Appunti Zanfei Analisi

DEFINITIONS:

Remediation (according to Bolter): process in which each medium relates to the other and each

format borrows part of its meaning from the previous product format.

Es. Videogames borrow contents and characters from films (films > videogames)

Radio station > Itunes; Printed encyclopedia > Wikipedia; TV > Youtube; schoolmates’ photo

album > Facebook; blog > Twitter etc.

All current media are remediation of some preceding medium.

Through remediation it’s possible to create a new media by refashioning of materials and references

to previous media.

Repurposing = pouring a familiar or successful content into another media form:

Example: Popeye: Comic strips, cartoon, film, radio program, toy

“Great Expectation”: from a novel to a film.

Example of remediation:

Manuscript > Printed book > E-book

Camera lucida > digital camera

Stage plays > Films

Multimodality is the use and co-deployment of more than one mode in the construction of a textual

entity.

Mode: it refers to the different ways in which text can be realized.

It may consist for example of words and images (visual + verbal mode).

A mode is a system of communication that consist of three metafunctions (Halliday):

representational or ideational: it refers to natural world;

- textual: it refers to verbal world (the flow of information in a text, cohesive devices);

- interpersonal: it refers to the social relationship between the speaker and the listener (es.

- formal-informal letters)

Ex: the visual mode can be an image; a written mode can be a written text; other modes are colours,

typography, spoken mode etc.

es. Webpages are multimodal: they use a variety of modes, in order to make meaning.

Resources for meaning making:

Kind of knowledge, skills, instruments, to which one has access. They are:

• Linguistic: grammatical resources / lexical resources;

• Cultural (literary, conventions);

• Social: social/political economy;

• Technological: capabilities of new technologies;

Medium: the physical base/channel which carries/transmits a message: written texts can be printed

in a magazine, newspaper, book, or can appear on a computer screen.

Trascrizioni dei video (slide):

1. What is remediation?

Remediation is the act of observing and repurposing a media into another media form.

Remediation is everywhere, we live in a “remediate culture“.

Remediation has a double logic, it wants to combine:

immediacy: how much the user forgets the medium; actually the medium disappear; es.

watching a film, how engrossed is the person in the storytelling, how little is the person

thinking about film techniques; the less you see the tools, the higher you can experience

immediacy and you can focus on the contents; immediacy is a synonym of “transparency”;

and

hypermediacy: it’s the opposite of immediacy: when the user is continually made aware of

the interface; the acts of representation are all visible to the user;

Remediation is mediation of mediation: media are continually reproducing and replacing each other.

It’s not just a replacement, but a spread of contents.

The goal of remediation is to refashion other media: new media achieve their cultural significance

by refashioning such earlier media:

photography remediated painting, film remediated photography, video games remediated films.

2. Why adopt a multimodal approach (trascrizione del video):

Identity and language are connected: we are more than what we speak.

A multimodal approach gives you the possibility to see more.

A website is socially formed: an English website reflects English identity, the English environment.

3. What is a mode? (trascrizione del video):

You don’t need to use language for everything: we have different modes by which we can make

meaning.

A combination of elements permits to give a richer meaning.

What the different modes have in common? The sign (form + meaning)

MULTIMODAL ANALYSIS - A promotional text:

1. Composition and Layout:

The multimodal elements in this composition are an image (visual mode) and a written text (written

mode).

The image is located at the top of the composition: it’s at the left and its big dimensions create

salience.

The text is at the bottom of the composition and it’s divided from the image through the technique

of separation.

Framing: if there are lines, white spaces between the different modes, framelines etc.)

[il framing è ciò che dà individualità alle informazioni]

Framing devices:

Separation (through lines); es. in the promotional texts with texts and images;

- Segregation (suddivisione): es. in comic strips (separation in time/space): es. nei fumetti in

- cui l’immagine dopo rappresenta uno spostamento nello spazio o nel tempo;

Integration (when the title is located inside the image); es. film posters;

- Overlapping (sovrapposizione);

- Ex: the text creates a frame around the image and it’s

separated from the image through white spaces.

The image represents the ideal information value (it need to be explained by the real element,

which is the text). The text represents the real information value.

[Ideal information rappresenta la promessa, l’obiettivo, il primo element su cui cade l’occhio

dell’osservatore. La parte ideale viene poi concretizzata nella parte reale, cioè il testo, in cui

vengono date informazioni reali, dettagliate, che spiegano l’elemento ideale)]

In the text, the first part (at left) is the given information, the following part is the new information.

(è la sequenza delle parole a determinare quali sono gli elementi nuovi: da sinistra a destra:

all’inizio viene data l’informazione generale, condivisa, andando avanti con la lettura viene

presentata l’informazione nuova, che fa riferimento all’informazione già conosciuta; quindi

l’informazione nuova, nel paragrafo seguente diventa given, e viene aggiunta un’informazione

nuova).

2. The written text:

If there is the title: it is a salient element (it can be written in capital letters or italics type or bold

type).

Typography: underlined (sottolineato); italics (corsivo); bold type (grassetto): devices used to

foreground some elements of the texts.

The salient elements in the text are the elements that capture the reader’s attention:

• foreign words: Via Redentore, pastiche;

• numbers;

• intensifiers (adjectives, adverbs, superlatives): the most beautiful… the best-preserved…

magnificent, wonderful etc.

• repetitions; the city… the city… the city….

• imperative verbs: Choose it! (conative function: persuade the reader);

• Similes (like a…) and metaphors (poetic function);

• cohesive elements: pronouns, synonyms, conjuction (but: contrastive; and: coordination),

ellipsis,

• lexical items, colloquialisms, dialect forms, spoken language’s words, grammatical mistakes:

whattaya; dat’s all; photo-op; I catched*;

• new words (blends, clippings, acronyms, compound words etc)

• polysemic lexicon;

• quote or mentions of famous people: es. the architect “…” said that… ; mentions/quotations

give legitimation to the text (as powerful cultural symbols);

• coherence (meaning of the text) is created by a logic order of the sentences, relationship

cause-effects, temporality etc.

The modality of a text can be: high or low. It refers to how certain we are about something.

High modality is given by:

present tense / imperative tense: choose it! the city is; here you can find…

- verbs, adverbs and adjective that shows certainty: es. always, totally, completely, must, can,

- want, will;

Low modality is given by:

past tense (here there were… you could find… you should do… you may… rarely, possibly

- etc)

verbs, adverbs, adjectives that refers to uncertainty;

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Legitimation is given by:

conformity: everyone has visited this place;

- tradition: you can still find… ;

- evaluation by critics, experts, celebrities;

- authenticity: real Italian risotto; healthy food, etc.

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