Marcha das Vadias [The SlutWalk] on social media: a militant discourse?

Abstract

This paper aims to study, from the theoretical perspective of French Discourse Analysis, some advertising campaigns produced by Marcha das Vadias [The SlutWalk] and published on Facebook. We expect to understand how a saying about both women and the feminist movement gathers significance in the technological environment, fostering the disempowering effects of certain meanings and the emergence of others. In addition, we intend to reflect upon how it is discursively materialized what some authors have been referring to as cyber militancy, i.e., digital environments which lead to claims, to protests by nullifying the so-called dominant discourses. Therefore, we investigate how a saying about women is designed and circulates in contemporary society and on the network, seeking to part with sayings already engraved in the memory of society about what it means and what it does not mean to be woman.