I love freedom! - The Role of Art in Social Movements: Women's Strike Protests in Poland 2020

Abstract

Thesis refers to the fields of art, social science, and politics and the role of artworks in social movements. It emphasizes the meaning and power of art in social movements. Using the concepts of structural violence, protest art, artivism, and transformative power of art as theoretical background as well as multimodal discourse analysis as methodology, it provides answers to research questions. They are related to artists' motivation to create during social movement and the way the art was interpreted and used by the protesters. The main focus and subject of analysis for this thesis are social movements known as Women's Strike in Poland in 2020 opposing abortion restrictions imposed on women by the right-wing ruling party.