Strategic Studies of Art

Strategic Studies of Art

Representation of Children’s Rights in Multimodal Text-Image Interactions: A Critical Analysis of the Third-Grade Persian Textbook Based on the Kress and van Leeuwen Framework

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
Maryam Jalali 1
Fatemeh Benvidi 2
1 Associate Professor, Department of Persian Language and Literature, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran. (Corresponding Author) Email: ma_jalali@sbu.ac.ir
2 Assistant Professor, Faculty Member at the Academy of Arts, Academy of Arts, Tehran, Iran. Email: benvidi@honar.ac.ir
10.22083/ssa.2026.582887.1134
Abstract
Introduction: Primary school textbooks are multimodal educational media that play an important role in children’s civic and legal socialization. Drawing on multimodality theory, this study views meaning as emerging through the interaction of text, images, color, and layout, with visual elements playing a central role in shaping interpretation and values. Although the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child emphasizes children’s rights to dignity, participation, identity, and appropriate education, little attention has been given to how these rights are represented visually in textbooks. This study examines how children’s rights are constructed through the interaction of text and image in the illustrated stories of the 2022 third-grade Persian textbook, using a multimodal social semiotic and educational policy perspective.
Methods: This study employs a qualitative descriptive-analytical approach based on multimodal social semiotics. Four illustrated stories from the 2022 edition of the Iranian third-grade Persian textbook were selected through purposive sampling. The analysis draws on Kress and Van Leeuwen’s (2006) Grammar of Visual Design, examining representational, interactive, and compositional meanings. Indicators derived from selected articles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child were used to assess how children’s rights are represented in both text and images. The analysis involved multimodal description, systematic coding, identification of rights-related themes, and comparison with the Convention to reveal recurring patterns relevant to educational policy.
Findings: The findings show that children’s rights are communicated through the interaction of text and images rather than by either mode alone. Four dominant multimodal patterns emerged. First, education is represented as an experiential process in which images reinforce the emotional and environmental dimensions of learning. Second, rights related to care, protection, and emotional support are conveyed mainly through visual elements such as facial expressions, body language, and spatial relationships. Third, identity and belonging are constructed through cultural symbols, meaningful places, and visual representations of individuality. Fourth, participatory rights are presented through dialogue supported by visual features that emphasize equality, interaction, and mutual respect. However, the analysis also reveals that several rights-including child labor, disability inclusion, and explicit anti-violence themes-receive limited attention, and visual resources are not always used consistently to strengthen rights-based learning.
Conclusion: This study confirms that the representation of children’s rights in primary school textbooks is inherently multimodal and cannot be adequately evaluated through textual analysis alone. Meaning emerges from the semiotic division of labor between language and image, consistent with multimodality theory.
Importantly, the distribution of meaning between modes is not merely aesthetic but policy-driven. Textbooks function as instruments of curriculum policy, and visual design decisions implicitly communicate institutional priorities. The partial or uneven visual representation of certain rights suggests the absence of explicit multimodal design guidelines within textbook production policies.
Accordingly, the study proposes three policy-oriented recommendations:
1. revising multimodal design guidelines to integrate children’s rights indicators;
2. diversifying visual narratives to include marginalized childhood experiences;
3. implementing pre-publication multimodal review mechanisms involving interdisciplinary experts.
By linking social semiotics with educational policy analysis, this research contributes a framework for evaluating textbooks as multimodal policy artifacts. It highlights the need for systematic integration of children’s rights principles into both textual and visual dimensions of educational materials
Keywords
Educational Policy Research
Children’s Rights
Multimodal Theory
Semiotic Analysis
Persian Textbook
Subjects
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