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Overview of Galamsey and Environmental Destruction in Ghana
Multimodal and Networked Rhetoric as Drivers of Participation in Digital Environmental Activism
Analysis: Multimodal Strategies and Social Media Amplification
Example 1: The Polluted River Bodies–A Multimodal Call to Action
Cultural Authority and Moral Legitimacy: The Asantehene’s Intervention
Conclusion
This study has examined how the hashtag StopGalamseyNow campaign mobilizes civic participation through multimodal and networked rhetorical strategies that transform environmental harm into collective action by analyzing the circulation of polluted river imagery and the intervention of the Asantehene. The paper demonstrates how visual evidence, emotional appeal, and culturally grounded authority work together to move audiences from awareness to action. The campaign's effectiveness lies not only in its use of digital platforms but in its ability to frame environmental destruction as an ethical and ancestral concern, thereby situating activism within shared systems of value, memory, and obligation. In doing so, the movement challenges Western-centric assumptions about digital activism by foregrounding indigenous epistemologies and locally rooted forms of legitimacy within networked public discourse.
Future research could extend this analysis by examining how material conditions and landscapes themselves participate in environmental activism, particularly how degraded rivers, mining equipment, and altered terrains function as persuasive agents within digital circulation. Such work might explore how the physical presence of polluted environments interacts with visual documentation, cultural authority, and platform affordances to shape public understanding and mobilization. Attending more closely to the material dimensions of environmental harm would further illuminate how Global South communities integrate lived environments, indigenous knowledge systems, and digital media to sustain long-term civic engagement against ecological exploitation.
Finally, the hashtag StopGalamseyNow campaign demonstrates that digital environmental activism is most powerful when multimodal rhetoric, emotional resonance, and cultural authority converge, transforming collective outrage into sustained civic action aimed at protecting both ecological systems and cultural futures.