Images of the Mother in Selected 2020 Mother’s Day WhatsApp Postings in Zimbabwe

Abstract

This paper looks at the image of the mother as depicted in selected messages sent on the occasion of Mother's Day of 2020 via WhatsApp which is the most widely used social medium platform in Zimbabwe. The study is confined to a few selected pictorial messages circulated on this special day which was however celebrated under lockdown in most countries of the world due to the Covid 19 pandemic.The restrictions imposed by the pandemic may also have contributed to the avalanche of messages as movement was restricted and many could only express their feelings to their mothers virtually. The researcher belongs to a variety of WhatsApp groups that provide a rich vein of the said raw materials. It should be noted that the aforementioned groups rarely solely stick to the core-business of their original formation as their membership 'strays' outside to smuggle messages outside their 'mandates'.This is understandable since group members assume a multiplicity of roles in real life necessitating multiple group affiliations making 'message importation' inevitable. The result is a mega-net and wide currency of 'trendy' messages. The study adopts an Africana Womanist approach to the analysis of the selected postings since the concoctions of signs sent were on or targeted at the African mother from her African chidren at home or abroad therefore read and understood in an African setting. The study notes that the pictures seem to celebrate mothers as architects of the infrastructure of a child's character and springboard of his/her eventual achievements.She is depicted as an important cog of the family machinery that is often unacknowledged.