimodal elements as appraisal resources in #Endsars civil unrest-related memes in Nigerian social media space (WhatsApp and Twitter) to express affective meanings and intersubjective positioning. The study investigates how both verbal and non-verbal elements are deployed as appraisal resources to evaluate the trajectory of the protest. The data, which comprise thirty purposively selected Internet memes, collected between October and December, 2020, were analysed qualitatively. The study shows that the meme producers, through the use of multimodal concepts such as symbolic, analytical, action, reactional processes, offer and salience, among others, project various expressions of affect, judgement and appreciation of things to create important narratives in the memes. Thus, the verbal elements are graded/upscaled through the non-verbal elements in the memes to evoke specific reactions, positive/negative, which signal intersubjective positioning about the protest and relevant social actors. The study concludes that meme producers effectively utilize multimodal elements to interrogate various expressions of attitude and intersubjective opinions that Nigerians made about the protest and its management by the Nigerian government.