Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T07:34:43.057Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Perspectives on multimodality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 March 2007

Susan M. Hagan
Affiliation:
English, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, [email protected]

Extract

Eija Ventola, Cassily Charles, & Martin Kaltenbacher (eds.), Perspectives on multimodality. (Document Design Companion Series.) Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 2004. Pp. x, 250. Hb eur. 95.00/$114.00.

This sixth volume in the Document Design Companion Series, like its predecessors, is devoted to issues of written, spoken, and visual (electronic) discourse as a contextual undertaking. While other volumes have roots in social semiotics, this one is unique for the breadth of its multimodal curiosity. Its cross-section of essays emerged from discussions that took place during the First International Symposium on Multimodal Discourse at the University of Salzburg. The symposium's organizers, who are also this book's editors, hope their work will foster discussion encompassing theory, method, and an eclectic array of applications, from the multisemiotic construction of mathematics to visual/verbal humor in comics. From their point of view, this work suggests possibilities for future study rather than fully realized principles in a field where nonlinguistic meaning making is only beginning to be incorporated into linguistic analysis. Therefore, one can often forgive the uneven nature of this undertaking. Stronger concerns arise when problematic or missing information affects a central claim.

Type
BOOK REVIEWS
Copyright
© 2007 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Buswell, Guy T. (1935). How people look at pictures: A study of the psychology of perception in art. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Carney, Russell N., & Levin, Joel R. (2002). Pictorial illustrations still improve students' learning from text. Educational Psychology Review 14:526.Google Scholar
Halliday, M. A. K. (1978). Language as a social semiotic. London: Edward Arnold.
Kress, Gunther R., & Van Leeuwen, Theo (2001). Multimodal discourse: The modes and media of contemporary communication. New York: Oxford University Press.
Mayer, Richard E. (2002). Using illustrations to promote constructivist learning from science text. In J. Otero et al. (eds.), The psychology of science: Text comprehension, 33355. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Norton, D., & Stark, L. (1971). Eye movements and visual perception. Scientific American 224:3443.Google Scholar
Paivio, Allan (1986). Mental representations: A dual coding approach. New York: Oxford University Press.
Plass, Jan L.; Chun, Dorothy; Mayer, Richard E.; & Leutner, Detler (1998). Supporting visual and verbal learning preferences in a second-language multimedia learning environment. Journal of Educational Psychology 90:2536.Google Scholar