<p>Pashto tappay, a centuries-old genre of traditional poetry, blend themes of romance, intimacy, and spirituality with undercurrents of social critique and resistance. This study presents a large-scale quantitative content analysis of 1000 tappay to examine shifts in thematic focus, symbolic imagery, gendered voice, and emotional tone over time. Guided by symbolic interactionism and cultural resistance theory, and extended through contemporary perspectives on negotiated agency and everyday politics, the study employs a structured coding scheme and statistical testing—including chi-square analysis—to assess associations and temporal changes. The findings indicate a clear transformation: contemporary tappay emphasize resistance more than traditional ones, with symbolic imagery shifting from flowers and bodily metaphors to blood, graves, and homeland. Women’s voices remain consistently central, affirming their enduring cultural role, though not significantly expanding over time. These patterns suggest that tappay function not merely as aesthetic expressions but as structured cultural responses to prolonged conflict, displacement, and social constraint in Pashtun regions. By offering systematic quantitative evidence, the study highlights the adaptability of folk traditions as dynamic cultural forms through which identity, memory, and subtle resistance are negotiated. It contributes to folklore, gender studies, and peace research by demonstrating how everyday poetic expression can carry broader social and political significance in conflict-affected societies.</p>