ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Commun.
Sec. Multimodality of Communication
Multimodal Representation of Violent Death in Mass Media: A Case Study of Izium Mass Burial Reporting in the News
Provisionally accepted
- Tomas Bata University in Zlín, Zlín, Czechia
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This study investigates how the discovery of mass graves in Izium, Ukraine, after the liberation of the town from the Russian occupation in 2022, is multimodally framed in geographically diverse, but mainly ideologically homogeneous, international media, highlighting the use of visual and verbal (im)personalization and visual euphemization practices in reporting violent death. Combining Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) and Social Semiotics approaches, the analysis reveals how news narratives construct symbolic proximity and regimes of pity while adhering to genre conventions and cultural knowledge around death. The aforementioned practices help the mass media navigate the ethical tension between informing and protecting audiences. The deceased in the news reporting acquire symbolic agency but also reflect broader ideological mechanisms, including the mobilization of public support through media framing. The findings contribute to the understanding of how the mass media shapes the discourse of and about violent death, illustrating the role of media in managing affect in wartime reporting.
Keywords: Conflict1, impersonalization3, MCDA4, spectatorship of suffering5, violentdeath6, visual euphemisation7, war2
Received: 24 Jun 2025; Accepted: 12 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Shurma. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Svitlana Shurma
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