Urban arts as critical commentary acts of pandemic in Indonesia: Multimodal critical discourse analysis

Abstract

The present study examines the practice of urban arts as critical commentary acts of pandemic issues in Indonesia’s public spaces based on the viral news on July–August 2021. There are 11 viral arts as examples which are evaluated by three approaches, i.e. Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) approach, Systemic Functional Linguistic and Ideological square. This study aims to critically examine the meaning-making process of different semiotic resources, reveal the ideas and values, and how the in-group and out-group representation in the underlying discourse. The findings reveal that the urban arts are powerful mediums of voicing and criticism publicly about social, political, and humanity issues during pandemic. Since the urban artists may position themselves as the representative of the public, they are depicted in the miserable states as the victims of the unresponsiveness and incapability of the government in handling the pandemic. The choices of verbal and visual modes purposely signal the public’s despair state and emphasize the government’s shortcomings. However, the presence of urban arts is not entirely accepted as social form of communication. Lack of appreciation and official public spaces always put the urban arts on the edge of vandalism. Power and political elements even come into play to restrain the freedom of speech.