Gravestones as Texts: A Genre Analysis of Tombstones through a Gendered Lens

This study applies Swales’ (2008) genre analysis framework to Iranian tombstone inscriptions, drawing on direct observation of 1,400 gravestones (750 male, 650 female) and integrating qualitative and quantitative structural-semantic move analyses. Linguistically, the findings reveal a striking predominance of Persian poetic metaphors (82.86% of epitaphic content) over direct Quranic verses (4.8%), underscoring cultural-literary traditions rather than strictly religious rhetoric. Syntactically, the Persian ezafe construction encodes paternal lineage on 84% of men's tombstones, while maternal names are entirely absent (0%), grammatically materializing patriarchal descent. The rhetorical structure comprises nine distinct moves, two of which are obligatory: the deceased’s particulars (name/titles) and lifespan (birth/death dates). Additional gendered markers include photographs (44% on men’s stones, 0% on women’s) and explicit paternal name mentions (84% for men, 58.5% for women), further reflecting Iran's male-dominated social norms. By positioning tombstones as communicative artifacts, this study bridges a gap in genre analyses of non-academic texts, offering a nuanced, gendered perspective on how death, identity, and socio-cultural values are discursively memorialized in Iranian society.