Education through TIME: Representations of United States Education on TIME Magazine Covers

This study examined how TIME Magazine has visually represented and communicated ideas about education from TIME’s inception in 1923 through 2019. Drawing upon theories of visual culture and social semiotic approaches to multimodality, the researchers conducted a Qualitative Multimodal Content Analysis of 115 covers that featured content related to education and schooling. Findings included: (a) names and places are used to suggest authority, power, or importance in educational circles; (b) learning and school are presented as having not changed over time; (c) overgeneralized and metonymic representations can stand for broad categories of educational stakeholders; (d) schools are presented as in need of fixing; and (e) schools are perceived as sites for larger, sociopolitical debates.