Multimodality in Higher Education [1 ed.] 9789004312067, 9789004312050

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Multimodality in Higher Education

Studies in Writing The Studies in Writing Series was founded by Gert Rijlaarsdam and Eric Espéret in 1994. It was pursued by Gert Rijlaarsdam until 2014, becoming a reference in the field of writing research.

Series Editors Raquel Fidalgo (University of León, Spain) Thierry Olive (National Centre for Scientific Research (cnrs) & University of Poitiers, France)

Editorial Board Rui A. Alves (University of Porto, Portugal) – Montserrat Castelló (Ramon Llull University, Spain) – David Galbraith (University of Southampton, uk) Karen Harris (Arizona State University, usa) – Charles A. MacArthur (University of Delaware, usa) – Rosa Manchón (University of Murcia, Spain) Gert Rijlaarsdam (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands & University of Antwerp, Belgium) – Mark Torrance (Nottingham Trent University, uk) Luuk van Waes (University of Antwerp, Belgium) – Åsa Wengelin (University of Gothenburg, Sweden)

volume 33

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/siw

Multimodality in Higher Education Edited by

Arlene Archer Esther Odilia Breuer

leiden | boston

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Archer, Arlene, editor. | Breuer, Esther Odilia, 1971- editor. Title: Multimodality in higher education / edited by Arlene Archer, Esther Odilia Breuer. Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, [2016] | Series: Studies in writing ; 33 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016009146 (print) | LCCN 2016021452 (ebook) | ISBN 9789004312050 (hardback : alk. paper) | ISBN 9789004312067 (e-book) | ISBN 9789004312067 (E-book) Subjects: LCSH: Academic writing. | Education, Higher–United States. | Communication–Methodology. Classification: LCC LB2369 .M845 2016 (print) | LCC LB2369 (ebook) | DDC 808/.0420711–dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016009146

Want or need Open Access? Brill Open offers you the choice to make your research freely accessible online in exchange for a publication charge. Review your various options on brill.com/brill-open. Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface. issn 1572-6304 isbn 978-90-04-31205-0 (hardback) isbn 978-90-04-31206-7 (e-book) Copyright 2016 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

Contents List of Figures and Tables List of Contributors x

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Introduction: A Multimodal Response to Changing Communication Landscapes in Higher Education 1 Arlene Archer and Esther Breuer

part 1 Multimodality in Academia 1

Ploughing the Field of Higher Education: An Interview with Gunther Kress 21 Anders Björkvall

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The Past in the Present: Modes, Gaze and Changing Communicative Practices in Lectures 31 Lucia Thesen

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Aspects of Multimodality in Higher Education Monographs 53 Tuomo Hiippala

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Multimodality, Argument and the Persistence of Written Text 79 Lesley Gourlay

part 2 Multimodality in Text Composition 5

Multimodal Academic Argument: Ways of Organising Knowledge across Writing and Image 93 Arlene Archer

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Genre Inside/Genre Outside: How University Students Approach Composing Multimodal Texts 114 Bronwyn T. Williams

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contents

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Writing against Formal Constraints in Art and Design: Making Words Count 136 Simon Bell

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Reclaiming the Authorial Self in Academic Writing through Image Theatre 167 Aditi Hunma

part 3 Multimodality across Domains 9

Intersemiosis in Science Textbooks 195 Leo Roehrich

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Multimodal Literacy and Numeracy Practices in Postgraduate Management Accounting 216 Hesham Suleiman Alyousef and Peter Mickan

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Drawn Writing: The Role of Written Text in Civil Engineering Drawing 241 Zach Simpson Index

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List of Figures and Tables Figures 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 7.1 7.2 7.3

7.4 7.5 7.6

A lecture hall in 14th century Bologna (c. 1380) 40 A seventeenth-century image of a lecture hall used for both lecture and disputation at Leipzig 42 Lecture on the evils of alcoholism in the auditorium at Fresne prison, in the late 19th century 46 A wireless classroom in the early 21st century 48 Medium, semiotic modes and genre 58 A sketch of Figure 2.5 on page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012), which retains the original layout and conceptual structure 63 The layout structure of page 52 64 Layout structures in a tourist brochure and an in-flight magazine 66 A partial rhetorical structure on page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012) 69 Example of visual-verbal linkages in a first year student essay 98 Caption as delimiting argument 99 Single image depicting change over time 102 Argument established through juxtaposition of images 103 An example of classification in order to generalise from the particular ‘type’ 104 Comparison based on classification 105 Modality in a schematic diagram 109 Changing modality in digital arenas 110 Blahnik project student handwritten text inside image, foregrounding fit and sequence 146 Blahnik project student handwritten text inside image, foregrounding tone of voice and alternative readings 148 Two details of student texts from the Comic Sans fashion magazine project, showing radically different ways of handling the generally unwelcome font requirement 151 Dior project student text with 50 adjectives bracketed between blocks of more conventional text 153 Example of one of a set of student Wallace Collection texts on the theme of seductive archetypes—this one is ‘The Delicate’ 155 An example of a Mannequins Are Vile student text, showing the unevenness resulting from column restrictions anchored and calmed by imagery 157

viii 7.7 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 9.5 9.6 9.7 9.8 9.9 9.10 9.11 11.1 11.2 11.3

list of figures and tables Four contrasting examples of 128-word texts, with quite different approaches ranging from apparent fact to fiction 160 Clover model of writer identity 177 Different greeting styles 180 The fist as a common gesture 182 Transitional image 1 183 Transitional image 2 183 Adapted from Berger (2009) 196 Adapted from Berger (2009) 196 A map of delicacy and metafunctions 198 A visual description of Intersemiosis 200 The Logico-semantic framework 201 Percentage used among elaboration types 207 Visual medium divergence 208 Danger in Photography 209 Simplicity in Sketching 209 Overwhelming use of Elaboration 210 A grouping of plants 212 Resolution of forces: text produced in first year civil engineering diploma course on drawing 246 Truss diagram—enlarged view 249 Magnitude and nature of forces within Truss members—enlarged view 250

Tables 3.1 3.2 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 9.5 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5

Page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012) 60 Cohesive chains on page 52 of Bateman and Schmidt (2012) 72 Expansion Types 201 Subcategories of Expansion 203 Examples of Elaboration 204 Examples of Extension 205 Examples of Enhancement 206 The graduate attributes and learning outcomes related to the assignment 221 Projected manufacturing costs for each product in 2011 222 The manufacturing overhead budget for 2011 223 Frame-it Ltd projected balance sheet 224 Group 1’s Budgeted Balance Sheet 226

list of figures and tables 10.6 10.7 10.8 10.9 10.10 10.11 11.1

Types of conjunctive ties in the two groups’ texts 227 The frequency of process types in the two written assignments 229 Group 2’s Sales Budget for s and l Line 230 Examples of relational processes used to assign a new function to the participant 232 Frequency count and top key words in the two texts 233 Group 2’s Production Budget for s and l Line 234 Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model 244

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List of Contributors Arlene Archer University of Cape Town South Africa Esther Odilia Breuer Cologne University Germany Anders Björkvall Stockholm University Sweden Lucia Thesen University of Cape Town South Africa Tuomo Hiippala University of Jyväskylä Finland Lesley Gourlay University College London Institute of Education United Kingdom Bronwyn T. Williams University of Louisville usa Simon Bell Coventry University United Kingdom Aditi Hunma University of Cape Town South Africa

list of contributors

Leo Roehrich Marshall University usa Hesham Suleiman Alyousef King Saud University Saudi Arabia Peter Mickan University of Adelaide Australia Zach Simpson University of Johannesburg South Africa

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introduction

A Multimodal Response to Changing Communication Landscapes in Higher Education Arlene Archer and Esther Breuer

Introduction Multimodal communication is playing an increasingly important role in everyday life, the workplace, public sphere, as well as in academic settings. Changes in the communication landscape in Higher Education have engendered an increasing recognition of the different semiotic dimensions of representation. Multimodality refers to “a field of application rather than a theory” (Bezemer & Jewitt, 2010, p. 180). It offers a theoretical perspective that brings together socially organised resources that lecturers and students use to make meaning. These resources include modes (such as image, writing, gesture, gaze, speech, posture) and media (such as screens, books, notes). In Higher Education, multimodality manifests in multimodal pedagogies (including the use of digital technologies), in multimodal student texts, and in the increasing inderdisciplinarity of both content and methods (for instance, the analysis of film in the discipline of history). Most research on academic discourse has been based on the analysis of written text (for example, Galtung, 1981; Swales, 1990) and as a result, most classes on the teaching of academic writing have concentrated on language. However, student assignments require increasingly complex multimodal competencies and Higher Education needs to be equipped to help students with the construction of these texts. As with predominantly written assignments, multimodal texts raise issues about power and access in Higher Education. The norms and conventions around constructing multimodal texts are no more ‘transparent’ than the norms around writing. As a consequence and as will be shown in the different chapters in this book, multimodality in Higher Education is important

Archer, A. & Breuer, E. (2016). Introduction. A Multimodal Response to Changing Communication Landscapes in Higher Education. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 1–17). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_002

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and in need of further research, both in the analysis of academic texts and in the ways in which a multimodal approach can foster the writing and learning processes of students. Multimodality in Higher Education shows how a multimodal approach is used and could be used in different texts and contexts in Higher Education.

Writing in Higher Education Key to Multimodality in Higher Education is the exploration of how to define the scope, nature, and function of writing in Higher Education, especially when ‘writing’ now includes oral, visual, multimedia, and technology-enriched aspects. Writing has always been a multimodal practice. Old Egyptian script was based on images, and so still are Chinese and other logographic languages (Coulmas, 2003). The visual and spatial dimensions of writing are evident in spelling, typography, emphasis and layout. For instance, differently spelt words have different visual connotations. Spelling is used to differentiate between voices, indicate spoken voice in writing and degrees of informality, and can also index a ‘cool visual dialect’ such as in the language of mobile telephones. Typography includes fonts, lettering systems, calligraphy, and gives writing materiality through the medium used, such as pens, brushes, pencils, word processors. Emphasis can be achieved through font size, use of bold, boxes around text, point form. Layout and the use of white space can complement the writing, as in instructions, or can intrude on the writing as in calligraphy and concrete poetry where clarity gives way to visual appeal. Writing thus creates a “web” not only of semantic meaning, but also of “visual connotation” (Sharples, 1999, p. 137). What is seen as ‘academic’ writing is contestable and always emergent. Bhatia (2002) understands academic communication as the “situated linguistic behaviour in institutionalised academic or professional settings” (p. 22) and Swales (1990) talks about the “classes of communicative events which typically possess features of stability” (p. 9). In order to understand how texts work, one must, therefore, include the analysis of multimodal elements in texts, how they interact with each other, as well as with the genre in which they are performed. In all approaches to genre analysis, no matter how different they can be (e.g. Berkenkotter & Huckin, 1995; Bhatia, 1993; Martin, 1993; Martin, Christie & Rothery, 1987; Miller, 1994; Swales, 1990), it is essential to keep in mind that different genres (creative writing, journalistic writing, business writing, academic writing) have social origins and that genres have varying degrees of status in particular domains. Genres have been developed over time for

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particular communicative purposes and thus reflect the disciplinary cultures of specific social groups. It is the discourse communities that own them, the “socio-rhetorical networks that form in order to work towards sets of common goals”. Members of these discourse communities possess a “familiarity with the particular genres that are used in the communicative furtherance of those sets of goals” (Swales, 1990, p. 9). There are textual and discursive features in disciplinary genres, as well as contextual and disciplinary factors that define them. This means that the writer does not have complete freedom to change these genre characteristics—especially if the writer is not a long-standing member of the academic community (Bhatia, 2004; 2010; Hyland, 2004). When comparing academic texts emanating from different academic contexts, one can see that students from English speaking backgrounds tend to focus on creating linearity in texts that contain content that is topic relevant (Clyne, 1994; Siepmann, 2006). Other academic approaches, for example in France, Germany, Russia, Arabia, do not cohere to this rule of linearity but prefer to present a wider picture of the topic or of taking different perspectives on them (Galtung, 1983). Reading these texts is more demanding, and could result in academic communities being seen as elitist, trying to ‘keep out’ readers that do not belong to the academic community. These traditions tend not to ‘sell’ ideas as does the English academic community, but rather to ‘tell’ them (Swales & Feak, 1994, p. 214), and the text is understood as working as a “stimulus for thought or even intellectual pleasure” (Yakhontova, 2002, p. 230). English (which today means internationally accepted) academic writing tends to ‘empathise’ with the reader, developing the argument in a linear way, making sure the reader can grasp the argument and share the opinions introduced by the author. This shows that original German and English academic styles are somewhat different. However, in recent years German academic writing has changed because it has become crucial for academic success to be published in international (in terms of English language) journals. If writers do not meet the textual ideologies applied by the evaluators, texts are refused not because of content or purely linguistic inappropriateness, but because the reviewers do not accept the different discursive and pragmatic patterns (Clyne, 1994; Lillis & Curry, 2010, p. 156). One of the main challenges for teaching writing is to provide access to academic and disciplinary discourses through making explicit how texts work in a critical manner, whilst at the same time, inducting students into these discourses (see Archer 2010; Breuer 2013). Discursive practices are ideological in the ways in which they serve to maintain existing social relations of power. Street (1996) shows how joining a particular ‘literacy club’ can be problematic for those trying to learn its rules of entry from non-dominant, or disad-

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vantaged positions in the power structures of the university and the society in which the university is located. Social, political and economic power is closely associated with access to and knowledge of certain discourse forms. There are social, educational and political advantages of acculturation into university practices for individual students. If students are denied access, their marginalisation is perpetuated in a society that values these practices. However, socialization into dominant practices could contribute to maintaining their dominance and uncritically perpetuating the status quo. Dominant practices include languages, varieties, discourses, modes of representation, genres and types of knowledge. Teachers of writing are, therefore, in a double-bind. On the one hand, it would be in their learners’ interests if they could help them to conform to the expectations of the institution. On the other hand, by doing so, they are reproducing the ideologies and inequities of the institution and society at large Writers need to acquire the textual genre features as well as the knowledge about social and cultural practices in the foreign language setting. They have to identify the social forces that underlie the form and purposes of genre and its changing function (Dufrenne, 1963; Galtung, 1981). Concentrating only on formal features in academic texts without showcasing why it is that we write in a specific way, does not lead to a critical engagement with these texts (Hyland, 2004). This is even more so for international students because, as noted above, “given acts and objects appear vastly different in different cultures, depending on the values attached to them” (Oliver, xi). In addition, there is always a tension between convention and a dynamic for constant change. This is the effect of the “constantly transformative action of people acting in ever changing circumstances” (Kress, 2003, p. 108). Thus, there can be no sense of a ‘pure genre’; rather there is constant change, mixing and hybridisation of genres (see Breuer, 2011). A more generative notion of genre for Higher Education is not one where you exclusively learn the forms of existing kinds of texts in order to replicate them, but “where you learn the generative rules of the constitution of generic form within the power structures of a society” (Kress, 2003, p. 121). Teaching writing should thus aim to bring generic conventions into focus, to show what kinds of social situations produce them, and what the meanings of these social situations are. Students need to explore the nature of the discourse community they are working in to identify the discourse conventions and the dominant genres so that they can gain critical access to those genres. The challenges of teaching writing and multimodal composition are compounded and enlivened through changing communication landscapes in Higher Education in terms of both spaces and texts. It is to these changing spaces and texts that we now turn.

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Changing Spaces in Higher Education Changes in Higher Education, such as shifts towards managerialism, commercialism, and accountability have increasingly resulted in a reduction in dialogic spaces. However, it is imperative to recognise the value of unregulated spaces where contesting knowledge and subject positions can be foregrounded since there is a strong link between a particular learning space and the creation of an academic identity. These can be physical spaces which can be more or less performative or dialogic. In thinking about changing spaces in Higher Education, Thesen’s chapter on lecture theatres is particularly apt. She offers new ways of thinking about lectures that highlight embodiment and performance, as well as multivocal and distributed meaning. Thesen argues that the rise of the new media may strengthen the potential of lectures: “As the online environment gets drawn into pedagogy and assessment, and with the increased ‘textualization’ of academic work … this performative face-to-face aspect may be kept alive” (Thesen, 2007, p. 49). Hunma’s chapter also explores alternate spaces in Higher Education, particularly in relation to performativity which can facilitate the development of the ‘authorial self’ in academic writing. Unregulated spaces are enabled through image theatre, where students are invited to negotiate the “positional and spatial boundaries of pedagogical spaces” and the “rules and reach for creative and critical textual performance” (Hunma, this volume, p. xx).

Changing Texts in Higher Education Along with the changing spaces in Higher Education, there are also changing texts. Archer (2011) mentions three types of multimodal assignments encountered in Higher Education, namely predominantly visual texts, written texts that use images, written texts that analyse and discuss visuals. Researchers have also explored the changing nature of the doctoral thesis, including the visual and performing arts doctoral thesis (Ravelli et al., 2013; Fransman, 2012; Kress, 2012). Digital media have enabled students to create and distribute multimodal work which has had implications for the ways in which we engage with text in Higher Education. As Kress notes, a mode is a “socially shaped and culturally given resource for making meaning” (2009, p. 55). That is, the way different modes work does not lie in their materiality per se, but in the way that social groups define and use them. For example, in academic writing double inverted commas usually indicate a quote, whereas single inverted commas often signal metaphoric expression or irony.

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In academia, images and other multimodal elements play important roles in constructing complex meaning in a multifaceted way. Images can function as examples for phenomena described in writing or as elaboration on content provided by words. In some academic texts, the multimodal elements (graphs or tables) take over the dominant role of information provider, as is shown in Simpson or Bell (this volume). In different academic fields, graphs can be the main mode for constructing meaning, and the role of writing is to add information for clarification. Still, multimodal elements need to conform to the demands set by the text form in which they occur, and producers and receivers of texts need to know the functions they can encompass, and how to read them. How writers use modes is relevant for the success of communication in a specific community (Archer & Breuer, 2015). Joining the academic community involves in part the ability to analyse the different functions of the modes. Because of the importance of multimodality in higher education, it is necessary to find ways of analysing these textual elements and their relation to each other in order to use them effectively ourselves and to teach students to understand and create multimodal texts. For understanding these processes, it is necessary to find a method to analyse the functions of the different modes in academic texts. The approach taken by the majority of the authors in this book, is the adaptation of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday, 1975; 2003) to the needs of multimodal analysis which is done in the approach of Social Semiotics (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2001). This approach is based on the assumption that language and other meaning-making modes form a social semiotic system. All modes can realise the three metafunctions described in Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday, 1994), namely the ideational, interpersonal and textual. Representations of the world outside the representational system are realised through the ideational metafunction. The information in various modes is conveyed by the writers and perceived by the readers in terms of social relationships, thus realising the interpersonal metafunction. Lastly, how the multimodal elements are integrated into the text and their effect on text flow and organisation is defined by the textual metafunction. Of central interest to the concerns of this book is the question: What are the characteristics of multimodal academic argument? The book looks at some considerations for multimodal argument, including the establishing of difference, use of evidence, affordances of modes, and choice of images. Many of these issues are raised in acute form in the ‘bonsai’ arguments or short texts described in Bell’s chapter. Bayne and Ross (2013) propose that due to the growing importance of the visual in today’s texts, the dominance of the written word is becoming weaker and it can become completely superfluous in some kinds of

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academic argument. Gourlay’s chapter is a response to this kind of position and argues that written language may in fact remain the most appropriate mode for certain kinds of academic argument. Key to the exploration of academic argument in Archer’s chapter is the idea of affordance and the fact that “each mode in a multimodal ensemble is understood as realising different communicative work” (Jewitt, 2009, p. 15). This need to “rethink the relationship between modes, for example, the interaction between image and writing in a text, is at the heart of much multimodal research” (Jewitt, 2014, p. 13). As Hiippala points out, it is the relations between writing and image that have gained the most attention in the studies of multimodality in academic discourse (this volume, p. xx). Many chapters in the book (Alyousef & Mickan; Archer; Roehrich; Simpson) explore the influence and incorporation of the visual into student texts in Higher Education, looking at the semiotic weighting of modes, conventions and functions of images, and visual and verbal linkages. These aspects of multimodal texts have implications for the ways we teach writing practices in Higher Education.

Harnessing Multimodal Resources to Access Writing Multimodality in Higher Education works against a ‘deficit’ view of student writing which emphasises ‘lack’ in relation to the norms of the academy. Rather, the chapters accentuate the resources that students bring with them to the academy, including linguistic, cultural and gender resources. This ‘recognition’ (Kress, 2010; Archer & Newfield, 2014) of students’ resources is key to a transformative agenda in Higher Education. ‘Recognition’ involves noticing students’ resources, making these visible and integrating them in a range of contexts (Archer, 2014, p. 190). Recognition is also about recognising student ‘interest’ (Kress, 2010) and agency as people choose how to represent meaning from a range of possibilities which are shaped in a particular context. This may mean drawing on resources that are not necessarily valued in Higher Education, such as multilingual, experiential, or embodied resources, or, as Williams (this volume) points out, a range of genres from popular culture. Williams aims to surface students’ resources and to harness these in innovative ways in the writing curriculum. His chapter explores how students’ antecedent genres influence their writing assignments. Also in this volume, Hunma’s notion of image theatre as a pre-text for writing is an innovative way of surfacing students’ brought along resources in order to surface the tensions students experience between texts, self and contexts. Some of these resources include different greeting styles, ways of approaching an essay, and views on academic writing.

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Employing students’ resources in this way could enable them to understand the notion of semiotic choice—how to select according to criteria, context and design. However, it is worth noting that a move to multimodal texts and pedagogies may entail risk of various kinds in specific contexts, and that transduction to writing often involves both gains and losses. Thesen (2014) explores the relation between writing, risk and voice, particularly at postgraduate level in Higher Education. Risk is partly defined as the sense of loss that writers and researchers can experience when producing a written account of their research: “In the process of writing, various experiences and modes of expression are revised or erased along the way” (Thesen, 2014, p. 1). Risk is thus inextricably linked to the notion of ‘voice’ as writer agency. Voice is about representation of the self in text and is subject to contextual conditions within larger patterns of inequality and power relations (Archer, 2013). There can be ‘risk’ in producing multimodal texts, as well as in multimodal pedagogies. However, risk can be generative as Bell demonstrates in chapter 7, this volume. He describes tasks which require writing under strict constraints, which ironically enable a kind of ‘freedom’ and risk-taking not appropriate in more conventional genres in academia.

Overview of Chapters Multimodality in Higher Education theorises writing practices and writing pedagogy in Higher Educational contexts from a multimodal perspective, exploring institutional relationships of discourse and power, and the contested nature of writing practices. Some of the chapters analyse the processes of production and creativity in the new media. The book is divided into three sections, the first focusing on broad cross-cutting issues in academia, the second focusing on issues around text composition, and the last section focusing on applying multimodal principles to a range of disciplinary domains, including science, accounting and engineering. Multimodality in Academia The first section—Multimodality in academia—offers some broad strokes in looking at the multimodal practices in Higher Education, including the form and function of face-to-face lectures, the future of disciplinary domains, the research monograph, and debates around multimodal academic argument. Thesen’s chapter focuses on the function of lectures in Higher Education and argues that lectures are “ideally suited to the complex and often contradictory functions of Higher Education” (this volume, p. xx). According to Thesen,

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lectures are “one of the few spaces that are not directly caught up in assessment practices, where exploratory embodied co-presence is possible” (p. xx). She highlights that lectures have always been dynamic and subject to social and technological changes. This serves as a critical statement against a possible hype around technology, which is often portrayed as ‘transformative’. Thesen gives an historical overview on the fact that lectures have always been a form of multimodal teaching but shows how the functions of modes have changed over the years. Important modes have not only been the oral texts and the written ones but also the gaze of the lecturers and students. The chapter explores the contradictory aspects of meaning-making in lectures, focusing on the ways in which verbal and visual modes interact with gaze in the analysis of changing communicative practices in lectures. The concept of gaze is employed to account for the power relations between participants. Thesen exemplifies her argument with images of lecture halls in the middle ages, in the seventeenth century, as well as in contemporary universities. This series of images constructs and reflects the discourses and practices around communicative practices in lectures across particular time periods. Björkvall’s chapter presents an interview with Gunther Kress, one of the leading researchers in the fields of discourse analysis, genre studies, social semiotics and multimodality. Björkvall and Kress’ discussion on multimodality in Higher Education covers a range of topics, including the future of current disciplinary domains, the changing nature of agency, the design of physical and digital spaces for learning, and multimodal pedagogies and access. The chapter engages with the question ‘How do the spaces and places for learning in Higher Education need to be designed in order to make them relevant for students and teachers of tomorrow?’ It also explores the status of the mode of writing in Higher Education, with Björkvall provocatively asking about the gains and losses of “dancing one’s PhD”. Of particular interest, given the concerns raised in this introductory chapter and the book in general, is the discussion about the relation between the motivated sign and convention. Continuing in the vein of alternate modes in academia, Gourlay’s chapter engages with debates around the affordances of modes and genres for academic argument. Gourlay introduces various theorists on academic communication who claim that academic argument can be realised exclusively through visual images. These authors claim that image can make a proposition and take a position. However, Gourlay gives convincing arguments for why written language may remain the most appropriate mode for realising academic argument, especially in terms of extended and complex development of propositional content, intertextuality, levels of precision and critique required in academic argument.

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Hiippala’s chapter usefully looks at a common genre across disciplines in Higher Education from a multimodal perspective, namely the research monograph. The research monograph continues to be dominated by written language, although it does include diagrams, tables and other elements. The chapter demonstrates how applying a multimodal perspective to a particular genre can open up new questions and ways of seeing, which are invaluable for accessing content as well as for recontextualising knowledge. Hiippala shows how the multimodal ensembles in the monograph support the rhetorical structure. There are, for example, elements which help readers to navigate the text, thus supporting the understanding of cohesion. The analytical approach provided by Hiippala can be used in the teaching of academic reading and writing to raise students’ awareness of the underlying structures in the presentation of content. This awareness could make it easier to transduct the meaning in monographs from one mode and medium to another, in for example, presentations or teaching. Multimodality in Text Composition Producing multimodal texts is not just about selecting multimodal semiotic resources, but it is also about the weight given to each mode in a particular text. The choice of how to represent data or create an argument presents complex choices about conjunctions of meaning and form in text composition. The second section—Multimodality in text composition—explores the relations between modes in academic argument in architecture as well as art and design. It also explores ways of harnessing student resources and student identity in textual composition. The chapters demonstrate how, when creating texts, people bring together and connect the available form that is most apt to express their meaning at a given time. They look at the coming together of modes in texts and the affordances of different modes for different functions. In the opening chapter to this section, Archer showcases the ways in which multimodality can be used in academic argument. She introduces the concepts and elements of academic argument and applies these to multimodal student texts in a first year History and Theory of Architecture course. She shows how argument can be realised through the complexities of the writingimage interaction and explores the underlying ways of organising knowledge in academic argument, thus showing how argument can be constructed through narrative, contrast, induction, and classification for comparison. Since citation is an essential aspect of academic argument, Archer explores the ways in which intertextuality and precedence operate in images. Her way of looking at argument has implications for teaching reading and writing in Higher Education— if students know how to recognise and apply this knowledge appropriately,

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the potential for understanding and constructing academic argument can be realised. The chapter thus forms a possible basis for creating these learning programmes. The chapter by Williams focuses on the ways in which students draw on texts from popular culture as antecedent genres. Different from classic teaching methodologies, the approach does not start with a deficit view, but recognises students as people who already have a great amount of knowledge in a range of genres. By activating a conscious examination of the multimodal genres of popular culture, students become aware of the goals and the characteristics of these genres, thus enabling an understanding of academic genres. Williams argues that knowledge of antecedent genres provides a rich pool from which writing teachers can harness competencies in order to enable students to successfully participate in multimodal academic communication. It is not only the analysis of different genres which helps students enhance their academic writing, but it is also the application of this knowledge in a project. The students were asked to create a video, as well as to generate a multimodal academic text about the same topic. The chapter thus raises and explores many of the issues of interest in Multimodality in Higher Education, including the notion of genre as a social practice; issues around sampling, remixing, citation and intertextuality; questions of audience for multimodal texts in Higher Education. It also puts into sharp focus the notion of ‘recognition’ of students’ resources and the importance of harnessing these in curriculum design. As a lecturer in a School of Art and Design, Bell takes a look at multimodality in writing from an interesting perspective. He looks at the creative affordances for students of creating texts with artificial constraints, such as word limits. Bell’s projects emphasise the visual aspect of words, and it is the images or the layout that ‘dictate’ the writing, not the other way round. In this, it is not the semantics of the words but the graphics of the letters and the words which make the meaning—a process that is demanding for writers as well as readers, but which opens up new ways of expressing oneself. The chapter is full of examples of how certain design constraints can shape writing, and the affordances of particular types of genres for student meaning-making. Hunma’s chapter is an innovative take on getting students to reflect on the complexities of identity and diversity in Higher Education. Hunma describes the challenges that international students (and students in general) often face when confronted with the task of working in a new academic context. For them, writing is a challenge that is related to the foreign community, to the new, uncommon genre and often to the foreign language. The result could be texts that do not always fulfil the academic demands, nor do they necessarily reflect thinking processes that are taking place in the writers’ heads. This could result

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in “formulaic parroting” (Swales, 1990, p. 16) rather than active participation in academic communication. A reason for this can be the loss of the authorial self in academic writing. Hunma presents a study in which international students regain this authorial self by participating in a class using image theatre as a pedagogical concept. The students participate in constructing images by creating human sculptures. They pose for an image in which they present challenges in their university context. They then create a sculpture of the ‘ideal’ situation and visualise possibilities of getting from the ‘now’ to the ‘ideal’. By doing this, students are encouraged to integrate their authorial selves, their thoughts and their experiences into the task. This can be explored as a valuable form of pre-writing, but can also be used to reflect on the authorial self in academic writing, making the students write and engage in the academic context more actively and with greater awareness. Multimodality across Domains When analysing multimodality in Higher Education, it is important to keep in mind that the role different modes play in a specific text depends not only on the overall culture the text is embedded in, but also, and sometimes even more so, on the disciplinary culture (Egbert, 2015; Kashiha & Chan, 2014). The third section of the book—Multimodality across domains—looks at multimodal texts and pedagogies in science, management accounting and civil engineering. It concentrates on the role of writing within and across modes in these domains, including technical drawing, mathematical notation, scientific images and information graphics. As is shown by the different approaches to and the results of the studies presented in this book, it is important to value the possibilities and opportunities of using different modes to look beyond our own disciplinary borders and to get an understanding of how and why specific modes work in different types of disciplinary genres. For example, in Mathematics, it is often a formula as short as a2+b2=c2 (Pythagorean Theorem) that suffices in order to express that “[i]n a right triangle, the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the legs” (Yeng, Lin & Lin, 1990)—a sentence that to an uniformed reader is as incomprehensible as the formula itself. Because of these disciplinary differences, multimodality, multimodal texts and especially the teaching of how to use multimodality in academic writing cannot be analysed and conducted in a uniform way. Roehrich’s chapter explores intersemiosis in academic writing, focusing on image and writing relations in undergraduate introductory science textbooks. He demonstrates that, from a Systemic Functional Linguistic perspective, images in these textbooks are mostly used for ‘Elaboration’ of meaning ex-

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pressed in the written text. The images provide the readers with means to better understand the writing—they clarify, exemplify or expose the written text. The images are accompanied by a certain type of language, which is used to guide the readers and—in the case of textbooks—enable understanding of the content. When teaching students how to analyse textbooks, they could learnby-reception and apply this knowledge to the multimodal texts they have to produce themselves. In this way, guided reading can be a tool for learning to write multimodally. The final two chapters look at multimodality in professional disciplines, namely accounting and engineering. Alyousef and Mickan’s chapter investigates the interrelated dimensions of disciplinary context and multimodal literacy and numeracy practices, and looks at how financial tables work as meaning-making artefacts. They present a case study of five international postgraduate students enrolled in a management accounting course at an Australian university. The focus is on how these students create a budgeted balance sheet, and how the orthographic texts interact with the tables in which the calculation is presented. Applying Halliday’s (1975) Systemic Functional Linguistics, the authors analyse the experiential and the logical features of the texts and tables and argue that accounting discourse comprises not only quantitative technical calculations but also qualitative material. In this way, the text created by the students shows the degree to which they are able to manage accounting language and the multimodal practices required, not only in Higher Education, but also in the professional contexts they will enter after study. Simpson’s chapter opens a new perspective on the relation between written text and images and the functional specialisation of these modes. He looks at a student-generated drawing in a first year Civil Engineering course. In analysing this text form, Simpson draws on Lim’s Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model (2004). He shows how writing and image cooperate on different planes, and how medium and materiality have an impact on all of the planes. The analysis shows that the information is provided in the drawing by using an “invisible language”, and that the writing takes over a summative function. This function of written text stands more or less in contrast to the average understanding of the role of images and writing in texts, and proves that language is not necessarily superior to other modes in meaning-making. If teachers are able to explain to their students how these complementary functions work, this may enable students to understand the importance of drawing classes which are often different to the professional practice in which no hand drawing but software is used. It is important to stress that drawing in Engineering is a meaning making process that can help students enter their scientific community.

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Final Comments Multimodality as an academic area of study is undertaken by researchers from a wide range of disciplines. Multimodality in Higher Education looks at the theoretical and methodological uptake of multimodal approaches in a range of domains in Higher Education, including art and design, architecture, composition studies, science, management accounting and engineering. We have argued that in Higher Education contexts, a multimodal approach has the potential to provide a healthy antidote to monolingual and logocentric approaches to meaning-making, enabling a metacognitive view of semiosis as occurring across languages and modes, as well as a successful way of enabling access to dominant and powerful forms. In addition, we have shown that textual production is dictated by discourse conventions, and that texts are structured in reasonably predictable ways according to patterns of social interaction in particular groupings.

References Archer, A. (2014). Power, Social Justice and Multimodal Pedagogies. In Jewitt, C. (Ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Multimodal Analysis (2nd edition) (pp. 189–197). London: Routledge. Archer, A. (2013). Voice as Design: Exploring Academic Voice in Multimodal Texts in Higher Education. In Bock, N. & Pachler, N. (Eds.), Multimodality and Social Semiosis. Communication, Meaning-Making, and Learning in the Work of Gunther Kress (pp. 150–161). New York and London: Routledge. Archer, A. (2011). Clip-Art or Design: Exploring the Challenges of Multimodal Texts for Writing Centres in Higher Education. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 29(4), 387–399. Archer, A. (2010). Challenges and Potentials of Writing Centres in South African Tertiary Institutions. South African Journal of Higher Education, 24(4), 495–510. Archer, A., & Breuer, E.O. (Eds.). (2015). Multimodality in Writing. In Rijlaarsdam, G. & Olive, T. (Series Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 30, Leiden: Brill. Archer, A., & Newfield, D. (2014). Challenges and Opportunities of Multimodal Approaches to Education in South Africa. In Archer, A. & Newfield, D. (Eds.), Multimodal Approaches to Research and Pedagogy: Recognition, Resources and Access (pp. 1–18). London and New York: Routledge. Bayne, S., & Ross, J. (2013). Posthuman Literacy in Heterotopic Space: A Pedagogical Proposal. In Goodfellow, R. & Lea, M. (Eds.), Literacy in the Digital University: Critical Perspectives on Learning, Scholarship and Technology (pp. 95–110). London: Routledge.

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Berkenkotter, C., & Huckin, T.N. (1995). Genre Knowledge in Disciplinary Communication: Cognition, Culture, Power. Hillsdale, nj: Lawrence Erlbaum. Bezemer, J., & Jewitt, C. (2010). Multimodal Analysis: Key Issues. In Litosseliti, L. (Ed.), Research Methods in Linguistics (pp. 180–197). London: Continuum. Bhatia, V.K. (1993). Analysing Genre: Language Use in Professional Settings. London: Longman. Bhatia, V.K. (2002). A Generic View of Academic Discourse. In Flowerdew, J. (Ed.), Academic Discourse (pp. 21–39). Harlow: Pearson Education. Bhatia, V.K. (2004). Worlds of Written Discourse: A Genre-Based View. London: Continuum International. Bhatia, V.K. (2010). Interdiscursivity in Professional Communication. Discourse and Communication, 21(1), 32–50. Breuer, E.O. (2013). Die integrierte Vermittlung von Schreibkompetenzen in Fachseminaren [The Integrated Teaching of Writing Competency in Seminar Courses]. JoSch: Journal der Schreibberatung [ Journal of Writing Consultancy], 6, 77–86. Breuer, E.O. (2011, January). Wissenschaftliches Schreiben—die Sicht der Studierenden [Academic Writing—The Students’ View]. Paper presented at the LiKom, Bielefeld. Clyne, M. (1994). Inter-Cultural Communication at Work: Cultural Values in Discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Coulmas, F. (2003). Writing Systems. An Introduction to their Linguistic Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Dufrenne, M. (1963). Language and Philosophy. Translated by Henry B. Veatch. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Egbert, J. (2015). Publication Type and Discipline Variation in Published Academic Writing: Investigating Statistical Interaction in Corpus Data. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics, 20(1), 1–29. Fransman, J. (2012). Re-Imagining the Conditions of Possibility of a PhD thesis. In Andrews, R., Borg, E., Boyd Davis, S., Domingo, M. & England, J. (Eds), The sage Handbook of Digital Dissertations and Theses (pp. 138–156). London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi, Singapore: sage. Galtung, J. (1981). Structure, Culture, and Intellectual Style: An Essay Comparing Saxonic, Teutonic, Gallic and Nipponic Approaches. Social Science Information, 20(6), 817–856. Halliday, M.A.K. (1975). Learning How to Mean. London: Edwald Arnold. Halliday, M.A.K. (1994). An Introduction to Functional Grammar (2nd edition). London: Edward Arnold. Halliday, M.A.K. (2003). On Language and Linguistics. Edited by Webster, J. London: continuum. Hyland, K. (2004). Genre and Second Language Writing. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.

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Jewitt, C. (Ed.). (2009). The Routledge Handbook of Multimodal Analysis. London: Routledge. Jewitt, C. (Ed.). (2014). The Routledge Handbook of Multimodal Analysis (2nd edition). Oxon: Oxford University Press. Kashiha, H. and Chan, S.H. (2014). Cross-Linguistic and Cross-Disciplinary Investigation of Lexical Bundles in Academic Writing. Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences & Humanities, 22(4), 937–951. Kress, G. (2012). Researching in Conditions of Provisionality: Reflecting on the PhD in the Digital and Multimodal Era. In Andrews, R., Borg, E., Boyd Davis, S., Domingo, M. & England, J. (Eds.), The sage Handbook of Digital Dissertations and Theses (pp. 245– 259). London: Sage. Kress, G. (2010). A Social Semiotic Approach to Contemporary Communication. London, New York: Routledge. Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the New Media Age. London, New York: Routledge. Kress, G. (2009). Assessment in the Perspective of a Social Semiotic Theory of Multimodal Teaching and Learning. In Wyatt-Smith, C. & Cumming, J.J. (Eds.), Educational Assessment in the 21st century: Connecting Theory and Practice (pp. 19–43). London, New York: Springer. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal Discourse: The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication. London: Arnold. Lillis, T., & Curry, M.J. (2010). Academic Writing in a Global Context: The Politics and Practices of Publishing in English. London and New York: Routledge. Lim, F.V. (2004). Developing an Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model. In O’Halloran, K.L. (Ed.), Multimodal Discourse Analysis (pp. 220–246). London: Continuum. Martin, J.R. (1993). A Contextual Theory of Language. In Cope, B. & Kalantzis, M. (Eds.), The Powers of Literacy—a Genre Approach to Teaching Writing (pp. 116–136). Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press. Martin, J.R., Christie, F., & Rothery, J. (1987). Social Processes in Education: A Reply to Sawyer, Watson and Others. In Reid, I. (Ed.), The Place of Genre in Language: Current Debates (pp. 55–58). Geelong: Deakin University Press. Miller, C.R. (1994). The Cultural Basis of Genre. In Freedman, A. & Medway, P. (Eds.), Genre and the New Rhetoric (pp. 67–78). London: Taylor and Francis. Ravelli, L., Paltridge, B., Starfield, S., & Tuckwell, K. (2013). Extending the Notion of ‘Text’: The Visual and Performing Arts Doctoral Thesis. Visual Communication, 12, 395–422. Sharples, M. (1999). How We Write. Writing as Creative Design. London and New York: Routledge. Siepmann, D. (2006). Academic Writing and Culture: An Overview of Differences between English, French and German. Meta l1, 1, 131–150. Street, B. (1996). Academic Literacies. In Baker, D., Clay, J., & Fox, C. (Eds.), Challenging

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Ways of Knowing in Maths, Science and English (pp. 101–134). Brighton, Philadelphia: Falmer. Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre Analysis. English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Swales, J., & Feak, C.B. (1994). Academic Writing for Graduate Students: Essential Tasks and Skills: A Course for Nonnative Speakers of English. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Thesen, L. (2014). Risk as Productive: Working with Dilemmas in the Writing of Research. In Thesen, L., & Cooper, L. (Eds.), Risk in Academic Writing. Postgraduate students, their teachers and the making of knowledge (pp. 1–26). Bristol, Buffalo, Toronto: Multilingual Matters. Thesen, L. (2007). Breaking the Frame: Lectures, Ritual and Academic Literacies. Journal of Applied Linguistics 4(1), 33–53. Yakhontova, T. (2002). ‘Selling’ or ‘Telling’? The Issue of Cultural Variation in Research Genre. In John Flowerdew (Ed.), Academic Discourse (pp. 216–232). Harlow: Pearson Education. Yeng, S., Lin, T., & Lin, Y.-F. (1990). The n-Dimensional Pythagorean Theorem. Linear and Multilinear Algebra, 26(1–2), 9–13.

part 1 Multimodality in Academia

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chapter 1

Ploughing the Field of Higher Education: An Interview with Gunther Kress Anders Björkvall

Introduction Professor Gunther Kress is one of the international leading researchers in the fields of multimodality, social semiotics, discourse analysis, genre studies and education. He has published widely in these fields, and has a new book out in 2016: Multimodality, learning and communication: A social semiotic frame (written together with Jeff Bezemer). Kress has supervised more than 60 PhD researchers over the years, an experience that he draws upon in the chapter ‘Researching in conditions of provisionality: Reflecting on the PhD in the digital and multimodal era’ (2012). Anders Björkvall met up with him in London in order to discuss a number of topics, ranging from the broader challenges of higher education today to the relation between theory and methodology in the PhD.

Interview Anders Björkvall (ab): You have experience of academic life in a number of countries over a long period of time, both as a leading researcher in your field and in terms of PhD supervision. In your view, what are the main challenges facing higher education at present? Gunther Kress (gk): In German there is a word called ‘Umbruch’. When you are ploughing the field, the plough turns the earth over. I think we are in the period of ‘Umbruch’. Things are changing in a significant way, and things that have been underneath and not really looked at are now surfacing. For instance, how

Björkvall, A. (2016). Chapter 1. Ploughing the Field of Higher Education: An Interview with Gunther Kress. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 21–30). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_003

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should knowledge be defined? What is knowledge? Things which have been regarded as tacit and implicit, simply things which have not been attended to, should now be the focus of attention in the academic enterprise. That will be one challenge. The second one is that the ‘social’ is changing dramatically as part of this ‘Umbruch’. The academic disciplines which we have now were responses to problems of the 19th century. The problems of the 19th century sort of persisted into the 20th century, but are now being overtaken rapidly by new kinds of problems. In other words, the question of securely placing doctoral work, for instance, in one discipline has for the last 40 years, at least, become increasingly problematic. It is marked by phenomena such as, in the 70s, centres within departments, multi-disciplinary centres, then cross-disciplinary or trans-disciplinary centres. Those are, for me, symptoms of something that is no longer working. And now, of course, the big research organisations force academic institutions into not just trans-disciplinary work, but also into the wider world, the professional business world. So, these changes are all having effects on what a PhD is, what it should be, what it can be, and what it needs to be. As a consequence of this, a third challenge is that the notion of agency is changing, and agency not only of those who have always assumed to have agency, but of the lonely PhD researcher. How is she, increasingly, or he, assuming to have agency, and how is that expressed in the PhD? All of this leads to generic changes. The genre of the PhD is no longer secure; the purposes of the PhD are no longer secure. Here, in London, the PhD is still ‘a contribution to knowledge’, although that is beginning to be so weakly present now; the PhD is beginning to be a certification of competence in certain forms of conducting research. Add to that a fourth challenge: out of the 60 odd PhD researchers whom I have seen successfully to completion over the last 20 years, I would say 60 % came from outside the uk, so there is a huge cultural difference. And I would say that at least 40% came from outside an Anglophone background. Therefore, there is a whole question of epistemologies and maybe even ontologies of somebody who speaks a non Indo-European language and, therefore, sees the world differently—no matter how good their English. ab: Would you say that it is still possible to hold on to a type of core content in any given academic discipline, say English or Scandinavian Languages, or are we past that type of disciplinary demarcation?

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gk: First of all, the question of what English is as a university subject, and as a school subject, and how it changes is important: What is the function of English in schools and what is the function of Scandinavian Languages— what are we preparing young people for? And here, for me, this question of ‘Umbruch’ is again crucial. Maybe 40 years ago, or maybe even less, we prepared young people in the Scandinavian countries, or in England, for a seemingly secure place in the economy and the social organisation of their country. What is England now? The United Kingdom is increasingly disunited. So, these kinds of social movements are inevitably going to be reflected in what the questions are for somebody in Scandinavian Studies, or Languages or Linguistics, as to what their subject is. ab: Multimodality in education is sometimes described as something desirable (not the least in New Literacy Studies), but is there reason for saying that some realms in higher education should remain dominated by writing? Say, for instance, that it was possible to dance one’s PhD thesis instead of presenting it in writing—what would be the gains and losses? gk: What are the things we need to protect or might like to protect, and how would we do it? We have been taught, or told, or have accepted, that language, and maybe writing, is the finest achievement of humanity, so therefore it is only when something is represented in the linguistic form and in written form it can count as knowledge to be taken seriously. Well, I think that is nonsense. Because when you watch surgeons operating, a lot of what they are doing is not written anywhere, it is not even spoken about, it is actually acquired in action, in the action with others. So, this notion about the tacit and the implicit is a kind of a whole new area, which needs to be explored, and that is a question about what we count as knowledge. That is the question for me, what are the best means for doing what it is we want to do? In the 1980s, when I was dean in a faculty that was about media studies and cultural studies and media production and cultural production, and the people who were teaching radio studies or film studies, or film makers could not get promotion because, you know, they did not write PhDs, they did not even write academic articles, but they might have made extremely interesting documentaries or films. Then I thought to myself, if you make a very interesting documentary, are you extending the horizons of understanding in that particular field? Or with a film? Or a novel? Does a novel extend our understanding?

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ab: So the answer would be ‘yes’ then, you think that we should be able to dance our PhD if we can make the argument that this is the most apt way of representing the kind of knowledge that we are interested in representing? gk: You could ask, should somebody who is an absolutely outstanding ballet dancer be excluded from the possibility of being recognised as being outstanding in her or his understanding of what ballet is and how it functions, unless they could write about it. In fact, most mixed PhDs are still clean of that; you can have a little video or a cd rom with that stuff, but you must have your 40,000 words of something. And that seems to me the field before the plough. ab: When PowerPoint entered academic life, many embraced it, while others were a bit reluctant. How would you say that PowerPoint has affected meaning making, teaching and learning in seminar rooms and lecture halls? I am thinking, for instance, about the epistemological consequences of going from the linear principles of semiotic organisation of speech and writing to the spatial organisation of PowerPoint. gk: You will have seen any number of different kinds of PowerPoint presentations; those where a person more or less reads from his or her script what is already on the slide; okay, that is one thing. But that is still different to the person simply reading extremely boringly the script, because, in the first case, there is another means of accessing what is going on. I, for instance, could not give a talk without PowerPoint, because I want the people in the audience to see what this image looks like, and what colour means there, and how the drawn part compliments, or is complemented by, or whatever, is paralleled by … I could not speak it; it is impossible. What that shows, of course, is that PowerPoint is opening the door to an understanding that language, whether spoken or written, is always partial. Now, some people use PowerPoint in the most kind of facile and terrible fashion, and some people use it very, very interestingly, and kind of change, as you say, the logic of the presentation from the strictly sequential. Talk is epistemologically, I think, and maybe ontologically different to seeing. I mean, hearing is different to seeing, and talking is different to showing, ontologically and epistemologically. So, you are actually expanding the range of means of accessing, or transcribing—I talk about modes as different means of transcribing the world—and PowerPoint expands the range of transcription of the world.

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ab: Do you think that multimodal pedagogies could in any way open up our universities to groups that previously had less access to them? Are there certain disciplines in higher education that are more open to multimodal means of communication and multimodal ways of learning than others? gk: I met Arlene Archer, one of the co-editors of this book, when she came here shortly after the transition in South Africa. She had to teach engineers with the means which they brought, which were not necessarily written at all. Of course, they would have had spoken means, but they also had means of having threedimensional or drawn kinds of things, and that was the basis for her PhD study. It was an attempt to say: in this South Africa we have many cultures, and people come with very different kinds of resources into higher education. We should attempt to understand what these resources are capable of doing. Power is of enormous significance, of course, and what mode has most power assigned to it. Somebody who comes here from, say, East Asia or from Africa with very different ontological orientations, comes here in part to get access to still powerful ontologies. And that kind of thing, that happens globally, of course, happens locally too. Bangladeshi parents in the East End of London want their children to get access to the resources, which confirm or lend or lead to power. ab: That is written English then, right? gk: Exactly. So all of that, I think, has to be the frame for that kind of recognition of different resources. And then, I think, comes the question: is Physics, or is Chemistry, best represented in the way we have always done? Of course, Chemistry has its formulae and Physics has its forms of expression, which are not spoken or written necessarily. The questions are: What is it we are actually teaching? And how is it best represented? At that point I would make a distinction between curriculum and pedagogy. For me, the curriculum should be modally apt, or multimodally apt. So, your question about dancing the PhD: there might be forms where the written will continue to be significant because I think certain forms of literary representations I would like to see continue. ab: Human life is by definition multimodal, but in higher education this multimodal nature is often restricted by the physical and virtual spaces in which academic activities take place. For instance, many virtual learning environments still have a skeuomorphic design, resembling traditional environments such as the classroom, drawing on representations of a library, the printed book,

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the teacher’s desk and so on. What do you envisage for the future in terms of physical and digital sites for learning in higher education? How do the spaces and places for learning in higher education need to be designed in order to make them relevant for students and teachers of tomorrow? gk: My brief answer would be, I do not know. But my other answer would be that I would attempt to ask, again, this question of the West versus the world, because my 1930s desk in my office, representing the teacher, may not work in another culture. In other words, these are very specific, to use a term that I do not usually use, symbols. We have to bear in mind that with a move to the virtual environments, we are moving to a projected ‘social’, which is not anchored in national semiotic histories. The other thing we are moving to, which I think is very important and which you will have seen in Sweden and in Stockholm I am sure, is that we get a lot of students from China. When they come here they may be uncomfortable with what I attempt to do as a means of making them feel at home. They bring with them notions of social relations which are completely unalike to the kind of social relation which I think ought to obtain between higher education students—whether PhD or undergraduate level—and academics. In other words, we are now dealing with a ‘social’ which is no longer certain: What should I do? What are the kinds of social models behind that, which should inform us about pedagogies? My sense is that the first step is to really understand that question. Pedagogy is actually, for me, the naming of social relations in environments of learning. How can I make that such that it is globally acceptable? What would an equitable global education pedagogy be about? My answer to that is that it is a complete re-thinking of the position of the learner. My sense of communication is that communication happens when there is interpretation. The learning–teaching situation is one of communication. It fails or does not fail whether there is interpretation or not. In other words, it rests on the action of the learner. And I think that is the case whether I am in a Confucian system, where the power relations are different, or whether I am in a kind of a Western system, where the power relations are different. So I would start from that. ab: Well, I guess there are ways to design more open environments for learning. For instance, in a virtual learning environment it would be possible to hand over the power to design the learning environment to teachers and students in

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a more ad hoc way, so to speak. I guess the same would be possible in lecture halls and seminar rooms. gk: I would want, again, to really examine: What is it that I want to achieve? I think communication is not the sender and receiver model—the shared code which we absolutely cannot assume anymore. Or the power of the sender as against the lesser power or agency of the receiver. So, I would say, let us start with assuming that, for communication to have happened, the interpretation by the learner is central. Does that do away with the role of teacher? No, it changes the role of teacher completely to a person who is absolutely more equipped to understand deeply varied, differentiated social relations. In Uppsala, in Sweden, there is this famous, old anatomy theatre. Of course, the anatomy theatre exists even today, a little bit more spread out and not circular, but it represents a hugely stable relation of teacher to student, and I think we are in a period where that hugely stable relation is changing. Not that the person who carried out the anatomy is not expert; she is expert, he is expert, but rather that the relation with the audience has changed in a profound way. ab: And in the long run, that will also change the design of the environments in higher education? gk: Yes, design is actually sign, and sign has to be motivated by the ‘social’ in which it exists. ab: We know that social semiotic frameworks can be helpful when trying to understand younger children’s meaning making and learning. Is that in any way different when we turn our focus to meaning making and learning in higher education? I am thinking of the motivated sign, for instance; is there a difference between understanding the motivated meaning making of a 4 yearold and that of a PhD student that needs to draw on the history of ideas and traditions in various academic disciplines in order to make meanings that are socially accepted in the academic context? gk: I think either the sign is motivated or it is not motivated. I think you cannot be a little bit pregnant; it is one thing or the other. I would not wish to have different theories of learning, or of sign making, or of meaning making for the 4 year-old, or the 40 year-old, or the in between. What I do think changes, of course, is that the life history of the 4 year-old is very different from the life history of a 14 or 24 or 40 year-old and with that comes an experience of very

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different kinds of environments and what those environments offer, and what those environments offered for the person by way of resources to make herself or himself as a social subject. These resources become part of what we call identity, and so the 4 year-old has lesser resources than the 40 year-old, but when I, at my ripe old age, go to France and speak there, I have less resources and I make use of the lesser resources to attempt to express the meanings. We have a deep misunderstanding, for instance, about lexis. We think words are signs, but words are signifiers; words are means for making new signs. So, in France, I am constantly aware that I use French signifiers to express things which my interloculars—you can see the supressed smiles of amusement— interpret, because they want communication to happen; they are willing to do the work of interpretation. I think, let us say, the 18 or 19 year-old or the 22 year-old who comes to do university work has already access to many resources. When she or he makes signs they enter into a world where new kinds of meanings are at issue, and these new kinds of meanings will eventually come with new kinds of resources, but they have to work their way into it. And as they work their way into it, they will use the resources which they have. I think the principle is not different. The environments, the conditions of power, the resources are very different; the principle is the same. ab: So what happens with convention in all of this? I guess that in order to become a legitimate actor in the academic context, you have to use the academic conventions as a sort of resource. gk: It is a resource, but with this notion of ‘Umbruch’. The reason why a lot of people have begun to use the notion of rhetoric again, including myself, is because in unstable social environments conventions disappear. You know, it is like these kind of car rallies from North Africa; suddenly you get to the Sahara and the road has disappeared. And I think convention is actually an expression, which comes from a period of relative semiotic stability where the exercise of power, not normally even noticed because it is very subtle, leads to a kind of agreement to do things in a certain way. But in a deeply multicultural world— a hugely diverse world—there are no such agreements. And, as you know, in Anglophone PhDs in many places you can now use the first person, ‘I’, which you could not do 25 years ago. So, what is that about? It is another symptom, or rather an effect, of those kinds of social changes.

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ab: Partially as a result of technological developments, but also, I assume, due to other changes in society, you have both observed and predicted a move from theory to methodologies in PhDs and, presumably, also in research in general. Which are the risks in applying methodologies that are less informed by theoretical consideration than what was previously the case? Is there a need for resistance from the academic community? gk: I do think that it is a problem, and I am aware, also, that it is a problem for me, but not for very many young academics. So, that makes me think that I am carrying the luggage of the past into the present. Therefore, I have a question to myself, exactly as you formulated it, related to gains and losses: What will we want to preserve? And is it the case that if I ask a question, or if somebody asks me to address a question in a research project, does that question arise out of nowhere? Does it just kind of rain down with lots of heavy showers, lots of research questions coming down, we pick some up, we do them. Actually, questions come out of specific environments, and I think that a theory is usually at the back of it, a kind of explicitly understood theory or an implicitly held theory is at the back of some kind of question. I think it is a move away from understanding histories and origins, and even short term: ‘What is the origin of this question?’ ab: Do you think that the shift from theory to methodology is more significant, or at least more visible, in the humanities than in disciplines such as Chemistry or Medicine, where methodology, presumably, has been more in focus? gk: I am not sure that method has been more in focus in those disciplines. If you are thinking about understanding how cancers work, it is not methodological. I think the denial of theory has, of course, ideological causes, and I do not think that you could do research into cancers of a particular kind without having a theory of what cell structures are like and how cells interact; you have to have a theory of that kind. ab: Then again, I assume that you can still find papers in the humanities that deal with theory, include one empirical example, and leave out other methodological issues. gk: I see myself as a peasant. I like to have my feet in the furrow, behind the plough, but look ahead where the horse is going, and perhaps look up a little bit and see, is it going to rain this afternoon, will I be able to plough this afternoon or not? I really want to keep my feet on the ground of what is the ‘social’. What

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are the social changes? How do they demand of me? So, a theory arises out of the questions that are posed in the ‘social’, but I think that method cannot do that. ab: Let us end with that ploughman metaphor; that is sort of where we started. Thank you so much for your time.

References Bezemer, J., & Kress, G. (2016). Multimodality, Learning and Communication: A Social Semiotic Frame. London: Routledge. Kress, G. (2012). ‘Researching in Conditions of Provisionality: Reflecting on the PhD in the Digital and Multimodal Era’. In Andrews, R., Borg, E., Boyd Davis, S., Domingo, M. & England, J. (Eds.), The sage Handbook of Digital Dissertations and Theses (pp. 245– 259). London: Sage.

chapter 2

The Past in the Present: Modes, Gaze and Changing Communicative Practices in Lectures Lucia Thesen

This chapter works with multimodality in historical perspective to analyse evolving practices in the lecture over the long term. This approach makes it possible to challenge the dominant view of lectures which are often critiqued for being out of step with current ideas about teaching and learning. While they are economical for delivery of mass higher education in that one expert has face-to-face contact with large numbers of students, they are at odds with contemporary ideas about student learning, which espouse participation and ‘critical thinking’ and downplay teacher authority. Bligh’s classic study, ‘What’s the use of lectures?’ concluded that “lectures can be used to teach information, including the framework of a subject, but an expository approach is unsuitable to stimulate thought or to change attitudes” (1971, 223). For Barnett, the lecture is an anachronism, “a refuge for the fainthearted, for both lecturers and students. It keeps channels of communication closed, freezes hierarchy between lecturer and student and removes any responsibility on the students to respond” (2000, 159). The resistance to looking systematically at the lecture is also fed by arguments in favor of the role of the new media (icts—information and communication technologies—and virtual learning environments) in higher education. Once again, the lecture becomes a symbol of ossified learning. On the Instructional Technology Forum, an information technology mailing list, a contributor dismisses the lecture: “Now that the lecture has fallen into disgrace as an instructional art form1 …”. A contributor on another chat forum2 asks, “How do we rid ourselves of this catastrophe?” The lecture is seen as a rigid space which fosters demonstrations of single authority, in contrast to potentially more egalThesen, L. (2016). Chapter 2. The Past in the Present: Modes, Gaze and Changing Communicative Practices in Lectures. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 31–52). Leiden: Brill. 1 http://it.coe.uga.edu/itforum, accessed 13th April 2006. 2 The ifets International Forum of Technology and Society.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_004

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itarian learner-centered spaces afforded by online learning. Yellowlees Douglas (2002), for example, asks what is lost by offering a course online, rather than in lecture form: “Absolutely nothing” (128). She argues that lectures have survived from their medieval antecedent because they are “cheap to produce, provide an easy means to control students, supply fodder for tests … accommodate scores of students to only one faculty member” (128). Whether for their architectural solidity or suitability for mass education, they persist, with raked benches that appear to tie students to fixed positions, subject to the canonical text of the podium speaker. For many, they appear to be in crisis, out of fashion, needed but not wanted, an inherited necessity that is very difficult to fill with contemporary educational meanings. In this chapter I argue instead that lectures offer a vivid canvas for understanding some of the more interesting, contradictory aspects of meaningmaking and authority in higher education, especially when looked at historically, with an interest in the interplay between modes (spoken and written language, gaze and image) and how these modes index changes in communicative practices. The chapter is framed by questions such as: how come the lecture has survived? What has changed, and what has remained the same? How can we read changing communicative practices in the lecture multimodally, attending to written and spoken language, image and gaze? And finally, what additional theoretical and methodological lenses assist with the analysis of the lecture over time? The last question is important, as multimodal analysis tends to be concerned with semiotic change in the relatively recent (post 1945) past. This chapter is part of a larger doctoral research project on changing communicative practices in lectures in a South African university (Thesen 2009a). The overall methodology for the doctoral study was textually oriented discourse analysis, within the broader project of critical discourse analysis (cda). I used Fairclough’s (2003) approach, which argues that discourse analysis is “best framed within ethnography” (15), and “should be seen as an open process which can be enhanced through dialogue across disciplines and theories, rather than a coding in the terms of an autonomous analytical framework or grammar” (16). The approach in this chapter on the history of lectures is ‘text expanding’, looking at broad historical practices rather than ‘text reducing’ (Titscher et al 2000, 167), an approach used in parts of the larger study (Thesen 2007, 2009b). For this chapter, I analyse images of lectures (paintings, engravings and photographs) which seem to me to be emblematic of a historical moment: they are representations that tell us about arrangements in lectures, but also show the way they were seen at the time. These images are indicators of prevailing discourses that both reflect what lectures were like,

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and construct the discourses around the multimodal genre of the lecture in a particular time and place. In some cases I have chosen the images from scholarly works such as Clark (2006) which analyses changing academic practices, including the lecture, over time. I am trusting the link Clark has established between the image and the historical point he is making about the materiality of academic practices at the time. The images enable us to explore the represented arrangements between human and non-human elements (spatial arrangements and media such as books, notes, screens) and from these to infer the use of modes. Other images come from internet-based image searches and are thus the products of a quest for correspondence between my emerging reading of the typical arrangements of the time, and images that match this mental picture. In the earlier doctoral project, I was mainly interested in the affordances of lectures for doing identity work in humanities disciplines in a rapidly changing university in post-apartheid South Africa. The research (Thesen 2007, 2009a, 2009b) showed that lectures are far from dead: they offer students from different lifeworlds a rich site in which to take up positions on academic identity and authority. I saw lectures as important sites of co-presence where young people previously kept apart by the crude and brutal logic of the apartheid regime, could participate in a ‘contact zone’ (Pratt 1992) and make sense of how their histories brought them to this shared presence in the post-apartheid university. Multimodal discourse analysis became an important tool to unlock what lectures, beyond the written language, do and mean in the lives of young people entering higher education. However, multimodal discourse analysis proved to be limited for the analysis of the longer history of the lecture, to help explain why, in spite of all the negativity, the lecture is still here 800 years later. It is thus also limited in helping us understand why the lecture also has an interesting future. It is certainly not frozen or redundant, as shown by innovations such as podcasts and moocs (Massive online open courses) in higher education, and the popularity of forms such as ted Talks outside of the academy, where engaging speakers can be viewed online. Lectures are far from dead: they are a highly malleable and flexible genre. Their persistence can be explained by this flexibility and unique affordance of bringing together both textual and embodied authority in the living present. New tools are needed to understand their persistence— tools that neither dismiss history nor elevate the present, without lectures, as inevitably better or more progressive and participation-friendly than the past.

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Text-Expanding Discourse Analysis: Modes and the Shifting Gaze I am critical of the absence of history in textually-oriented approaches to university communicative practices, which frequently collapse history into the category of ‘context’ (Blommaert 2005). A narrow tracing of ‘the new’ in well resourced ‘first world’ contexts, with the historical dimension carried in constructs like ‘intertextuality’ (Fairclough 1992, 1999) does not account for the long histories in which structures of authority have come to take particular forms. Blommaert warns that “we need to take history seriously, for part of the critical punch of what we do may ultimately lie in our capacity to show that what looks new is not new at all, but the outcome of a particular process which is systemic, not accidental” (37). I trace what Blommaert (127–128, citing Braudel 1981) calls ‘layered simultaneity’ in what appears to be the present (synchronisation) there are traces of different orders of the past: the longue duree (the long term, slow time of invisible transformation—structural time which is not available to individuals in moments of sense-making); intermediate time of ‘long cyclical patterns’ (127), of for example, the middle ages, colonialism, capitalism or the enlightenment, which cut across local experiences and often link people globally; and lastly event time. The interaction between these different orders of the past is experienced in complex and often contradictory ways in contemporary institutions in both centre and periphery locations. These layers enable us in southern Africa to be part of the universal while at the same time being firmly rooted in ‘southern’ conditions and politics. The emphasis in this chapter is on being part of the global story about lectures, rather than on the particular situatedness of the lecture in southern Africa. Using secondary sources and images, I explore changes and continuities in communicative practices in lectures, with an emphasis on modes—spoken and written language, and the gaze. Communicative practices are patterns of communication that involve both interaction and representation. The term communicative practices is chosen instead of literacy practices, as the latter is generally associated with writing and its role in the university (Lillis and Scott, 2007). Modes are central to multimodal social semiotic theory, but deciding what constitutes a mode is by no means straight-forward. As Kress 2010 puts it, “modes are the product jointly of the potentials inherent in the material and of the culture’s selection from the bundle of aspects of these potentials and the shaping over time by (members of) a society of the features selected” (2010, 80–81). Thus analytical questions about modes—what they are and what they do in particular settings—make up an important part of the intellectual project of multimodal social semiotics. More significant than individual modes is the way they work together through multimodal ensembles (Kress 2010, 162–

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169) that constitute (in this case) the genre of the lecture. A microanalysis of a lecture event reveals how different modes such as gesture, image, spoken and written language are foregrounded and backgrounded in sequentially unfolding patterns that create a recognisable whole. As Bateman puts it, multimodal genres are “constituted of collections of rhetorical strategies deploying the semiotic modes provided by the medium within which the communication is being enacted” (2008, cited in the mode Glossary of multimodal terms). Although very difficult to define,3 the concept of medium is also relevant in this study, as carriers or organisers of modes under analysis. It is important in two senses: as the texts (painting, engraving or photograph) that I analyse, and also as represented frames, or carriers of messages. Thus writing as a mode would be different in the medium of a printed book, or as a Powerpoint presentation on screen, or handwritten in a student’s notebook. Spoken language would be produced and received differently via the media of live lecturing, as opposed to audio or video recording. The interplay between writing and speaking (modes) with their carriers of media such as the book, notebook, screen and embodied performance, is particularly interesting when analysing lectures in historical perspective. As I will show later, the lecture has always been a space for creative interplay between modes of spoken and written language. Gaze is also a key mode in public space. The gaze provides a way of tracing power effects in visual texts. Gaze can be understood in quite a narrow technical way, as “the direction of orientation that people display through the position of their head, notably their eyes, in relation to their environment”. (https://multimodalityglossary.wordpress.com/gaze/). This orientation is used as a means to read power and authority by analysing the way the gaze works in representations of lectures (who looks at whom, or what, in what way). Kress and van Leeuwen (1996) use the gaze to analyse power in interaction between viewer and what is represented, as well as between elements that are represented. So a gaze that looks down suggests asymmetry between participants. While Kress and van Leeuwen (1996, 2001) have focused on the profound shifts in recent history—the ‘turn to the visual’ since the mid-20th century—I wish here to draw from a much longer evolution of the lecture to illustrate the discursive patterns and practices in which the lecture is situated, a history where long 3 In some of the earlier work on social semiotic multimodality (e.g. Kress et al 2001) medium is seen as the raw material out of which modes are shaped. Other researchers such as Friesen who are working in multimedia education, tend to use the term to mean something closer to artefact (e.g. book, computer, screen, overhead projector), and don’t distinguish medium from mode.

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cyclical patterns were interrupted, emblematised by the slow but profound shift that Clark (2006) calls the ‘triumph of the eye over the ear’, as technologies of record overshadowed communicative practices in which the spoken word was central. Here I am using gaze as a bigger concept to lift it out into a more abstract notion of discourse in for example Kress’s (1985) classic definition of discourse, which borrows from Foucault: discourses are “systematically organized sets of statements that give expression to the meanings and values of an institution. Beyond that they define, describe and delimit what it is possible to say and not possible to say (and by extension—what it is possible and not possible to do) with respect to the area of concern of that institution” (6). Here the interest is in the subtle often invisible, internalised embodiments of disciplinary power and how subjectivity is constituted through an internalisation of authority relations forgotten as history. I will show that an analysis of gaze in the lecture gives a rich illustration of how modes are shaped over time and how they are caught up in what it is possible to say or do in practices at particular historical times. In taking the concepts of mode and particularly gaze back, further away from the contemporary communicative situation, deep into the origins of the university in antiquity, I draw on Foucault’s notion of ‘spectacle’ or ‘many to few’, the typical gaze of antiquity, the social arrangements reflected in the design of architectural spaces for sacred and secular expression of public life (1977, 216). I will also show how, if we move from the medieval university with its elevated, church-like lecture podium, to the enlightenment, the lecture reflects a shift from the ‘many to few’ gaze of antiquity to the ‘one to many’ gaze of modern institutions, in which an expert or authority can see everyone; the gaze has been reversed from spectacle to surveillance in which all participants in an event can be seen. With this shift from spectacle to surveillance, individuals begin to hold themselves to account in the absence of higher religious authority, to internalise the ‘cop in the head’; we monitor our thoughts and actions in relation to the growing role of the state. As pointed out earlier, while broad historical shifts can be discerned, there are never clean breaks, but rather overlapping functions that give the university, and at its core the lecture, its adaptability. The oral does not disappear: its relationship to the written is adjusted. It is more about foregrounding and backgrounding than replacing either speaking or writing. At the level of modes, Clark’s long history of material practices in the changing university shows how, with an epistemic shift which he calls ‘the triumph of the eye over the ear’ (2006, 13), material practices that favoured the visible and legible (reading, writing and recording) gradually displaced the predominantly oral, memorial culture of the medieval university. This modal shift is also

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described in Kruse (2006), in relation to the origins and growing importance of writing in the university. Kruse shows how the seminar enters the university, driving a wedge between the medieval and the modern institution. This advent of the seminar, the signature communicative event of the Humboldtian research university, brings with it a new function to the university: research. Whereas in the medieval university, collaborative knowledge was furthered through oral exchange, after the modernisation of universities that emerged in Germany in the 19th century, a break was made with the pedagogic function of handing down knowledge mainly in the oral form. Writing becomes the mode and site for producing knowledge generated by the research seminar, rather than handing it down from higher ecclesiastical authority via the lecture. Kruse’s work is also a reminder not to isolate the lecture from other evolving spaces such as the seminar. Within this changing picture, the lecture plays an important role that helps to explain its endurance to this day. Friesen (2011) stresses the mediating possibilities in lectures, as a ‘transmedial pedagogical form’: the lecture is “most effectively understood as bridging oral communication with writing rather than being a purely spoken form that is superseded by textual, digital or other mediatic forms” (96, original emphasis). He shows that pedagogical and technological change in education is not successive, but cumulative: “Instead of being replaced or rendered obsolete, the lecture, with its oral roots, is complemented, augmented, and reconfigured through changes in textual technologies” (101). Friesen does not speak of modes, but of media and their relationship to epistemology: he shows how the lecture has accommodated shifting pedagogies from the memorial, predominantly oral transmission and preservation of authoritative scarce text, to the performative authority of the lecturer, with text as background. Contemporary lecture audiences value what Goffman calls ‘a fresh talk illusion’ (1981, 171): lecturers work off written text, which are in part memorised, but generally read aloud, “And in reading aloud, what the lecturer strives to create is the illusion of spontaneity and extemporaneity” (Friesen 2011, 99). Thus modes and media are not seen in isolation, but always in relation to one another. This is true in a double sense: media help realise modes, and different modes must always be looked at in relationship to one another. The written language in books, and spoken language in live conversation work together to allow new forms to evolve. Lectures are not ossified throwbacks to the past, but become fertile ground for integration and experimentation with a wide variety of modes, media and their associated social practices. In the rest of this chapter, a chronology of the lecture is presented in broad brushstrokes. It begins by establishing a link to the university as a flexible

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institution that has been responsive to changing contexts and contradictory functions. Emblematic images illustrate how the lecture space has enabled changing communicative practices from the oral and memorial culture of the medieval university, through to the enlightenment emphasis on legibility, selfregulation and the written word. In the contemporary well-resourced university the projector and laptop screen play an important role, but the strands that favour oral performance that went underground in the birth of the research university in early modern Germany are still present. This helps us to account for the ambiguity in the lecture, the tension between rigidity and strongly coded authority on the one hand, and meanings related to the theatre and performance on the other. The latter meanings are available, but are often suppressed.

Dynamic Systems and Contradictory Functions One of the striking things about lectures is that they have remained a key teaching space in higher education over a very long period. Lecture theatres, along with universities as institutions, appear to be remarkably enduring. It is only in the elite universities with the college system and pedagogy based on individual tutors, that they have not been the dominant pedagogical space. The history of the lecture is inevitably tied to that of the university; while much of the detail has changed, universities have always been what Castells calls ‘dynamic systems of contradictory functions’ (2001) including the generation and transmission of ideology, selection and formation of dominant elites, production and application of knowledge, and training of a skilled labour force. 210

In the western European historiography of what came to be called the university, higher education has its origins in schools in urban communities (Bologna and Paris) where students and teachers were granted certain privileges and liberties in the 12th century (Ruegg 1992). Ruegg acknowledges the many influences that flowed into the medieval university, including Islamic schools of learning, which shaped its organizational arrangements. From these early stadia generale, influenced by traditions in antiquity and the early Christian church of St Augustin, as well as Islam, emerged the lecture-based pedagogy that has been central to universities for the past 900 or so years. Perkin’s history of universities summarises this process as follows:

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Only in Europe from the 12th century onwards did an autonomous, permanent, corporate institution of higher learning emerge and survive, in varying degrees, to the present day […] In the interstices of power the university could find a modestly secure niche, and play off one authority [e.g. king v archbishop] against another. Unintentionally, it evolved into an immensely flexible institution, able to adapt to almost any political situation and form of society. In this way it was able to migrate, eventually, to every country and continent in the world. 1997, 3

Perkin outlines the striking way in which universities outlived the medieval world that had brought them into being. They helped argue against that world during the Reformation, adjusting later to the priorities of the Industrial Revolution, while at the same time making contributions to successive waves of colonization in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, as well as to the struggles for freedom from colonial rule of many of these colonized countries. Since the Second World War, it has become the ‘key institution’ in the transition from elite to mass higher education (4).

Lectio and disputatio in the Medieval University In the medieval university, scholastic practices revolved around Latin as the medium of instruction, with a rigid pattern of delivery, in which there were two basic types of exercise, the lecture (lectio) and the disputation (disputatio). In the lecture, the master read out of an assigned canonical text which was explained in sections. The aim was to acquaint the audience with key texts and make sure they passed down through the generations. In the disputation, material from the key texts introduced in the lecture was applied and refined through oral debate conducted according to Aristotelian logic. With constant references to the ‘authorities’, particular cases or theses were established, defended or refuted in the interests of developing a consistent body of knowledge, a ‘higher truth’. (See Schwinges, 1992, for a general description). In the pedagogy there is thus a dual energy, one (lectio) concerned with memory and the other (disputatio) with movement, through subjecting knowledge to the examination of pros and cons. Clark (2006) observes that “Ecclesiastical elements inform the lecture, while juridical or judicial etiquettes imbue the disputation” (75–76). This image below (figure 2.1), a painting by Laurentinus de Voltolina in the late 14th century, is emblematic of the lectio situation. The similarities between

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figure 2.1 A lecture hall in 14th century Bologna (c. 1380). It is emblematic of the early medieval lecture situation, with raised chair in a sacred space. The artist is Laurentinus de Voltolina, and the lecturer is understood to be Heinrich of Germany.

this and the contemporary lecture are striking. There is the authoritative chair in the centre front. There are serried rows, differing levels of attention (with some students on the margins talking or falling asleep). Student boredom, or uneven attention, appears to have a very long history. Those in the front have their texts out, following the lecture, while those behind (presumably poorer) do not have books. To my eyes, there are two marked differences between this representation and the current situation. The first is that the podium is elevated, suggesting an ecclesiastical and legal space. The lecturer is raised above the audience, and the artist has depcted him with his gaze directed on the level, and slightly upward, as if focused on the higher authority of the church, and the lecturer’s role as mediator of sacred knowledge. This perspective gives the opportunity for the artist to emphasise the height of the chair. From this elevated seat the lecturer could look out of the window on to a view of trees, gardens and meadows, as ‘viewing nature strengthens memory’ (Clark’s paraphrase of an early 13th century description of the ideal lecture hall, 2006, 69).

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The relationships between lecturer and students in this image represent a profound underlying pattern that characterized pre-modern public space. This gaze of ‘many to few’, what Foucault calls spectacle, the typical pattern of antiquity, the social arrangement to which ‘the architecture of temples, theatres and circuses responded’ (1977, 216–217). [This is discussed later in this chapter, where this concept of spectacle is compared with philosopher Guy Debord’s notion of spectacle, and used to refer to contemporary mediadriven ‘second hand’ views of reality]. The second difference is that, on close inspection, the literacy arrangements, while appearing to be similar, also differ from contemporary practices. While some students have books, no-one (apart perhaps from the person in the front, to the lecturer’s left) appears to be taking notes. The next section pauses briefly on each of these differences. Reflecting on the marked differences between this representation and the current situation, it is noted that the elevated chair reflects the juridico-ecclesiastical underpinnings of the university in medieval Europe. The seat conveyed the legitimate power of the authorized speaker. Like the bishop who was entitled to occupy this chair in order to pronounce with authority, a lecturer like Heinrich of Germany (shown in this image) was qualified to occupy the chair, and to read and interpret (in this case theological) canonical texts. The literacy practices also differ from more recent arrangements. While this pedagogy was strongly centered on the medium of the book, it was embedded in a predominantly oral culture, in which keeping texts alive depended on oral dissemination beyond the university, through the law and the church. The focus on books was as much to do with their scarcity as their status in the method. In this image, the manuscripts are not printed, but handwritten on paper. Some writers (for example Fischer 2003) see the invention of the printing press in the mid 1400s as a turning point in literacy and consciousness, while others such as Carruthers (1990) point out that while the increase in the availability of books in the late middle ages was important, this shift in technology was less significant than the memorial culture in which technologies of both parchment and eventually paper were embedded for a very long period of time. By stressing the continuities she questions the distinction between orality and literacy that writers such as literacy anthropologist Street (1984) and South African social historian Hofmeyr (1993) have argued strongly against, urging us to look closely at the interface between writing and speaking in particular contexts.

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figure 2.2 A seventeenth-century image of a lecture hall used for both lecture and disputation at Leipzig. This image is used by Clark (2006) to represent the birth of the early modern research university in Germany. The student body language, suggestive of deep engagement with lecture note taking, illustrates the birth of a work ethic.

‘The Triumph of the Eye over the Ear’: The Demise of the Disputation The next image of a lecture hall in Leipzig, Germany (figure 2.2), is used by Clark to make his compelling argument that in the early modern era (about 1500 to 1800, from the Renaissance to the enlightenment) there was a gradual but profound shift which saw the triumph of the eye over the ear (2006, 13) as material practices that favoured the visible and legible (writing and recording) took over the predominantly oral, memorial ethos of the university. Clark (following Foucault 1977 and others who focus on the relationships between epistemology and material practices) calls these material practices an ‘arsenal of little tools’ such as lists, timetables and graphs, which displaced the role of oral narrative (19). Interestingly, this lecture space would have been used for both lectures and disputations, though the image is of a lecture. As with figure 1, the chair is still elevated, and the authorized lecturer still reads from a book. The main difference is that the body language of the students indicates intense focus on a new form of written language: lecture note-taking. Unlike the

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books in figure 2.1, these would be blank. Attention has shifted from following the speakers’ words, to capturing those words for the record. The gaze of the note-takers shifts downward to the handwritten notes used to record the authoritative texts. Note-Taking: A ‘Striking Modern Development’ Clark sees this full, industrious lecture theatre as evidence of the forging of a Protestant work ethic and the pervasiveness of note-taking as a “striking modern development” (87). In the well-endowed disciplines such as medicine and law, wealthy students paid poor students to take notes for them. Notes were sometimes copied painstakingly at home from borrowed manuscripts as lecture note-taking practices changed in response to epistemological shifts. Previously, the handwriting of the individual student had not been at the centre of pedagogy. Scholarship was underpinned by memorisation and handwriting had a different significance, as Carruthers (1990) describes. The design of manuscripts with rich visual elements was an aid to memory. These manuscripts were handwritten by scribes whose function was to copy the authorities as accurately as possible, perpetuating the religious authority through the text, downplaying individual differences. Handwriting became a sign of individually held literacy in the shift illustrated by figure 2. This point is also made by Foucault (1977). For Foucault, the changes that took place in institutions in the 18th century, emblematized by the shifts in penal punishment from the public spectacle of the gallows to the incarceration and minute management of the individual through surveillance, are symbolized by the centrality of the timetable. As universities prepared bureaucrats for the colonies, handwritten documentation backed up by signatures were the main means of legal and institutional control. In medieval universities, examinations were conducted in the oral mode; in the course of the 18th century, individuals were tested in written examinations, a shift that allowed a large number of students to sit an examination at the same time. He explores handwriting as an expression of how ‘anatomo-chronological schema of behavior’ defined gestures and action in institutions such that “time penetrates the body and with it all the meticulous controls of power”: In the correct use of the body, which makes possible a correct use of time, nothing must remain idle or useless everything must be called upon for the support of the act required. A well-disciplined body forms the operational context of the slightest gesture. Good handwriting, for example, presupposes a gymnastics—a whole routine whose rigorous

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code invests the body in its entirety, from the points of the feet to the tip of the index finger. 1977, 152

This well-disciplined body is strongly present in this representation of a lecture room and the examination hall; handwriting becomes the sign of the individual’s presence, and therefore compliance with that system. What this engraving does not show is that lectures and disputations had been in decline with falling attendances. Differences appeared between English and German universities. In England the lecture method was in trouble. Money for endowed chairs meant that incumbents had tenure for life, often treating their chairs as sinecures requiring little effort, putting lecturers beyond discipline. In Germany however, attendance at lecturers was increasingly monitored. By means of payment for lectures given, the introduction of a timetable, and stronger control over the curriculum, the lecturer was drawn in to the developing bureaucracy of the state, while the disputation failed to survive as a pedagogic form. (See Clark 2006, 81–89 for a description of these processes). So the lecture survived, but the disputation did not. It had become a farce, with its theatrical ethos out of character with the emerging Protestant moral order. Clark notes that the main reason for the weakening of the disputation is that it had lost all spontaneity (89). Declining spoken Latin skills also meant that rehearsal was necessary. From the medieval trial of courage modeled on the joust, it had descended into a prefabricated, often comical show. The disputation was abolished at Cambridge in 1839 (90). Clark argues that new practices emerged from the decline of the disputation, with an emphasis on the written and the legible. These practices included the written exam, seminar paper, doctoral dissertation and the ethos of publish or perish. The rationalization of German academia wrought by ministries and markets aimed to substitute writing in place of speaking and hearing. Academic charisma would be manufactured by publications and written expert or peer review, instead of the old-fashioned disputational oral-arts, unsubstantiated rumours, and provincial gossip. clark 2006, 29

This shift to the dominance of the legible included the ascendancy of “the author and reader over the orator and audience, as well as to the triumph of the academic ‘I’ as charismatic individual over the corporate, collegial, collective bodies of academics” (2006, 402).

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Foucault on Surveillance The way the eye took over from the ear that Clark refers to resonates with the great shift that Foucault writes of in ‘Discipline and Punish’ (1977). Between the modern situation and the middle ages, lies the growth of discipline in the sense of the myriad technologies of power that turned absolute power into a more dispersed, subtle exercise in control during the enlightenment. Foucault’s argument is made with reference to philosopher Jeremy Bentham’s panopticon, a design for a prison in which prisoners could be seen by a single observer, without the prisoners knowing whether they were being watched or not. This produces an environment in which people feel under surveillance, and therefore, it was claimed, they would take responsibility for their own actions, through self-regulation. This shift is represented in this image (figure 2.3) below. This image from Foucault’s ‘Discipline and Punish’ can be contrasted with the image of the note-taking students in figure 2.2. The caption tells us that it is a lecture on ‘the evils of alcoholism’ in a French prison. Unlike the pulpit-like arrangement in the medieval lecture hall, the lecturer is below, and is able to see everyone at a glance, arrangements that resemble the panopticon. The ‘students’ (prisoners) have an appearance of power, in that they can look down at the lecturer, but they cannot see each other. They are controlled by the panoptic gaze—the possibility that they might be seen. In education, the disciplinary system has shifted the locus of power from external sources of authority such as corporal punishment, to the individual who through self-regulation takes responsibility for behaving well. Through the micro politics of technologies such as physical arrangements in the classroom, timetabling, ranking of individuals, and the examination, the gaze of the Other is internalized. Foucault (citing a 19th century historian, Julius) describes this shift from the ancient and medieval worlds, typified by social arrangements of spectacle, to the early modern patterns that favour surveillance: Antiquity had been a civilization of spectacle. ‘To render accessible to a multitude of men the inspection of a small number of objects’: this was the problem to which the architecture of temples, theatres and circuses responded. With spectacle there was a predominance of public life, the intensity of festivals, sensual proximity. In these rituals in which blood flowed, society found new vigour and formed for a moment a single great society. The modern age poses the opposite problem: ‘To procure for a small number, or even for a single individual, the instantaneous view of a great multitude’. 216

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figure 2.3 Lecture on the evils of alcoholism in the auditorium at Fresne prison, in the late 19th century. In Foucault (1977), reproduced between pages 169 and 170. This shows how the lecturer’s chair has come down, enabling the lecturer to see everyone in the room simultaneously.

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Foucault ascribed this change to the growing influence of the state, “to its ever more profound intervention in all details of and all the relations of social life” (217). This distinction between ancient and modern is compelling, but as I have already suggested, it is not the break that is significant, but the capacity of the lecture to accommodate multiple and potentially contradictory elements and gazes at the same time.

The Contemporary Lecture: ‘Everybody is Watching Everybody All the Time’ In moving to the contemporary era, the lecture seems to have survived remarkably well. This is not just because it is suited to the economics of mass education, or that it is good for out of fashion transmission pedagogies, but because it is adaptable as a form that lends itself simultaneously to both spectacle and surveillance. While Foucault seems to present these kinds of relationships as exemplars of a historical break (particularly in his earlier ‘archaeology’ work), others such as Vinson and Ross (2001) see them as co-existing in many contemporary forms such as reality shows on tv, with important implications for education. We need to remind ourselves of the point made earlier, that there are multiple and competing ideological and functional currents that run through universities in particular times and places and the lecture seems to accommodate these currents very well. This image of a lecture theatre shows medical students in a crowded wireless classroom. Everyone has a laptop. The image resonates with figure 2.2, the industrious body language of the digital ‘note-takers’ (though not all are attending to the official lesson) reminding us of the forging of a work ethic that Clark refers to in the early modern research universities. The large screen at the front is also remarkably like an authoritative religious text, or textbook, at the centre of pedagogies in figures 1 and 2 in this chapter. A closer look shows multiple smaller versions of this central screen to make sure that everyone is on task. Most eyes are directed downwards, towards the screen of the individual laptop computers. This suggests the patterns of the gaze in the image of the Fresnes prison in figure 2.4, as the audience appears to be divided from one another by the control of the individual laptops. The screen is a symbol of commodified culture, suggesting a different use of the term spectacle. Guy Debord uses spectacle4 to express the nature of contemporary capitalist culture and its resulting commercialization: 4 Foucault put forward his concept of spectacle without any reference to Debord’s version,

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figure 2.4 A wireless classroom in the early 21st century. This photograph was taken by a medical student and shared on a photographic site with the caption ‘My med school this morning. Future doctors of America learning adhd one imgur image at a time’. http://imgur.com/n2pyk8s?tags

The whole of life of those societies in which modern conditions of production prevail presents itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles. All that once was directly lived has become mere representation. debord 1995, 12

Vinson and Ross suggest that new technologies make possible the ‘absurd’ situation in which ‘everybody is watching everybody all the time’. This is achieved through the combination of the gazes of surveillance and Debordian spectacle. However, resistance to the effects of disciplinary power in education is played out all the time, through scratchings on desks, non-attendance, doodling on note-paper, or speaking a language that is not the official language of schooling. This image was uploaded on a web image share site.5 At first glance it looks like an innocuous photograph of industrious, engaged students.

which had been published in France a decade previously. See for example http://www .notbored.org/foucault-and-debord.html for a discussion of this gap. 5 The site is ‘the best place to share and enjoy the most awesome images on the internet’ (imgur .com/about).

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But the caption tells us more: it reads ‘My med school this morning. Future doctors of america learning adhd one imgur image at a time’. Key words like ‘med school’ and ‘america’ are in lower case, while adhd is in caps. The image was taken from the back of the lecture theatre by a bored student with a satirical, critical message to convey. The subversive angle shows most students straying from the official screen, engaging with social media sites. The gaze here is ambiguous, able to show both compliance and resistance that an angle from the front of the room (the lecturer’s view) or from the side as in figure 2.1 would not afford.

Conclusion: Lectures as Sites to Transform Practices This chapter has approached the lecture by drawing from history, exploring how it has survived and nurtured different communicative practices. However, we have looked at both continuities and changes. The physical form in which the method was carried, a pulpit-like podium from which a single authority held forth, has proved particularly durable in the context of the massification of higher education, and the need to fit as many students as possible into a space where they can benefit from a single authority. Yet there are also many changes that are apparent, particularly in the lowering of the chair to ‘bring knowledge down’ to people, but at the same time the ‘little tools’ of coercion regulate time and space, and produce conditions for surveillance in which the audience is intended to self-regulate, and adopt the docile bodies of the student identity. Another change can be seen in the literacy practices. We saw the medium of the authoritative book in an oral memorial culture give way to a form of reproduction based on hand-written notes. We also saw the disputation, a twin practice that complemented the lecture, disappear, and migrate into the forms of written research scholarship that we are familiar with today. The oral practices of scholarship on which academic charisma was founded have been supplanted by written ones, but the phantom of the oral is still present. In the contemporary lecture theatre, with its screens, we can also see traces of contemporary media and the ‘second-hand’ simulated experiences that they evoke. The screen on which the lecture is projected could as easily be used to show a movie. I suggest that one of the reasons why we may be uneasy about lectures is that the sense of theatre that survives in them is an uncomfortable reminder of a pre-modern integrated self, in which body and cosmos are whole. If we accept that lectures need not be seen as instantiations of frozen, locked in power dynamics, but can instead be understood as open to multiple mean-

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ings and transformations, we may see lectures as transformative sites at multiple levels. They are evolving genres that draw on different sometimes contradictory assemblages of rhetorical strategies that reflect competing discourses of the market, the academy, the state, the church etc. These strategies find form in the interplay between semiotic modes (for this chapter, spoken and written language and the gaze) offered by a range of media that can be brought in to the lecture. They can be sites for ongoing relational activity between modes. A full understanding of the potentials of lectures must be a multimodal analysis, but an analysis that does not fixate on what appears new, while being blind to the complexity of what is going on in the interaction between lecturers and their students in the contact zone. This is particularly important as lectures are one of the few spaces not directly caught up in assessment practices, where exploratory embodied co-presence is possible.

References Barnett, R. 2000. Realising the university in an age of supercomplexity. Buckingham: shre; Open University. Bligh, D. (1971). What’s the use of lectures? (1st ed.). Harmondsworth: Penguin. Blommaert, J. (2005). Discourse: A critical introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Braudel, F. (1981). The structures of everyday life: The limits of the possible (civilization and capitalism, vol. 1). New York: Harper & Row. Carruthers, M.J. (1990). The book of memory: A study of memory in medieval culture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Castells, M. (2001). Universities as dynamic systems of contradictory functions. In J. Muller, N. Cloete & S. Badat (Eds.), The challenges of globalisation: South African debates with Manuel Castells (pp. 206–223). Cape Town: Maskew Miller Longman. Clark, W. (2006). Academic charisma and the origins of the research university. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Debord, G. (1995). The society of the spectacle. New York: Zone Books. Fairclough, N. (1992). Discourse and social change. Cambridge: Polity Press. Fairclough, N. (1999). Linguistic and intertextual analysis within discourse analysis. In A. Jaworski, & N. Coupland (Eds.), The discourse reader (pp. 183–211). London: Routledge. Fairclough, N. (2003). Analysing discourse: Textual analysis for social research. New York: Routledge. Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. Sheridan, trans.; 2nd ed.). New York: Vintage Books.

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Friesen, N. (2011). The lecture as a transmedial pedagogical form: A historical analysis. Educational Researcher, 40, 95–102. Goffman, E. (1981). Forms of talk. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Hofmeyr, I. (1993). “We spend our years as a tale that is told”: Oral historical narrative in a South African chiefdom. Portsmouth, nh, Johannesburg, London: Heinemann, Witwatersrand University Press, James Currey. Kress, G. (1985). Linguistic processes in sociocultural practice. Geelong: Deakin University Press. Kress, G. (2010). Multimodality: A social semiotic approach to contemporary communication. Abingdon: Routledge. Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (1996). Reading images: The grammar of visual design. London: Routledge. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal discourse: The modes and media of contemporary communication. London: Edward Arnold. Kruse, O. (2006). The origins of writing in the disciplines: Traditions of seminar writing and the Humboldtian ideal of the research university. Written Communication, 23, 331–352. Lillis, T., & Scott, M. (2007). Defining academic literacies research: Issues of epistemology, ideology and strategy. Journal of Applied Linguistics, 4(1), 5–32. mode Glossary of multimodal terms. esrc. http://multimodalityglossary.wordpress .com/gaze. Accessed April 2015. Perkin, H. (1997). History of universities. In L.F. Goodchild & H.S. Wechsler (Eds.), The history of higher education (2nd ed., pp. 3–32). Needham Heights, ma: Simon and Schuster. Pratt, M.L. (1999). Arts of the contact zone. In D. Bartholomae and A. Petrovsky (Eds.), Ways of reading: an anthology for writers. 5th ed. New York: Bedford/St Martins. Ruegg, W, 1992. Chapter 1: Themes. In H. De Ridder-Symoens (Ed.), A history of the university in Europe. volume 1: Universities in the Middle Ages. (pp. 3–34). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schwinges, R.C. (1992). Student education, student life. In H. De Ridder-Symoens (Ed.), A history of the university in Europe. volume 1: Universities in the Miiddle Ages (pp. 195– 242). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thesen, L. (2007). Breaking the frame: Lectures, ritual and academic literacies. Journal of Applied Linguistics, 1, 33–53. Thesen, L. (2009a). Lectures in transition: A study of communicative practices in the Humanities in a South African university. Unpublished Doctor of Philosophy, University of Cape Town, Cape Town. Thesen, L. (2009b). Researching ‘ideological becoming’ in lectures: Challenges for knowing differently. Studies in Higher Education, 34(4), 391–402. Titscher, S., Meyer, M., Wodack, R., & Fetter, E. (2000). Methods of text and discourse analysis. London: Sage.

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Vinson, K., & Ross, E. (2001). Education and the new disciplinarity: Surveillance, spectacle and the case of standards-based reforms. Cultural Logic, 4(1). http://clogic.eserver .org/4-1/4-1.html Wallerstein, I. (2004). World system analysis: An introduction. Durham: Duke University Press. Yellowlees Douglas, J. (2002). Here even when you’re not: Teaching in an internet degree programme. In E. Snyder (Ed.), Silicon literacies: Communication, innovation and education in the electronic age (pp. 116–129). London: Routledge.

chapter 3

Aspects of Multimodality in Higher Education Monographs Tuomo Hiippala

Introduction This chapter aims to contribute to the growing body of research on multimodality and higher education by viewing the research monograph—a common vehicle for disseminating knowledge within many fields of study—through the lens of multimodal analysis. Influential ideas require space, and the way major works are published testifies to the power of a monograph. Yet research monographs have not received much attention in multimodal research, possibly because their text-driven structure is not perceived as being multimodally interesting. At a time of pervasive multimodality, the research monographs continue to be dominated by written language, which is occasionally interrupted by figures, diagrams, tables and other graphic elements. Granted that language does most of the semiotic work in academic discourse, to support both learners and teachers (see Gourlay, chapter 4 this volume), we should also be able to describe what characterises the research monograph and other forms of academic discourse in terms of multimodality. Language, in short, offers powerful means for construing and disseminating academic knowledge, but covers only a part of today’s communicative spectrum. In this aspect, making the multimodal structure of research monographs explicit should ideally help readers to access their content. An improved understanding of their structure may support learners’ metacognitive activities (Kirsh, 2005), such as extracting knowledge from research monographs, while teachers may benefit with new ways of recontextualising the same knowledge in classroom settings and in other multimodal artefacts intended for learning, such as presentations (Jewitt, 2014b; Thesen, chapter 2 this volume).

Hiippala, T. (2016). Chapter 3. Aspects of Multimodality in Higher Education Monographs. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 53–78). Leiden: Brill.

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To support this kind of work and to better appreciate the research monograph as a form of multimodal academic discourse, I first outline several requirements for investigating the research monographs, before presenting several analytical tools geared towards their description. I then continue by exemplifying how these analytical tools may be used to capture different types of multimodal phenomena by applying them to a page from a research monograph. Now, to set us on our course, I begin with a brief overview of previous work on multimodality in educational contexts.

Multimodality in Academic Discourse There has been a long-standing interest in the relationship between multimodality and education (see e.g. Kress, 1998, 2003; Kress et al., 2001; Unsworth, 2008). Despite growing interest in recent years (Archer & Newfield, 2014), Archer (2010) observes that academic discourse has not received much attention in multimodal research, although images frequently accompany written language “to provide context, illustrate a point, make an argument, furnish evidence, organise data” (Archer, 2010, p. 202; Archer, chapter 5 this volume). It is precisely the relations between language and images that have gained the most attention in the study of multimodality in academic discourse. Taboada and Habel (2013), for instance, examine the rhetorical relations holding between text, figures and tables in an academic journal. Their analysis, which covered a total of 645 pages with 137 figures and 139 tables, concluded that figures often elaborate the accompanying text, whereas tables are used to present evidence. From the perspective of the current study, Taboada and Habel’s (2013) observation that figures, tables, diagrams and other graphic elements can stand in a variety of relations to the accompanying text—elaborating or presenting evidence—is particularly interesting. Additionally, Taboada and Habel (2013, pp. 81–82) note the possibility that multiple relationships can be simultaneously drawn between a single graphic element and the accompanying text. What this implies is that there are likely to be different types of multimodal structure at play. More specifically, these multimodal structures may be configured as necessary, ranging from defining specific text-image relations to ensuring that the content presented in text and graphics forms a coherent whole that works towards a common communicative goal. For multimodal researchers, the main questions are: Where does this potential arise from? What are the resources available for meaning-making on the page? Parodi (2012) proposes that the source of this potential may be traced back to at least four semiotic systems active in academic discourse. These are the ver-

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bal, graphic, mathematical and typographic systems, which may be deployed on the page and configured to interact with each other (see Alyousef & Mickan, chapter 10 this volume). Emphasising the synergy between these systems, Parodi (2012) argues that if we continue to talk about “the text and the figures” or “the text and the images” and treat them as separate entities, we may fail to truly appreciate the fundamental role of multimodality in academic discourse (p. 264). In Parodi’s view, the text-image relations constitute only a part of what is going on the page in terms of multimodality. In contrast, the entire multimodal page takes on the functions set out for images by Archer (2010, p. 202) above. It is the page that illustrates, argues and elaborates by combining text, graphics, diagrams and tables. In this aspect, Parodi’s (2012) proposal bears close resemblance to Bateman’s (2008) view of the page as a “site of integration” for several distinct resources for representation, which he characterises using the terms text-typographic, graphic and diagrammatic (p. 106). Moreover, the page has the potential to organise these resources in the two-dimensional layout space and combine their output in new ways. These combinations result in what Lemke (1998) calls the multiplication of meaning in scientific discourse. For this reason, understanding the page should be our first priority. The page provides a suitable point of departure for the current study, because it is something shared by all research monographs. Many other forms of academic discourse also work with a “page metaphor” (Bateman, 2008, p. 9), that is, organise their content along the vertical and horizontal dimensions. In order to take the page apart, we need a set of applicable analytical tools, beginning with an effective notion of ‘mode’. Semiotic Modes in the Research Monographs The concept of mode is central to multimodal research: the debates surrounding its definition also affirm its importance. Within the last two decades, various proposals for defining a mode have been put forward to help us understand the interaction between language, image, layout and other communicative resources. Some of the major proposals have been outlined in Jewitt (2014a), whereas other views can be found in, for example, Elleström (2010) and Forceville (2014). What is important to understand in this connection is that the definition of a mode is motivated by its use. Whereas a social semiotic approach to mode, which places emphasis on the sign-maker, can be particularly revealing for studying multimodality from the learner’s perspective (see e.g. Simpson, 2014), this chapter describes a multimodal artefact, which is designed to serve a set of communicative functions (Bateman, 2008; Hiippala, 2015). For research monographs, these may be broadly described as participating in building knowledge within a field

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by engaging with previous research through argument (cf. e.g. Maton, 2014). To fulfil these functions, the research monograph can draw on a variety of resources. Parodi (2012) conceptualises these resources as semiotic systems, whereas Bateman (2008, p. 106) characterises them as text-typographic, graphic and diagrammatic resources: what connects these two approaches is the focus on the page. Now, if we take the page as the starting point, as proposed above, we need to identify a definition of mode that can help us explain how texttypographic, graphic and diagrammatic resources interact in the research monograph (see also Simpson, chapter 11 this volume). Only then we may attempt to identify the semiotic modes active on the page. Considering the dominant role of written language in the research monograph, it is possible to draw on a very specific proposal presented in Bateman (2009) for identifying the semiotic mode: text-flow. According to Bateman (2009), the semiotic mode of text-flow … is found within page-based artefacts whenever there is verbal text. Here the visual line of the developing text provides a basic onedimensional organisational scheme. Although this may incorporate contributions involving other presentational modes, such as diagrams, tables, and related texts (e.g. footnotes, side notes, etc.), the most important distinguishing feature of this mode is that the spatial nature of the page is not made to carry significant meanings in its own right. p. 61

To summarise, text-flow is built around the one-dimensional, linear structure of written language, and does not take advantage of the layout space to make additional meanings. This does not, however, prevent the use of text-flow in multimodal artefacts that use the entire two-dimensional layout space. In fact, this is entirely common: one such example is contemporary secondary school English textbooks, whose layout and placement of textual and graphical content is described as “fluid” by Bezemer and Kress (2009, p. 261). They see “a clear shift from predominantly written text set in constrained typography and confined to a rigid, single- or two-column grid to a composition of (typo)graphically irregular writing and image-based elements placed fluidly on a two-page spread” (ibid.). Yet in some other artefacts, such as the research monograph, text-flow appears to be the dominant semiotic mode, taking over the entire page to realise a one- or two-column layout: one such example may be found right before your eyes. Although the principle of one-dimensional linearity governs the general organisation of text-flow, this does not rule out the possibility of exploiting the

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two-dimensional layout space within the diagrammatic mode, which can interrupt text-flow in the form of diagrams, figures, and other graphical elements— an issue to which I will return shortly below. With this brief description of text-flow, we are already a step closer to the research monograph, which reflects many of the characteristics ascribed to this semiotic mode above. But how does the semiotic mode of text-flow help us to understand the research monograph, as opposed to working with the assumption that language and images constitute their own semiotic modes? With text-flow, we can advance beyond the traditional language/image dichotomy, and focus on how written language and the accompanying graphic elements interact on the page, while the general organising principle remains linear and one-dimensional (Bateman, 2009, p. 61). At the same time, we naturally continue to observe how language and image are used to realise this particular semiotic mode. It is important to understand, however, that text-flow—like any other semiotic mode—is an abstraction. In reality, what the semiotic mode is used for determines its structure: when used for feature journalism, text-flow may take a very different form than in academic discourse. Additionally, within academic discourse, the configuration of text-flow is likely to vary multimodally (Parodi, 2012) and linguistically (Hyland & Bondi, 2006) according to disciplinary conventions. Because text-flow is driven by written language, we can also leverage previous research conducted within linguistics, particularly in the area of text organisation and structure (see e.g. Mann & Thompson, 1988; Martin, 1992). This places us in a relatively strong position with respect to written language on the page, but much more work remains to be done to achieve a similar position in terms of what occurs among the blocks of text-flow. The graphic and diagrammatic modes and their many realisations—figures, diagrams, tables, charts, in addition to their combinations in information graphics—have so far evaded comprehensive description. This may require, however, reconsidering our imports from the field of linguistics, as the diagrammatic mode, in particular, may involve increasingly complex multimodal structures. Guo (2004), for instance, has shown that diagrams can organise their content into sequences, while simultaneously grouping parts of the sequence together into a conceptual structure. In the case studied by Guo, making sense of the diagram requires the simultaneous application of two distinct interpretations to identify the sequential and conceptual structures. Without identifying and interpreting this kind of dual structure, the reader is unlikely to understand the meanings conveyed by the diagram. As said, much work remains to be done in mapping the diagrammatic mode, before our knowledge of its structure and functions matches the level of detail

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figure 3.1 Medium, semiotic modes and genre. The left-hand side shows a medium—such as a book—that provides a range of semiotic modes, whose specific configuration depends on what kind of multimodal artefact is realised using the semiotic modes. These are reflected in genre-specific patterns in the artefact structure, illustrated on the right-hand side, which include at least the content hierarchy, rhetorical organisation, typographic and graphic features and the use of layout space.

achieved for written language within the field of linguistics. For this reason, I seek to strengthen the analytical framework developed in this chapter by introducing two additional concepts, medium and genre, which help to tie together the textual and graphical contributions to the research monograph and its pages. Complementing the Framework with Medium and Genre The concept of text-flow serves as a foundation for analysing the research monographs, but the framework may be considerably reinforced by introducing two additional concepts: medium and genre. These concepts improve our capability to distinguish between the research monographs and other multimodal artefacts used in higher education. This capability is crucial, particularly if we wish to better understand what happens when the content of the research monograph is recontextualised—or “resemiotised”, to use Iedema’s (2003) term—in a classroom presentation or other form of learning material. To provide a general view of the framework, the relations between genre, medium, and semiotic modes are set out in Figure 3.1. The first concept, medium, is concerned with the material underlying of the semiotic modes. No semiotic mode, including text-flow, can emerge without a material that can be manipulated for communicative purposes by a group

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of users. Over time, these materials can take a more permanent form as their production and consumption stabilises. Prime examples of contemporary print media include newspapers and books, which provide a range of semiotic modes that can be used to realise various genres (Kress, 2005, p. 11). The newspaper, for instance, is a medium that can realise both tabloids and broadsheets. The book medium, in turn, commonly carries genres ranging from the research monograph to novels and non-fiction books. The second concept, genre, is frequently used in multimodal research to describe various artefacts and situations, and to circumscribe the phenomena under analysis (Hiippala, 2014, p. 111). In addition, this concept has been used to build analytical frameworks that aim to capture the differences between multimodal artefacts: this is also how the concept will be put to use in this chapter. The most well-known development in this area is the Genre and Multimodality model (hereafter GeM; see Bateman, 2008), which seeks to identify multimodal genre patterns. To capture these patterns, the model attends to various aspects of the multimodal artefact, including the content, its hierarchical organisation, appearance, placement in layout, and rhetorical relations. These patterns, together with the social practices associated with the use of the artefact, constitute the notion of genre within the GeM model (Bateman, 2008, p. 16). I will introduce the analytical tools provided by the GeM model in more detail shortly below, as I deploy them to describe the multimodal characteristics of the research monograph. But why it is necessary to bring in medium and genre to complement the concept of semiotic modes? I have argued elsewhere that their joint contribution is significant to any multimodal artefact (Hiippala, 2015). The medium provides the available semiotic modes, which are configured to reflect the properties of the genre that is being realised. The end result is a multimodal artefact, which is more or less appropriate for some communicative purpose, depending on how well it meets the requirements set for the particular genre in question. As Forceville (2014) argues: Genre is an element of context whose importance cannot be underestimated. Genre-attribution moreover occurs mostly subconsciously and in milliseconds, and is in my view the single most important element in the addressee’s cognitive environment steering his strategy of interpretation of any pictorial or multimodal message. p. 63, original emphasis

This also applies to the research monograph, whether it is realised in printed form or as electronic books, as the moment readers set their eyes on the

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table 3.1

Page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012)

Base unit Content

Layout unit

1 2

52 Semiotics and documents

Page number Running head

3

2.3.1 Three general perspectives on documents

Header

4

For documents in general one can essentially adopt three perspectives: the content view, the logical view, and the layout view. These perspectives are suggested graphically in Figure 2.5. In this section, we will characterise them in general and then in Chapters 5 and 7 work with them for capturing the specifics of films.

Paragraph #1

7 8

[A diagram showing the three perspectives, see Figure 3.2] Figure 2.5 Three basic perspectives on a document

Figure Caption

9

The content view perspective covers the ‘typical observer’ interest in a document: that is, assuming for now a range of presumedly intended ‘readers’, what these readers will generally orient towards will be the ‘represented content’ of the document. Although much can be said about such content, in this book we will only consider this view to the extent that it is relevant for building our analytic framework for the moving image. Paragraph #2 From the document perspective, the notion of content used corresponds to the body of material that has, by some means, been selected for presentation within some document; with respect to the document, therefore, it can be seen as ‘pre-existing’ and the main question concerns the organisation that is imposed upon it in order to construct a document.

5 6

10

11

12 13

We will impose constraints on the kind of content that is admissible as we proceed. For example, and to begin, since we will be focusing exclusively on filmic documents in this book, the content will be taken to be ‘raw’ recordings or creations of some pro-filmic material.

Paragraph #3

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Base unit Content 14

15

16 17

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Layout unit

This can be taken as corresponding loosely to the various ‘takes’ produced during filming before being edited into their appearance in the final film. For film, therefore, the ‘shot’ serves as a typical example of a content portion. Such content portions may be constituted by material of different kinds. All that is required for current purposes, however, is that we can assume … [page break]

Paragraph #4

artefact, they begin to make assumptions about its content and structure: What is this text about? What is the best strategy for engaging with the text? Genre generates expectations, and how it is able to do so can only be understood by considering genre in connection with both medium and semiotic modes. However, the contributions of medium, genre and semiotic modes are subtle and often conflated, thus explicating them requires a systematic approach, such as the one advocated by the GeM model.

Describing the Research Monograph In the following section, I will show how the analytical tools introduced above can be used to bring out certain characteristics of the research monograph as a multimodal artefact. Methodologically, I will mainly draw on the GeM model (Bateman, 2008), applying its tools to analyse a page from Bateman and Schmidt (2012). The research monograph in question proposes a new approach to multimodal film analysis, treating film as a kind of document (see also Bateman, 2013). Within the monograph, this specific page is a part of the theoretical discussion. It introduces several different perspectives to documents, and like many other research monographs, it does so by using the semiotic mode of text-flow. Moreover, as the page also integrates contributions from the diagrammatic mode, it presents a suitable target of analysis for this chapter. My analysis proceeds in the order described shortly below, because the GeM model builds its analysis layer by layer. Due to this approach, the model is best

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introduced as the analysis unfolds. Those wishing to introduce themselves to the GeM model before engaging with the analysis below may refer to the principles behind the model, which are set out in a concise form in Hiippala (2014) and more extensively in Hiippala (2015, chapters 3 and 5). In the following analysis, I will first use the GeM model to dissect the page into distinct analytical units, before moving on to consider aspects of page layout and its organisation. Having established a sufficient understanding of the layout structure, I proceed to consider how text-image relations emerge on the page. Finally, I present my conclusions based on these analyses, considering how an improved understanding of the research monographs’ multimodal structure may help both learners and teachers. Dissecting the Page Table 3.1 shows the content on page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012) and distributes this content into two analytical categories: base and layout units, which serve as the point of departure for the discussion. The centre column presents the actual content on the page, which is also marked for its typographic features, indicating the use of bold and italic typefaces. The left-hand column segments this content into base units, while the right-hand column distributes the identified base units into layout units (Bateman, 2008, pp. 111– 117). Throughout this chapter, I will frequently use the numbers for base units to refer to the content found on the page. To put this convention into practice right away, Table 3.1 also includes a diagram (7), which is represented in Figure 3.2. Next, I will explain how these analytical units help us to take the first step in investigating the multimodal structure of the page. The GeM model defines a range of base units to ensure comparable and reproducible analyses. In a strict sense, these definitions limit what can be talked about in the analysis, in order to avoid getting lost in the “infinite detail” (Forceville, 2007, p. 1236). This kind of detail accumulates rapidly if artefact parts are randomly picked up for analysis. The base units defined in the GeM model are given in Bateman (2008), but certain units can be showcased here using the examples presented in the left-hand column of Table 3.1. The base units identified in the GeM model include, for instance, – – – – –

page numbers (1), running heads (2), headers (3), sentences (4), and diagrams (7).

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figure 3.2 A sketch of Figure 2.5 on page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012), which retains the original layout and conceptual structure

These base units constitute the minimal units of analysis, underlining the rather broad approach to multimodal analysis taken within the GeM model. None of the aforementioned analytical units, including sentences and diagrams, are decomposed further, because maintaining a tight grip on analytical granularity allows the framework to “concentrate on the combination of information across modes” (Bateman, 2008, p. 111). This is precisely what we need, considering our goal, that is, an improved understanding of how this particular page operates multimodally as a part of the research monograph. However, the GeM model does more than segments the content into analytical units: after identification, the base units are handed over to a variety of analytical layers for further description. One such layer is the layout layer, which describes the content on the page from various perspectives: what kinds of hierarchical relations hold between the content, what are its typographic and graphic features, and where the content is located in the layout. In order to scale up the description, the base units are joined together to form layout units. As the right-hand column in Table 3.1 indicates, sentences, for instance, are combined into paragraphs in the layout layer: the base units 4, 5 and 6 make

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figure 3.3 The layout structure of page 52

up paragraph #1. The resulting layout units may be then observed from various perspectives introduced above: hierarchy, appearance and placement. The first perspective to be examined is the layout structure, which determines how the layout units relate to each other in terms of hierarchical relationships. These relations are typically represented using a tree structure, as shown in Figure 3.3, which visualises the layout structure of page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012). On the top of the tree diagram is the page, which does not constitute an actual layout unit itself, as indicated by its absence in Table 3.1. The layout structure, however, requires this unit to provide a root for the hierarchical organisation. Beginning from the top, the page 52 breaks into two branches: Section 2.3.1 and Page header. At this point, we can already begin to build bridges between the page analysed here and the concepts of medium and genre introduced above. Under Page header we can find a page number (‘52’) and a running head (‘Semiotics and documents’). These features—page numbers and running heads—can be found in a variety of books, regardless of the genre realised using the book medium. They are, in short, a feature of this particular medium (and many others), and for this reason, they should not be conflated with the contributions arising from genre within our framework. They do not participate in organising or presenting the content, but act as navigational devices that support the use of the entire artefact (Bateman, 2008, p. 114). The actual content, which can be more appropriately described in terms of genre, resides under the branch Section 2.3.1. This content consists of the

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header and the paragraphs that follow, which realise the semiotic mode of textflow on page 52. Keeping the initial characterisation of text-flow in mind, the paragraphs proceed in a linear order, but are interrupted by a diagrammatic element, Figure 2.5, which cuts the flow of written language. The presence of this figure within text-flow is marked by the introduction of an additional level to the hierarchy represented by the layout structure: the composite unit Figure 2.5, which joins together the diagram and its caption. This composite unit is particularly interesting from the perspective of artefact structure, because the introduction of an additional level to the layout hierarchy may also be perceived as a structural cue to the reader. Effectively, this structure puts the text-flow on hold, prompting the reader to reconsider and select the appropriate mode of interpretation to make sense of the diagram. As I will show shortly below, this also encourages the reader to seek out the relations holding between the diagram and the surrounding text-flow. Although text-flow proceeds in a linear order, a similar organisational principle does not necessarily hold for the diagrammatic mode used to realise Figure 2.5, as we saw in the case described above by Guo (2004). Holsanova and Nord (2010) have proposed that these structural cues play an important part in making sense of multimodal artefacts. They write: … the user recognises functional patterns and principles behind the structure, knows where to look for specific things, how to find entry points and possible reading paths, how to recognise information hierarchies, etc. holsanova & nord 2010, p. 83

The research monograph has functional patterns to support its interpretation, as exemplified by the layout structure used to introduce the diagram. It also has a very clear organising principle behind its structure, linearity, which is reflected in the positioning of the paragraphs on the same level of the layout hierarchy. Built around the one-dimensional linear structure of text-flow, the research monograph is far less demanding terms of visual perception and interpretation, particularly when compared to other genres taking advantage of the layout space. This can be made explicit by comparing the layout structure in Figure 3.3 to those found in other genres, such as a tourist brochure and an in-flight magazine, which are presented in Figure 3.4. As Figure 3.4 shows, genres that take advantage of the layout space to organise their content can have far more complex layout structures. Constructing composite units of text and graphics and demarcating them from each other in the layout space, while simultaneously establishing connections between the

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figure 3.4 Layout structures in a tourist brochure and an in-flight magazine

different parts of the content requires a complex layout structure. This is evident, for instance, in the tourist brochures, in which a double-page can host a wealth of different multimodal ensembles: descriptive texts, photographs with captions, information boxes, lists of destinations, schedules in tables, and so forth, which all work towards the same communicative goal. Compared to the tourist brochure and in-flight magazine, the research monograph is far less complex in terms of the layout structure. Why? Examined using the GeM model, which focuses on multimodal structure, the page of a research monograph appears deceptively simple. However, the complexity of text-flow in the research monograph is revealed upon zooming in to the written language deployed within this semiotic mode. What can be found here is language, used for academic purposes, which encodes and compresses meanings to a high degree (Ventola, 1996; Halliday, 1998). Because unpacking academic discourse is a demanding task, the research monograph—as a multimodal artefact—has to support easy access to the content. If the reader would have to simultaneously resolve a complex layout structure, such as those found in the tourist brochure or in-flight magazine shown in Figure 3.4, this would add considerably to the demands presented by the artefact to the reader. It may be proposed that by adopting a ‘shallow’ layout structure, the research monograph supports a specific type of activity: strategic reading. During strategic reading, the readers actively monitor their response to the content: this is different from skimming or searching, which are used when seeking an answer to a question (Waller, 2012, pp. 239–241). For this kind of reading, the complex but immediate layout structure of the tourist brochure may be more appropriate, given the right structural cues.

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What has not been discussed so far are the more explicit forms of cue structures, particularly those arising from the text-typographic resources available within the semiotic mode of text-flow. As Table 3.1 shows, several base units or their parts on page 52 are highlighted typographically. Within the actual content of the page, a header (3), parts of a sentence (4) and a caption (8) are emphasised either using a bold or italic typeface. Both the header and the caption may be considered “access structures”, which are distinguished typographically from the main body of content (Waller, 2012, p. 241). The three nominal groups—‘content view’, ‘logical view’ and ‘layout view’—marked using a bold typeface are particularly interesting, because these nominal groups are also present in the accompanying diagram (7) (see Figure 3.2). This kind of structural cuing is a common way of directing the reader’s attention from text to images, which has also been noted in the study of “multimedia learning” (see, for example, the references in Holsanova et al., 2009, p. 1216). However, on the current page, these typographically highlighted nominal groups do not constitute the sole reference to the diagram: it is also referred to explicitly in the following sentence (5). To shed light on the text-image relations, in the following section, I examine the relations between text-flow and diagrammatic mode, showing that the two examples introduced above—the nominal groups and the sentence—participate in different types of structure commonly found in the research monograph and other multimodal genres. Examining the Relations between Text and Images Several frameworks have been developed for describing text-image relations in multimodal artefacts (see e.g. Martinec & Salway, 2005; Kong, 2006). These frameworks draw mainly on previous proposals in linguistics and semiotics to provide detailed analyses of text-image relations. Bateman (2008, p. 145), however, argues that many of these accounts suffer from a significant limitation. They often draw “single relations between elements”, such as the diagram and its caption on page 52, while simultaneously assuming that similar text-image relations may also hold between collections of textual and graphic elements. Due to the lack of a supporting notion of structure, text-image relations are often drawn between any elements that appear connected. This analytical problem presents a challenge for the current study, which needs to be resolved if we wish to understand how page 52 is structured multimodally. As I pointed out above, both sentences 4 and 5 on page 52 seem to relate to the diagram (7) and its caption (8), which will be now bundled together into “an image-text-complex”, following the term proposed by Kvåle (2010). I do so based on the observation made in the layout structure: incorporating the diagram and its caption into the text-flow requires an additional

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level in the layout structure. Given this structural cue, it is likely that a textimage relation holds between the elements participating in the image-text complex—this is where we could also apply the frameworks proposed in Martinec and Salway (2005) and Kong (2006). Yet this would raise another question: if a text-image relation holds between the diagram and its caption, what kinds of relations hold between the image-text-complex and sentences 4 and 5, which also refer to the diagram and its caption? To achieve a more comprehensive and precise description of how text and images work together on the page, the GeM model carries the notion of structure over from the base layer to the description of text-image relations. These relations are described using Rhetorical Structure Theory (hereafter rst; see e.g. Mann & Thompson, 1988; Taboada & Mann, 2006)—an established theory of text structure and coherence, which provides a set of relations to describe how parts of discourse relate to each other. The GeM model extends these relations to cover the entire page, examining relations within text-flow, that is, how sentences relate to each other, while also acknowledging the possibility that relations may hold between particular segments in the text-flow and the accompanying graphic or diagrammatic element. As a part of the GeM model, rst has been applied successfully to various multimodal artefacts. It has been used, for instance, to draw out genre differences across cultures (Kong, 2013; Thomas, 2014) and to criticise graphic and document design (Delin & Bateman, 2002). It is important to understand, however, that rst does not pursue a description of rhetoric in its traditional sense as a form of persuasion, nor as it is often understood in North America (especially in relation to genre; see Bawarshi & Reiff, 2010, chapter 6). Instead, the aim of the rhetorical analysis in the GeM model is to uncover how multimodal artefacts achieve coherence, or well-formedness, which is an essential property, if the artefact is to achieve its designated communicative goals. Taboada and Habel (2013) summarise coherence effectively by defining it “as a property of texts whereby all parts of a text have a reason to be in the text and, furthermore, there is no sense that there are parts that are somehow missing” (p. 66). In plain words, coherence is achieved when the text meets the readers’ expectations. These expectations arise from genre and apply also to multimodal artefacts (Bateman, 2014a). Rhetorical relations are often presented using tree-like diagrams, such as the one shown in Figure 3.5 (see also Taboada & Mann, 2006, pp. 425–426). The diagram in Figure 3.5 presents a part of the rhetorical structure found on page 52 of Bateman and Schmidt (2012). In the following description, I will focus especially on how the diagram is integrated into the rhetorical structure, which

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figure 3.5 A partial rhetorical structure on page 52 in Bateman and Schmidt (2012). The numbers indicating the identified rhetorical units correspond to those presented in Table 3.1.

handles discourse relations within text-flow. The various relations present in text-flow have not been expanded in Figure 3.5, as indicated by the righthand side of the diagram. For text-image relations, Figure 3.5 proposes that a specific relation, restatement, holds between the diagram (7) and its caption (8). Essentially, this means that the diagram and its caption are treated as equals: they restate each other (see Bateman, 2008, pp. 158–159). What is worth noting here is that this image-text-complex falls under a different branch of the rhetorical structure as the units that make up the text-flow (4, 5, 6, 9, and so on). For this reason, in terms of the rhetorical structure, no direct rhetorical relation exists between the text-flow and the image-text-complex (7–8) incorporated within it. Although sentence 5 refers explicitly to the image-text-complex, as a part of the rhetorical structure its purpose is to add information to sentence 4. As Figure 3.5 shows, a relation of elaboration holds between the two sentences. It is also worth noting that Table 3.1 shows sentence 6 standing between sentence 5 and the diagram: the reference is embedded within text-flow and does not immediately precede the diagram. Thus, given the linear principle that governs text-flow, it may be more appropriate to describe the connection to the diagram established in sentence 5 as a navigation structure. This structure is

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realised using a direct reference in sentence 5 to caption 8: “These perspectives are suggested graphically in Figure 2.5.” We can use the navigation layer of the GeM model to explicate how the navigation structure is established. In sentence 5, ‘Figure 2.5’ acts as a pointer towards caption 8. It is caption 8, in turn, which identifies the accompanying figure as 2.5, that acts as an entry point in the navigation structure (Henschel, 2003, pp. 20–21). According to Taboada and Habel (2013), “rhetorical relations between figures and text can be understood as coherence links, contributing to the perceived coherence of a document” (p. 66). With the help of the GeM model and its multiple analytical layers, we can make increasingly precise observations about the nature of coherence in multimodal artefacts, situate them within the framework and consequently, complement Taboada and Habel’s (2013) already extensive description. The example in Figure 3.5 suggests that coherence can also be achieved using other means than drawing rhetorical relations between the content on the page. As I showed above for sentence 5 and the image-textcomplex, a navigation structure may also contribute towards coherence in a multimodal artefact: it may be suggested that the readers engaging with the research monograph genre expect the contributions from the graphic and diagrammatic modes to be signposted clearly within text-flow, either using the rhetorical structure or some other structure. Alternatively, this kind of signposting may involve the cooperation of multiple structures, such as rhetorical and navigation structures with typographic emphasis. As stated, the different kinds of structures found in multimodal artefacts are often intertwined. As Bernhardt (1985) writes: When a writer elects to make a text visually informative, the decision has consequences which extend down through the text to all levels of structuring, from the large rhetorical divisions of the text, to the intersentential strategies of cohesion, to the syntax of individual clauses. p. 19

So far, we have not considered the introductory sentence (4) on the page, except for its use of the bold typeface to emphasise certain nominal groups: “For documents in general one can essentially adopt three perspectives: the content view, the logical view, and the layout view.” As Figure 3.2 showed, these nominal groups are also rendered linguistically as labels in the diagrammatic mode. However, I also emphasised that the GeM model does not extend rhetorical analysis to nominal groups or clauses within sentences, nor does it deconstruct graphic or diagrammatic elements. Therefore, to account for the apparent textimage relations that lie beyond the reach of rhetorical analysis, we need to trace

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the steps outlined by Bernhardt (1985) and move from the rhetorical structure towards cohesion. In multimodal research, cohesion is often understood in terms set out for language by Halliday and Hasan (1976). Essentially, Halliday and Hasan (1976) treat cohesion in language as a non-structural resource for making meaning, that is, cohesion is not bound to any particular type of linguistic structure. In plain words, text achieves cohesion by talking about the same or related things, which together form a cohesive field of meaning. Within multimodal research, the concept of cohesion has been applied to the study of text-image relations by Royce (1998, 2007) and developed further in Liu and O’Halloran (2009). Bateman (2014b, p. 161) points out that it is not surprising that cohesion has gained currency in multimodal research, because the concept is not bound to any specific type of structure. Lacking the constraining notion of structure, cohesive ties may be readily drawn across multiple modes, as I have already shown in the case of the apparent links between the typographically-emphasised nominal groups in sentence (4) and their rendition in the diagrammatic mode in diagram (7). In this chapter, turning towards cohesion represents a departure from the approach pursued so far, which has emphasised the benefit of having the constrained notion of structure at hand. To examine cohesion in action, Table 3.2 tracks the cohesive ties found on page 52. As the table shows, cohesive ties may be found across the entire page, cross-cutting both text-flow and the diagram. Although Table 3.2 does not describe the actual mechanisms that create cohesion, for which proposals may be found in the work of Royce, Liu and O’Halloran, the table illustrates how the cohesive chains instantly weave a web across the entire page. As Taboada (2004, p. 168) points out, cohesive chains are rarely found in isolation: instead, they occur parallel to other chains. In this case, we may identify three cohesive chains, which correspond to the typographically-highlighted nominal groups: content view, logical view and layout view. The three chains are first introduced (4–6) and then visualised using the image-text-complex (7–8), followed by an examination of the first chain, that is, the content view. The logical and layout views are discussed later: for this reason, their cohesive chains disappear after sentence 8, because Table 3.2 does not extend beyond page 52. These chains are naturally picked up on the following pages. The reader is likely to know this as well, as such cohesive discontinuities are a common feature of the research monograph genre. Now, what does this brief analysis of cohesion reveal about multimodality on the page of a research monograph? The cohesive ties obviously cross-cut both text-flow and the diagram, but whether the analysis reveals any additional insights into the multimodal structure of the page is questionable.

72 table 3.2

hiippala Cohesive chains on page 52 of Bateman and Schmidt (2012). A bracketed letter l indicates a linguistic instance in the cohesive chain, whereas a bracketed letter v marks a visual instance. The cohesive chains are organised according to their respective topics: the content, logical, and layout views on document structure. The lines that span all three columns indicate where the chains merge.

Base unit

Content view

Logical view

Layout view

3 [Header] 4 5 [Pointer to 8] 6 7 [Diagram] 8 [Caption] 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

[ L: three general perspectives ] [L: the content view] [L: the logical view] [L: the layout view] [ L: these perspectives ] [ L: them ] [L: the content view] [L: the logical view] [L: the layout view] L: three basic perspectives ] [ [L: the content view perspective] [L: this view] [L: the notion of content] [L: the kind of content] [L: the content] [L: this] [L: a content portion] [L: such content portions]

In fact, it may be argued that the description of cohesive ties actually raises more questions, particularly in relation to how the typographically-emphasised nominal groups are used on the page. So far, we have worked with the assumption that these nominal groups were somehow related to the diagram. Given their position in Table 3.2, however, we may also consider whether the typographic resources are actually used to highlight the beginning of the three cohesive chains. This would mean that they are used as a structural cue to support metacognition, emphasising the most important topics to be discussed in the text, which extend beyond the page currently under analysis. At the same time, they can reinforce text-image relations on the page, but their presence would not be necessary: the diagram remains integrated into the artefact structure through the cross-reference in the navigational structure. Because the typographically highlighted text has the potential to serve two different purposes— highlight the beginning of cohesive chains and text-image relations—it may be suggested that this reflects precisely what Lemke (1998) called the multiplication of meaning on the page in scientific discourse.

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Generally, what this brief analysis implies is that we must evaluate the page in terms of multimodality, which encompasses far more than text-image relations. This proposition ties in particularly with Parodi’s (2012) observation that we must reconsider our often language-centric position and consider the page as an ensemble that works toward a common communicative goal. Depending on the artefact in question, the page will use the available texttypographic, graphic and diagrammatic resources as necessary to meet this goal. Moreover, the page is likely to have multiple strategies for doing so: for instance, as I showed above, text-image relations can be handled through both rhetoric and navigational structures. It is also possible to leave these relations to be handled by cohesion. However, in certain artefacts, such as the research monograph, abandoning the explicit references in the rhetorical or layout structure may result in reduced coherence, as the readers expect these relations to be set out using these structures. This concludes the analysis of page 52: in the following section, I will provide a brief summary of the analysis before considering its implications.

Conclusion In this chapter, I have described certain features of the research monograph as a multimodal artefact. First of all, I proposed that the research monograph can be described effectively by working with a specific definition of a semiotic mode, that is, examining its language-driven structure as text-flow. I then suggested that appropriate analytical tools can be used to reveal certain patterns that are characteristic of the research monograph as a genre realised using the book medium. These patterns, which comprised the layout, rhetorical and navigational structures, were described using the Genre and Multimodality model (Bateman, 2008; Hiippala, 2015). The layout structure, responsible for organising the content into hierarchies, revealed a relatively simple and shallow organisation: I proposed that the simple layout structure is motivated by the needs of using language for academic purposes. Unpacking the highly compressed meanings of academic discourse already requires significant effort from the reader. For this reason, the shallow hierarchy in the layout structure facilitates the reader’s access to the content, while simultaneously supporting the use of the artefact by signalling breaks in the text-flow, which may come in the form of tables, diagrams, and figures and other graphic and diagrammatic elements. To examine text-image relations in the research monograph, I analysed how text-flow handles relations between written language and the diagram on the

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page. I showed that text-image relations, which constitute one aspect of coherence in multimodal artefacts (Taboada & Habel, 2013; Bateman, 2014a), can also be realised using a navigation structure. Instead of embedding the diagram into the rhetorical structure, a direct reference is sufficient for integrating the diagram into the multimodal structure of the page, because the page constitutes a multimodal ensemble that works towards a shared communicative goal (cf. Hiippala, 2015, chapter 2). Finally, I considered aspects of cohesion, that is, how the page ensures continuity in presenting the subject matter, while also examining how typography can simultaneously support both cohesion and text-image relations. What I have attempted to show with this brief analysis of a single page in a research monograph is that by applying state-of-the-art theories and methods in multimodal analysis, we can also make useful observations about genres that may not be instantly perceived as multimodally interesting. In higher education, however, an improved understanding of such genres—the research monograph, for instance—may help to identify the most effective strategies for recontextualising its content in other genres, such as presentations, handouts, and in other media, such as blackboards or interactive whiteboards. The content may be recontextualised in various ways: the use of comics to introduce French critical theory (see O’Halloran, 1999) may be considered an extreme case, as this involves rendering the content using another semiotic mode (Bateman & Wildfeuer, 2014). A more ordinary situation facing the teacher may involve creating a slideshow using presentation software. From the perspective of this chapter, the recontextualisation of content involves a transition from one genre to another, which can also entail a change of the medium, for instance, from book to presentation. The contribution of the medium should not be underestimated, because it is the medium that makes the semiotic modes available. Apart from attending to the possibilities provided by dynamic digital media, this raises several questions for those working within areas of multimodal research and education: What are the most efficient strategies for recontextualising the content from research monographs in presentations? Can we summarise academic arguments realised using text-flow effectively in bullet points? Can we carry over the content in the diagrammatic mode to the presentation without any changes at all? Answering these kinds of questions will likely require input from researchers in education and other relevant fields specialising in the reception of learning materials, not to mention the students themselves. In any case, the more we know about multimodality in both ‘source’ and ‘target’ genres and media, the better. This leads us to the final point made in this chapter, that is, whether multimodal analysis can help the learners to better cope with research monographs.

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This does not, of course, involve them performing actual analyses of learning materials. Instead, an awareness of multimodality should provide various tools to support metacognition. Tracing the cohesive chains, for instance, may help to follow an argument in academic discourse. Based on my personal experience of teaching academic writing, students often tend to stop reading the moment they encounter an unfamiliar word or concept. Following through the cohesive chain on the page may help to contextualise the concept under discussion, and therefore, support strategic reading. Additionally, encouraging learners to attend to text-image relations may help them to make sense of the diagrammatic mode, and how this mode operates alongside text-flow. Moreover, explicating these structures to learners may help them to draw on their previous knowledge of complex multimodal genres acquired outside the classroom and consequently, help them to apply these literacies in academic contexts.

Acknowledgements I would like to thank Kate Maxwell and Ivan Berazhny for their comments on earlier versions of this chapter, and the Ella and Georg Ehrnrooth Foundation for supporting the research financially.

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chapter 4

Multimodality, Argument and the Persistence of Written Text Lesley Gourlay

Introduction In what is widely regarded as a foundational text, Kress and Van Leeuwen (2001) argue that in Western culture there has been a tendency towards monomodality across a range of areas of social and cultural life, citing the preponderance of un-illustrated text in highly-valued genres of writing as an example. They argue that this has begun to be broken down in contemporary practices, with a greater presence of multimodal texts drawing on a range of semiotic resources, including the visual. Their contention is that “within a given socialcultural domain, the ‘same’ meanings can often be expressed in different semiotic modes” (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2001, p. 1), to substantiate this point is the stated primary aim of the volume. They argue for this partly on the basis of the increased use of digitisation, which brings together modes which may have hitherto not been available for consumption or production via the same device. As they point out, the notion of a ‘grammar’ of various modes has been posited by a range of authors, such as Martinec (1998) looking at the semiotics of action, O’Toole’s (1994) work on the semiotics of images and their own work on images (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2006). (It is thought-provoking to note the use of the notion of ‘grammar’ to denote semiotic systems at work in these modes, as this is a term conventionally associated with language. This seems to imply that language is regarded here as the prototypical semiotic system, against which others should be compared, although it is worth noting that Kress has moved away from this notion in more recent work; see also Hiippala, chapter 3 this volume, on the dominance of written language in research monographs). They go on to compare the status of language as a system working through double articulation—message as form and meaning. This is contrasted with

Gourlay, L. (2016). Chapter 4. Multimodality, Argument and the Persistence of Written Text. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 79–90). Leiden: Brill.

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multimodal texts, which they claim as making meaning in multiple articulations. They use the term ‘strata’ to theorise multimodal communication— those of discourse, design, production and distribution. They also emphasise the importance of interpretation and an ‘interpretive community’—without which communication cannot be said to have taken place. As they point out, interpreters rely on semiotic knowledge of all of the four levels identified above. I will return to these constructs later in this chapter. As they put it: The field of discursive practice is social and therefore historical, and cannot be understood without a sense of the historical / social contingencies of the arrangement and configuration of practices and modes. Nor can we hope to understand fully the shaping and availability of modes and discourse without a clear sense of the embeddedness of semiosis in the social, and its historical shaping. kress & van leeuwen, 2001, p. 43

Academic communication relies on argument, a complex concept which may be defined in various ways. For the purposes of this paper I will be using the construct in the sense of “a connected series of statements or reasons intended to establish a position” (Andrews, 1995, p. 3). In argumentation theory, several commentators have argued for a greater recognition of the role of the visual. Birdsell and Groarke (1996) present a special issue of the journal Argumentation and Advocacy which explores the nature and importance of the nonverbal in argument, with a particular emphasis on the visual. Groarke notably continued to develop theories of the visual in argumentation (e.g. Groarke 2002; 2009). Drawing on this and other related work in argumentation theory (e.g. Gilbert 1994; Blair 1996), in a recent paper Barcelo Aspeitia (2012) argues that: … not all images used in argumentation play a merely illustrative or ornamental role. Instead, in some cases, images can substantially and directly contribute to the one of the key components of argumentation, i.e., the communication of propositional premises and conclusions. p. 356

He argues for what he terms heterogeneous arguments (following Barwise, 1993) which draw on both verbal and visual resources. His key claim is that images can convey propositional content without the need for verbalisation. He bases his argument on Stainton’s (2006) analysis of subsentential speech, where he proposes that this should not be understood as a form of syntactic ellipsis, but as a subsentential linguistic unit—“a bare phrase” (Barcelo Aspeitia, 2012,

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p. 357). The argument here is that when uttered in context, phrases which are not grammatically propositional can be grasped as full propositions. The example used by Stainton and referred to by Barcelo Aspeitia is reproduced below: Suppose Alice and Bruce are arguing. Bruce takes the position that there are not really any coloured objects. Alice disagrees. A day or so later, Alice meets Bruce. Having just read G.E. Moore, she offers the following argument. She picks up a red pen, and says ‘Red. Right?’ Bruce, guileless fellow that he is, happily agrees. Alice continues, ‘Red things are coloured things. Right?’ Bruce nods. At which point Alice springs her trap: ‘So Bruce, there is at least one coloured thing. This thing.’ stainton, 2006, p. 181; cited in barcelo aspeitia, 2012, p. 358

He argues that Alice conveyed the proposition not through linguistic ellipsis, but by the subsentential phrase plus the act of holding up the pen. Barcelo Aspeitia (2012) goes on to argue that the same holds for visual images, that they can contribute “novel and necessary information for the communication of arguments, without the need for fully sentential reconstruction” (2012, p. 359). He states his main aim as “to topple verbal language from its central place in argumentation, i.e. to show that non-linguistic entities like images can play a role in argumentation as substantial as that of phrases and sentences” (Barcelo Aspeitia, 2012, p. 359). He makes the point that verbal reconstruction of a full verbal proposition is not required in these heterogeneous arguments, a position which contradicts the claims made by other commentators in the field (e.g. Johnson, 2003; Tarnay, 2003; Alcolea-Banegas, 2009). In order for these arguments for be genuinely heterogeneous, Barcelo Aspeitia argues that the visual images must be seen not as mere clues used to recover ‘missing’ verbal elements, but must themselves be recognised as putting forward premises and conclusions. He uses the following example to illustrate this point: George and Hanna work at a petting zoo. The petting zoo sells small jars filled with food for the children to feed some of the animals. George and Hannah are in charge of labelling the jars. Instead of using words, they use pictures in their labels. Food for feeding sheep is labelled with a picture of a sheep, food for feeding llamas is labelled with a picture of a llama and so on. They have several jars filled with assorted vegetables, fruits, crackers, etc. Some they recognise easily, but for others it is a little harder. At a certain moment George picks up one of the unidentified jars and asks Hanna about its content. Hanna inspects its content and says ‘Let me see.

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It is mostly hay, but there are some vegetables in there too. I can see some chicory greens, kale, green pepper, red cabbage, and other stuff; but there are no rhubarb leaves or potatoes.’ So she takes one of the labels picturing a rabbit, sticks it on the jar and hands it to George. barcelo aspeitia, 2012, p. 364

It is worth pointing out that both Stainton and Barcelo Aspeitia build their arguments on invented (although plausible) examples of face-to-face spoken interaction, in which the visual element takes the form of gesturing towards or placing artifacts. It is also worth noting that the propositions carried by these visual artifacts are singular, not complex, and are embedded in surrounding verbal propositions. The case they make is a persuasive one for that type of context, but the question remains as to whether the same position can be maintained in the context of complex and sustained academic argument which is conventionally expressed in verbal written means over an extended text, involving a wide of range of specialist lexical items and complex grammatical features such as subordination, with reference to multiple other texts (see also Thesen, chapter 2 this volume, on the importance of gaze in the academic lecture). Working in contemporary rhetoric, Andrews (2014) also expresses the view that visual images can go beyond illustration and can constitute argument: … as far as visual argumentation is concerned, it is clear that images can be used as evidence for claims and propositions. In this role, they go beyond illustration to providing evidence in a court of law, as incontrovertible ‘fact’ in support of a thesis, or as a diagram of a process to be followed and that is based on a procedure that has been expressed verbally. But images can fulfil the function of claims and propositions themselves because of their multiple signification, and especially if they are juxtaposed with other images and/or they are set in a sequence that allows logical or quasi-logical connection. Their articulation constitutes an argument rather than merely persuading. andrews, 2014, p. 85

Andrews cites as an academic example Strickland’s Engladesh, which is no longer available online. This was a multimodal slide sequence submitted as an ma dissertation in Photojournalism at City University, London. The use of visual images and other forms of nonverbal artifact is an established part of academic representation in the creative arts, where students may submit visual or three-dimensional work as a major part of their thesis (See Richards

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et al., 2012 for a comprehensive exploration of digital and multimodal theses). However, there is still a requirement to provide a written academic commentary to accompany the piece. In Andrews’ view, what distinguishes Strickland’s piece was the very minimal use of verbal text, leading to an artifact which is almost entirely visual. Richards contends that the sequencing and juxtapositioning of images in the photo essay lead to a visual academic argument in this case. However, it is worth pointing out that Strickland’s piece was submitted for a degree in photojournalism, where the photo essay is an established genre, and is it likely that the work was being judged to a large extent on the basis of its merits in terms of that inherently visual discipline and field of creative and professional practice (see also Bell, chapter 7, this volume). Bayne and Ross (2013) report on a nonverbal ‘digital essay’ which they used to assess a module as part of an online ma in Digital Education. They focus on a digital artifact created by a student in the virtual world of Second Life™, focusing on Donna Haraway’s (1991) well-known theoretical work on the notion of the cyborg. The student created a virtual 3d ‘Imaginarium’ in this virtual environment, and deployed a series of images relating to the theme. As they describe it: Images of pages from books and articles consulted in creating the piece are scattered on the floor, as if in reference to the inadequacy of conventional academic citation norms to take account of the volatility of digital texts. To the left (off screen) is a teleporter which leads to an imax-type theatre, on which is displayed a looped video of cyborg imagery in films. Downstairs is a Second Life ‘chatbot’ called Unheimliche (‘unhomely’) who welcomes visitors and engages them in automated chat, delegating the speaking ‘voice’ of the essay to a non-human agent in a way which explicitly engages with the notion of the posthuman and its literacies. bayne & ross, 2013, p. 103

Minimal written text is used, and images of broken cyborgs are deployed throughout. Through this assignment Bayne and Ross explicitly encourage students to ‘take a stance against representationalism’, from a posthuman perspective, which questions assumptions about the stable and autonomous human author. As they put it: Here textuality becomes more complex, more diverse, and more visual, as the image and the logic of the screen topples the dominance of the written word and the logic of the printed page. When students engage with

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new forms of textuality in their academic meaning-making practices, academic discourse becomes newly strange, and the familiar is rendered unfamiliar. bayne & ross, 2013, p. 103

Bayne and Ross (2013) deliberately create a challenge for the reader / assessor, as essayist literacy has been deliberately rejected, leading to a shift in act of interpretation required for assessment, which becomes more explicitly dependent on “the intersubjectivity of the assessor and the assessed” (103). However, it is worth noting that—like Strickland 2008—this visual artifact and argument was constituted in a medium which was closely associated with a substantive focus of the course, in this case posthumanism and digital textuality. Here the visual has been chosen as a medium of argumentation in order to critique conventional essayist literacy, and also to draw out the substantive points of the module surrounding the radically distributed nature of authorship across the human and nonhuman in digital environments. This is a striking and innovative approach which powerfully disrupts notions of authorship and agency around digital texts. However, given that interpretation of the text depends on the ‘intersubjectivity’ of the assessor and the assessed, it seems likely that this Imaginarium would not function as a text beyond the context of this course. This may have been an accepted element of this radical pedagogical approach taken by Bayne and Ross, but it does limit the applicability of this type of approach beyond the expression of this very specialist and reflexive point. Additionally, it might be argued that the Imaginarium in a sense presents only one substantive proposition—that authorship, agency and textuality are radically dispersed across human and nonhuman actors. This is a striking and important point within the context of this course, but I would argue that this does not constitute a persuasive case for a wholesale rejection of conventional academic writing as a result, given the apparent limitations of this nonverbal approach in terms of sharing meaning beyond that context. Their second example is of a video focusing on the notion of the flaneur, depicting a flyover of Lower Manhattan. This is also a radically different approach to the conventional written essay, however it is accompanied by a voiceover using ‘conventional academic prose’, and so does not constitute a nonverbal academic argument per se. Ingraham (2005) presents a case for the possibility of sustaining academic argument without using written verbal text, proposing a bbc programme (bbc 2001) plus accompanying website about prehistoric wildlife as an example. I have already developed an extended critique of Ingraham’s chapter (Gourlay, 2012). In summary, my objections centre on the fact that the programme con-

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tains verbal commentary throughout, and that the website also deploys written text alongside the images. As above, the argument is carried here primarily by verbal texts, and where the visual images do carry argument it relies on viewers’ prior familiarity with the tropes and relatively simple messages conveyed by conventional wildlife documentaries. The literature reviewed above seems to have established that visual images can be used to express propositions in relatively simple spoken interactions in conjunction with speech (e.g. Barcelo Aspeitia, 2012). In academic contexts, it has been argued that visual images alone can also express argument (e.g. Bayne & Ross, 2013; Andrews, 2014), although the visual or reflexive nature of these disciplinary contexts and assignments should also be borne in mind. Ingraham (2005) establishes that visual images and video can carry academic argument up to a point, but the persuasiveness of his position was undermined by the presence of heavy verbal scaffolding in the example given. Arguably, the claim that visual images can carry complex academic argument without the support of spoken or written text has yet to be made convincingly in the literature. In the rest of the paper I will argue that although visual images can be deployed to great effect as part of multimodal (or heterogeneous) argument alongside verbal or written text, visual images alone do not confer the features required for the construction of complex and extended academic argument.

Ambiguity, Metaphor and Denotation This first difficulty with carrying complex academic argument in predominantly or solely visual formats lies with the precision and clarity that it might offer in terms of communication. Although language is not a static system and is constantly in flux and open to interpretation, it is relatively stable in terms of shared meanings or lexical items and grammatical structures. These shared meanings—although fuzzy and open to contestation—are reinforced to some extent by everyday nonacademic language use, formal education, artifacts such as dictionaries, and established generic conventions of academic writing. Concepts may be referred to in a way which assumes a relatively close and precise shared meaning between writer and readers. The importance of precision in this regard can be seen in the prevalence of definitions of terms in academic writing, emphasising the importance of clear and (at least temporarily) stable shared meaning. This seems indispensible when seeking to construct an academic argument, particularly in contexts where a range of inter-related terms are used, or the same terms are used and deployed slightly differently by different authors. Precision and differentiation between closely-related meanings is

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often at the heart of academic argument, and language—with its enormous range of lexical items—provides this. Language should also be seen as in a co-constitutive relationship with the social context of use as opposed to being prior to it—academic enquiry has led to the coinage of range of terms, in order to make the fine and nuanced distinctions required for high-level academic argument. Similarly, grammatical structures are used to communicate exact relationships between these referents. There may be a range of legitimate reasons to critique and question academic genre and conventions, and to seek to explore alternatives. However, language confers access to meanings such as tense and mood, which can be used to communicate a range of complex meanings such as sequence, causality and critique in a generally agreed shared code, and as such seems more suited to complex academic argumentation either used alone or in conjunction with multimodal forms of expression. In contrast, it might be argued that visual images (I am excluding diagrams and tables here) have conventionally been used to construct meaning in a rather different way—symbolically and metaphorically, as opposed to in the more restricted precise denotative relationship offered by a lexical item. An image may be widely recognized, but precisely what it should be understood to denote may be more ambiguous and open to individual interpretation. This becomes more complicated when seeking to construct a complex extended argument by linking a series of propositions together in relationships of comparison, contrast and critique through the justaposition of images, as opposed deploying the relative precision of lexis and grammatical structure. How this might be achieved unambiguously and in a shared and agreed format is hard to imagine, and has not yet been exemplified in the literature. In this situation a greater burden of interpretation falls on the reader and their individual standpoint—in Kress and Van Leeuwen’s (2001) terms, there is a lack of a stable interpretive community and broad agreement about the meaning of images in terms of the strata of discourse, design, production and distribution.

Reliance on Verbal / Written Proposition Additionally, it might also be argued that where visual images do succeed in carrying propositions, they do so through reliance on surrounding or preceding verbal texts as scaffolding. As can be seen above, verbal propositions structure the visual in the analysis offered by Barcelo Aspeitia (2012). It could also be argued that meanings conveyed by the student in the nonverbal digital Imaginarium presented in Second Life not only depend on prior knowledge on the part of the author of a highly complex and extended set of written texts, but

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also prior knowledge of those texts on the part of the ‘reader’. In that sense, the example of the images of cyborgs and so on function rather like a citation to prior written texts which must also have been read, as opposed to a denotation of a concept. This is admittedly a fine distinction, as it could be argued that concepts also need prior knowledge and exposure in order to be recognised and shared. However, my point here is that the burden of detailed argumentation still falls on the preceding foundational written texts. The expression of a complex sequence of propositions is not in fact required of the visual Imaginarium, if the assumption is made that the ‘knowing’ readership (in the form of the course tutors and fellow students) is already familiar with foregoing texts and conceptual framework. The image then comes to stand for a bundle of associated meanings, as opposed to conveying a structured and sequenced set of propositions in the form of an argument. Admittedly this is one case, and it should be acknowledged that all academic argument relies on familiarity with prior texts, but it is difficult to see how—given the problems with precision highlighted above—it would be possible to convey a ‘new’ academic argument which interweaves prior reading via visual images, without heavy scaffolding in the form of written texts, either co-present with the images or acting as supporting texts without which the image could not be interpreted precisely.

Intertextuality and Amenability to Critique In a related point, a final objection might be made to the notion that academic argument can be conveyed purely or predominantly by the use of visual images. Literature review and the critique of previous research and theory form an important and necessary part of academic argument. This presents an additional challenge when seeking to present an argument via visual images, in terms of how these might be deployed to refer to and convey in a nuanced and critical way the work of others, theoretical propositions and so on, and how to synthesise, compare and discuss these clearly and unambiguously. It is undeniable that visual images can be a powerful means of conveying critique through pastiche and irony, such as via political cartoons (although again arguably they are reliant on familiarity with news via written and verbal means). However, the dense, precise and closely-argued nature of much academic argumentation in reference to other academics texts seems to demand a system which delivers nuance and can be readily and relatively unambiguously shared with a readership beyond the immediate context of text production—the complexity of language still appears better-suited to the task than images alone. Although it is constantly evolving, language has powerful constructs governing this relative

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stability as a shared code, such as standard grammar, spelling, and dictionary definitions of lexical items. In addition, it is organised into recognizable written genres which convey ‘chunks’ of meaning which guide the reader towards a recognition of propositional meaning. Rightly or wrongly, it arguably remains the dominant semiotic mode in education, which also contributes to this stability as a shared and relatively unambiguous semiotic resource, unlike the visual.

Conclusion In this chapter I have sought to examine the contention that complex academic argument can be expressed solely or predominantly through visual images. Reviewing related literature from learning technologies, argumentation theory and new rhetoric, I have argued that—despite offering some thoughtprovoking or even radical challenges to established conventions of written academic argument and essayist literacies—the examples given did not amount to a persuasive case that visual semiotic resources alone are capable of conferring the level of detail, complexity and precision required for academic argumentation. In the second part of the chapter I argued that this is not possible, due to a series of limitations of the visual when compared to linguistic text. These centred on ambiguity of visual images, which I argued leads to a lack of stability in terms of interpretive community. While acknowledging the instability of language itself, and the legitimate criticisms which can be made of academic textual conventions, I contended that written text is still more suited than visual images in those terms due to its more strongly codified and therefore shared nature. I also made the point that visual propositions depend on accompanying or preceding verbal texts (spoken or written) in order to convey meanings in an unambiguous way. My final point was that language remains preferable to visual images for the expression of critique, and also amenability to critique by the readership. Challenges to conventional essayist literacies are often based on accusations that these genres are exclusionary or needlessly formal—these are all valid criticisms, and the field of multimodality studies offers fresh and radical new ways of expressing academic ideas in an increasingly digital society and academy. However, some of the features of written text can in fact be seen as shared, inclusive and highly generative, whether used alone in ‘conventional’ texts or in combination with multimodal semiotic resources. What is seen as ‘academic writing’ is contestable and always emergent and conventions are not fixed and notions of authorship are also amenable to challenge, for example through the radically distributed authorship exhibited in wikis. In this regard, I would sug-

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gest that the field guard against an overly oppositional stance which results in ‘conventional’ texts being demonised as inherently retrograde and therefore problematic. Instead these might be seen as a powerfully generative set of genres which can evolve in response to digital mediation, and in doing so embrace the richness and disruptive potential of multimodal semiosis without sacrificing the precision, shared code and amenability to critique which they confer.

References Alcolea-Banegas, J. (2009). Visual Arguments in Film. Argumentation, 23, 259–275. Andrews, R. (1995) Teaching and Learning Argument. London: Cassell. Andrews, R., Borg, E., Boyd-Davis, S., Domingo, M. & England, J. (Eds.) (2012). The sage Handbook of Digital Dissertations and Theses. London: sage. Andrews, R. (2014). A Theory of Contemporary Rhetoric. London: Routledge. Barcelo Aspeitia, A. (2012). Words and Images in Argumentation. Argumentation, 26, 355–368. Bayne, S., & Ross, J. (2013). Posthuman Literacy in Heterotopic Space: A Pedagogical Proposal. In R. Goodfellow, & M. Lea (Eds.), Literacy in the Digital University: Critical Perspectives on Learning, Scholarship and Technology (pp. 95–110). London: Routledge. Barwise, Jon. (1993). Heterogenous Reasoning. In J. Barwise & G. Allwein. (Eds.), Working Papers on Diagrams and Logic (pp. 1–13). Bloomington: Indiana University Logic Group. bbc 2001. Walking with Beasts: Episode 6 Mammoth Journey. Retrieved December 17, 2014, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=No6t6yl_imE. Birdsell, D., & Groarke, L. (1996). Toward a Theory of Visual Argument. Argument and Advocacy, 33(1), 1–10. Blair, J. (1996). The Possibility and Actuality of Visual Arguments. Argumentation and Advocacy, 33, 23–39. Gilbert, M. (1994). Multi-Modal Argumentation. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 24, 159–177. Gourlay, L. (2012). Media Systems, Multimodality and Posthumanism. In Andrews, R., Borg, E., Boyd-Davis, S., Domingo, M. & England, J. (Eds.), The sage Handbook of Digital Dissertations and Theses (pp. 85–100). London: sage. Groarke, L. (2002). Towards a Pragma-Dialectics of Visual Argument. In F. van Eemeren (Ed.), Advances in Pragma-Dialectics (pp. 137–151). Amsterdam: SicSat. Groarke, L. (2009). Five Theses on Toulmin and Visual argument. In F. van Eemeren & B. Garssen (Eds.), Pondering on Problems of Argumentation: Twenty Essays on Theoretical Issues (pp. 229–239). Amsterdam: Springer.

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Haraway, D. (1991). A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century. In D. Haraway, Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature (pp. 149–181). New York: Routledge. Ingraham, B. (2005). Ambulating with Mega-Fauna. In R. Land & S. Bayne. Education in Cyberspace (pp. 45–54). Abingdon: RoutledgeFalmer. Johnson, R. (2003). Why Visual Arguments Aren’t Arguments. In il@25. A Conference Celebrating the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of the First International Symposium on Informal Logic. Retrieved April 29, 2015, from http://web2.uwindsor.ca/courses/philosophy/johnsoa/visargtext.htm. Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the New Media Age. London: Routledge. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal Discourse: The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication. London: Routledge. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2006). Reading Images: The Grammar of Visual Design (2nd ed.). London: Routledge. Martinec, R. (1998). Cohesion in Action. Semiotica, 120(1–2), 161–180. O’Toole, M. (1994). The Language of Displayed Art. Leicester: Leicester University Press. Stainton, R. (2006). Words and Thoughts: Subsentences, Ellipsis and the Philosophy of Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tarnay, L. (2003). The Conceptual Basis of Visual Argumentation. In F. van Eemeren, J. Blair, C. Willard & A. Snoeck Henkemans (Eds.), Proceedings of the Fifth Conference International Society for the Study of Argumentation (pp. 1001–1005). Amsterdam: International Centre for the Study of Argumentation.

part 2 Multimodality in Text Composition

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chapter 5

Multimodal Academic Argument: Ways of Organising Knowledge across Writing and Image Arlene Archer

Introduction This chapter focuses on the ways in which academic argument is constituted in multimodal texts. In teaching argument, the mode of writing has generally been emphasised in the academic domain (see also Gourlay, chapter 4 this volume). However, academic texts of many kinds rely on the co-presence of graphic material and writing, and images are becoming increasingly important as carriers of meaning. It is thus important to think about the ways in which academic argument is constructed in speech, writing and images, as well as in the relations between these modes. Three semiotic systems are employed in most academic assignments. These include written language, images, and what Matthiessen (2007) calls “visual paralanguage” which includes font and layout (p. 24). In the composition of printed academic assignments, the semiotic labour is divided among these different semiotic systems, and the nature of this division depends on the disciplinary context or on the focus of the assignment topic. Increased ease and speed of access to different semiotic resources due to technological innovations leads to “quicker mixes, assembly, reassembly and distribution of these modes” (Coffin, 2009, p. 515). Also, there are changes in the division of labour between image and writing in a range of registers contributed to by the Internet, multimedia technologies, as well as other factors. These changes in the division of labour have resulted in changes in learning materials (see Bezemer & Kress, 2008), as well as in the texts students need to produce for assessment purposes in Higher Education.

Archer, A. (2016). Chapter 5. Multimodal Academic Argument: Ways of Organising Knowledge across Writing and Image. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 93–113). Leiden: Brill.

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What is Multimodal Academic Argument? Academic argument engages with ideas in the world, and with the existing positions and conventions of the discipline. It is a semiotic practice which has evolved to do specialised kinds of theoretical and practical work. Factors such as the purpose, the task, and the discipline influence the way in which argument works and the forms it takes (Coffin, 2009, p. 513). Broadly speaking, knowledge is often produced through negation and opposition, which involves positing a thesis, an antithesis and some new kind of synthesis. More specifically defined, argument is a quasi-logical set of ideas that is supported by evidence (Andrews, 2010). Evidence can be the existing accepted material that an ‘arguer’ embraces, or resists, but nonetheless draws on to establish a position. It is often seen as impersonal or objective. However, producing academic argument is a social process, where the production of texts reflects methodologies, arguments and rhetorical strategies of situated authors who adopt interactional and evaluative positions in order to engage their peers (Hyland, 1999; see also Thesen, chapter 2 this volume). According to Kress (1989), argument is a cultural textual form that produces ‘difference’ rather than closure. In other words, argument can foreground difference, produce ambiguity, and so open the space for reconsideration, for a shift in values and attitudes, and for an extension of thought and investigation. By providing the means for foregrounding and accepting difference, argument has the function of producing “new cultural values and knowledge” (Kress, 1989, p. 12). The notion of ‘difference’ offers insight into how tension is established in argument. Configurations of modes can construct difference variously through juxtaposition, comparison and ambiguity, in order to unsettle and question certain assumptions and perceived dominant ideas. Academic argument can thus open up a range of possible readings, through encouragement of mis-reading and ambivalence, but can also close down possible meanings. In multimodal argument, it is necessary to look at the relationship between different modes in terms of reinforcement of or opposition against a proposition (Andrews, 2010). ‘Mode’ refers to a socially and culturally shaped resource for making meaning, such as written language, spoken language, visual representation (Kress, 2010; Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2001). There are many examples of multimodal academic argument realised through a range of modes and media. For instance, McCloud (1994) uses the medium of the comic to make an argument about representation. Huang (2015) examines academic argument in comics, digital video and PowerPoint. She looks at how these multimodal texts enable reconsideration of what constitutes academic argument and what counts as evidence in different genres. For instance, the construction and pre-

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sentation of evidence in comic form may be quite different from video, as may other practices crucial to academic argument such as citation. Huang goes a long way in terms of establishing a metaview of academic argument. She looks at organisational structures and how they reflect the logic of argument, rhetorical strategies employed, and the ways in which ‘difference’ is established in different media. In thinking about how visual and verbal modes realise academic argument, it is useful to bear in mind the different affordances of these modes, namely their potentials and constraints for meaning making. In terms of design logics (Kress, 2003), written language has a linear sequential logic (where font type, font size and consistent headings follow a linear path) and images tend to have a non-linear logic of space (where different pathways are established through the text). The sentence or written line is a perfect example of syntagmatic logic where the words as signs only have meaning in relation to each other. On the other hand, in paradigmatic logic, more of the meaning is placed in the individual elements of the composition, for example, a visual that represents the characteristics of a particular group. Thus, generally speaking, language tends to realise sequential relations better than images which realise spatial relations. Although, one could complicate these categories by arguing that the underlying logic of writing is spatial, as illustrated by, for instance, the functioning of Braille (Harris, 1995, p. 45). The boundaries between writing and images seem blurred at times, but there is a clear semiotic distinction between them—both in terms of what they represent, and in terms of their potential for being ‘read’. Also, modes impose particular ‘epistemological commitments’ (Kress, 2003). For instance, the image of a building would have to be more specific than the written word ‘building’ in terms of style, types of doors and windows, roof line—pointing to a ‘type’ of building, even if it is a generic representation. The idea of epistemological commitment points to the fact that some modes are better than others for certain kinds of representational work. For instance, in the image, the windows of the building may be blue and made out of wood. This detail may not necessarily be described in the written mode, and points to the modal affordance of greater specificity in the visual mode. The type of image chosen to realise a particular function is key to academic argument in a multimodal composition, such as photographs for ‘observation’ images, as opposed to a diagram for more conceptual images. Here, the questions could be ‘What is the role of the image or the writing in communicating the argument?’ or ‘How is the specific image chosen apt in communicating the argument?’ The function of images in a history course in architecture is different to, say, a Design course. In a history course in architecture, images can

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be used to emphasise a building in its context or to demonstrate particular structural aspects. In Design courses, however, the image or the model is the argument, it does not represent the argument. Thus far, this chapter has outlined a definition of academic argument and looked at some considerations for multimodal argument, including the establishing of difference, use of evidence, affordances of modes, and choice of images. It now looks at the methodological approach employed to look at multimodal academic argument in the first year History and Theory of Architecture assignments.

Methodological Approach The theoretical approach taken here is multimodal social semiotics where meaning is seen to be context-dependent (Jewitt, 2014; Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2006; Stein, 2008; Van Leeuwen, 2005). The approach focuses on “the relationship among texts, social contexts, and the social practices language and other modes realise” (Stein, 2000, p. 334). A multimodal social semiotic approach highlights the decentring of language as the privileged mode and the need to take into account a range of modes in order to explore how argument is constructed. A social semiotic approach is based on a metafunctional view of communication (Halliday, 1978). According to this, academic argument is comprised of resources that reflect upon issues in the world (the ideational); resources that position the audience in relation to the argument (the interpersonal); and resources that organise texts and create coherence in argument (textual metafunction). Broadly speaking, the ideational resources this chapter outlines include the underlying ways of organising knowledge in academic argument, namely narrative, juxtaposition, induction, classification and comparison. The interpersonal resources it explores in relation to academic argument include citation and modality. Lastly, the textual resources relate to composition and layout, and include arrangement (left, right, top, bottom, centre, periphery) and foregrounding (in or out of focus, size, colour, spatial positioning, directionality of vectors, framing). A methodological concern about a social semiotic approach could be that it separates out and reifies the different modes and discourses in a text, whilst ignoring the situated uses of the text. However, rather than seeing the meaning of the text as divisible into a number of separate semiotic modes, a social semiotic approach looks at how the interactions of modes make meaning within particular texts and contexts (Alyousef & Mickan, chapter 10 this volume; Roehrich, chapter 11 this volume). In exploring multimodal academic argu-

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ment, this chapter looks at the ways in which certain functions are distributed across both visual and verbal modes. It explores this in student-generated texts in first and second year courses in architecture because here one often sees direct clashes between discourses which highlight the arbitrary nature of norms and conventions. It is also useful to see what students are grappling with in order to focus our pedagogical interventions and facilitate access to the discursive practices of the discipline (Williams, chapter 6 this volume). For this study, student essays were gathered from a first year course in History and Theory of Architecture (on 2 different essay topics). Both topics required the students to do a comparison of two buildings. In the first, they had to compare two similar buildings, such as town halls or churches. They were asked to “illustrate by way of analytical drawings done on site, the basic similarities and differences” in the buildings in terms of form, space, structure, movement and light. In the second topic, they had to critically assess whether or not a popular shopping centre in Cape Town, namely Century City, abides by the principles of Renaissance architecture. 80 essays per topic were analysed in order to identify trends in argument structure, and to provide examples to exemplify these trends. In outlining the contours of multimodal academic argument in student texts in Higher Education, the chapter now considers the work of each semiotic mode and their inter-relations, and the underlying ways of organising knowledge across modes in argument.

Argument Realised through Image-Writing Relations Contrary to Gourlay’s chapter (this volume), this chapter is not focusing on the question of whether a single image can construct academic argument. Rather, it looks at the relations between images, and between image and writing in multimodal texts. Here, what is of interest is the functional load of different modes in realising argument, and which aspects of argument are represented in what mode. Look at figure 5.1 as an example of how argument is realised through image-writing relations. This example is taken from the second assignment which required students to focus on the contemporary shopping and living centre, Century City, in Cape Town. Figure 5.1 appears at the beginning of the essay and its function is to locate Century City in its urban context. The aerial photograph taken from google maps is appropriate for this function. The caption is an example of elaboration—it is ‘specification’ as the words pick out one of the possible meanings of the image, or ‘anchorage’ in Barthes’ (1977) terms. The words focus the

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figure 5.1 Example of visual-verbal linkages in a first year student essay

reading of the image onto some of the social and contextual circumstances of Century City, and thus constrain the number of possible readings one could generate. The caption assumes that the offered interpretation for the image is self-evident: “It is evident that this ‘city’ does not seem to fit in with the context of its surroundings”. However, a substantial amount of contextual knowledge is needed to generate this reading. It would be necessary, for instance, to know that Century City is constructed in a living area previously designated not for whites, under the previous apartheid regime. The student puts quotation marks around the word ‘city’ in order to question the notion of Century City being a city which would include public facilities not solely aimed at financial gain, like schools and libraries. For these reasons, the opulence and consumerism of Century City fit somewhat uncomfortably in the surrounding poorer area. The caption claims that “Century City is quite clearly a demarcated area of its own”. Again, this assumes prior knowledge and Century City as a separate area is not

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figure 5.2 Caption as delimiting argument

indicated in any way through the use of a different colour or through the use of a border. Yet, the ‘city’ is a walled and gated one, separating itself very clearly from the impoverished surroundings. Although this caption serves to elaborate on the image and to specify one particular way of looking at it, it does assume a large amount of prior knowledge on the part of the reader. The image and the caption both form part of the larger argument that the student is making about the artificial and commercial nature of Century City. Let us look at another example of argument conveyed through the interaction between writing and image. Figure 5.2 is also taken from the assignment that required students to look at the influence of Renaissance features on Century City. The use of captions here is interesting. The student has used informal language and sentence fragments to convey disregard for what has been done with Renaissance architecture in the construction of the Century City complex, implying that the images on the walls are merely paint not art, are not carefully considered nor culturally embedded. The implication is that Century City’s architects copied Renaissance features (poorly) for their picturesque qualities in order to signify wealth and prosperity in the particular social and political context in Cape Town. It would be impossible to get this reading from the image alone, and the caption thus delimits the way we look at the image, especially in conjunction with the image of the Invalides alongside. The image dealing with Renaissance architecture from the past, the Invalides, has a more formal cap-

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tion, even though the descriptive language used is still judgmental: “these walls are sincere”. The sense of time and effort is used as evidence to validate the student’s judgement: “weeks were spent creating an intricate façade”. The student puts quotation marks around the word ‘decoration’ to indicate that the inside façade of the Invalides in Paris is about creating a space and is not a mindless ‘add on’, which the trivialising word ‘decoration’ may imply. The argument here is not only established through the visual-verbal relations (of the images and the captions), but also through the juxtaposition of images. This is discussed in the next section of the chapter which looks at underlying ways of organising knowledge in academic argument.

Ways of Organising Knowledge in Multimodal Argument As stated above, argument is a principle of textual organisation. In thinking about argument in multimodal academic discourse then, it is useful to consider the relations between entities, namely represented people, places, things and ideas, and the ways in which patterns encode ideational meanings. A crucial aspect of argument can be the representation of direct observation, description of an object, or some kind of freezing of experience. This is common in architecture. The underlying organisation of knowledge in textual representation can be either narrative or conceptual (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2006). Narrative structure can be used to represent sequencing in time (including representation of a procedure), but can also be used to represent change from one state to another. Conceptual patterns represent participants in terms of their classification, their analytical and symbolic processes, their generalised states of being. There are different types of conceptual patterns underlying academic argument. Argument based on comparisons is conceptual and based on underlying classifications that represent similarity and differences. Thus, classification taxonomies and analytical hierarchies are an important aspect of academic argument. Another conceptual pattern in argument is ‘induction’ which shows how or why something happens, for example, a process-oriented image like the water cycle. Lastly, argument can be realised through abstract modeling of some domain or a dialectic between the abstract and the concrete, such as in architectural perspective. Although there are many underlying patterns to argument, the chapter looks at four ways of organising knowledge in multimodal academic argument, namely narrative, contrast, induction and comparison.

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Arguing through Narrative: Change over Time In Reading Images, Kress and Van Leeuwen (2006) defined narrative patterns broadly as having participants and vectors of action; and serving “to present unfolding actions and events, processes of change” (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2006, p. 56). Narrative structure can be used to represent sequencing in time, but can also be used to represent change from one state to another. For instance, in a photoshop assignment in the architecture course, students had to indicate changes to a particular street over time. Using layering, the depiction of ‘before’ and ‘after’ had to be overlaid on one image, to indicate pre and post renovation (see Archer, 2013). In figure 5.3, change over time is depicted in a single schematic diagram. Colour coding is used to show stages in the development of the building. According to the key, the original walls (indicated in purple) were built in 1701 and included the sitting room, staff room and lower hall. Most of the rest of the building was added between 1760 and 1771 (indicated in blue), with the final addition of the music room sometime between 1774 and 1790 (indicated in red). Here, narrative is characterised by processes of change over time and information is structured as a series of unfolding events. Argument through Contrast Argument can be established through contrast, where a juxtaposition sets up a tension between images. Andrews (2010) posits that for argument to be present in a single image, there needs to be some kind of tension within the image, or there must be at least two images juxtaposed in order to explore tensions. Such juxtaposition creates the opportunity for inference through comparison. “It is as though we are presented with evidence but without the propositions; we are asked to provide these for ourselves” (Andrews, 2010, p. 51). See figure 5.4 for an argument established through contrast and juxtaposition. The underlying structure of the argument in figure 5.4 is a binary, where two images are juxtaposed in order to valorise the one over the other. Binaries can indicate either trajectory from one state to another or opposition. Binaries are never neutral—one pole of the opposition is always valorised. This kind of analytical binary is more common in the architecture assignments, than binaries which indicate change through narrative structures. This example also illustrates that positioning is important in visual argument. In this case, it is left/right positioning, but a binary can equally operate on a top/bottom positioning. In figure 5.4, the order of the images is important as they move from photographs of the contemporary shopping centre (the ‘given’) to a diagram of the ideal (the ‘new’) which is removed in time and space from the student.

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figure 5.3 Single image depicting change over time

The argument is realised both through the juxtaposition of images, creating ‘difference’, and through the captions, which communicate a sense of aesthetic and moral outrage. Here, Kress’s (1989) notion that argument foregrounds difference is pertinent, as this juxtaposition opens the space for reconsideration, for a shift in values and attitudes. There is ideational contrast within the same

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figure 5.4 Argument established through juxtaposition of images

mode (the contrasting of two images) and contrast between different modes, namely the image and the writing. There are two images showing ‘rustication’ (a type of decorative masonry) at Century City—one of the exterior, and one of a pillar in the interior. The caption for the Century City images implies a lack of sophistication: A simplified version of rustication; “where simplicity cannot work, simpleness results” venturi, 1966, p. 24

The architectural elements used in Century City are taken from an environment completely foreign to the South African context and are copied for purely picturesque reasons rather than for structural purposes. The image of the Palazzo Bevilacqua is presented as ‘speaking for itself’ in terms of sophistication, integrity and antiquity. This is not explicitly mentioned in the caption. Rather, the argument is made in the relation established between the two images and the caption underneath the first image. Arguing through Induction: Relating the Particular to the General Theorising the relation of the particular to the general is crucial in academic argument. This can be both descriptive (backward-looking) and predictive (forward-looking). In other words, one can generalise from the specific instance, as well as make predictions about specific cases based on the general. Key to ‘generalising’ is the underlying classification of concepts according to categories. See figure 5.5 as an example of classification.

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figure 5.5 An example of classification in order to generalise from the particular ‘type’

The image points to an example of one ‘type’ of architecture, namely ‘Cape Dutch’ architecture. However, the argument about ‘type’ here is not carried through in both the written and visual modes. There is a slight disjuncture between the surrounding writing (which talks about Groot Constantia) and the image (which is of the Tulbach Guest House). The image serves the function of filling the content gap in the written explanation between the description of Groot Constantia, and the statement that a definitive South African architectural language was born. It is as though using the image provides the readymade explanation of the features of “typical Cape Dutch” architecture, namely the rounded gable, thatched roof, sash windows and whitewashed walls, without having to explain these features in words. This points to the functional specialisation of the visual mode mentioned earlier, where the image is more specific than the written text—the shape of the building has to be shown in the image, whereas it need not be described in the writing. The positioning of “(fig. 2)” is important in the written text. If placed after “Van der Stel built Groot Constantia, a superb example of the typical Cape Dutch homestead” then it would probably exemplify that statement, making the disjuncture between ‘Groot Constantia’ and ‘Tulbach Guest House’ even larger. In its current position (after “A definitive South African architectural language was born”), it points to a ‘type’ of architecture, rather than a specific building.

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figure 5.6 Comparison based on classification

Arguing through Comparison Based on Classification Multimodal academic argument can also be realised through comparisons (both similarities and differences) which are based on underlying classifications. Arguing through comparison is the dominant structure underlying the two architecture assignments as the task requirement was to compare eras and buildings. This comparison requires underlying classification of certain features of the two buildings under discussion. See figure 5.6 for an example of the way in which comparison can be built into a ‘single’ image, almost in the form of a collage. The images are grouped according to the category of ‘domes’. Figure 5.6 combines photographs of domes from the Renaissance with a photograph of Century City (top right). These images are not labelled or identified, simply presented as a visual argument that Century City draws on Renaissance architecture in the form of domes in its design. A comparison could be weakened if only images of Renaissance architecture were included with no comparison explicitly made between Century City and Renaissance architecture. Confusion in ways of organising knowledge in students’ texts is realised through choosing different types of image for comparison or juxtaposing ‘unlike’ images which enables more of an observation than a conceptual and analytical comparison. These problematic underlying ways of organising knowledge can weaken argument. This section has explored different ways of realising argument including argument through narrative, contrast, induction and comparison. Now the chapter looks at another aspect of importance in multimodal argument, namely the use of sources and citation.

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Argument and Citation: Intertextuality and Precedence The use of sources is crucial in constructing academic argument. Academic citation in both writing and images involves appropriating a source into your argument and using the voices of others to negotiate your position in a particular discourse community. Academic argument instantiates negotiation with authoritative disciplinary voices and competing positions and ideologies. Thus, citation is not only about accurate attribution, but is also a means of constructing academic argument. The use of sources in argument involves a number of choices, including the selection of material from the source, the form of the citation, some kind of framing and critical evaluation. How the source is foregrounded or backgrounded is also of importance for academic argument. For instance, citation can be integral to the written text, where the names of the cited authors occur in the citing sentence, but it can also be non-integral where reference is made to the author in parentheses or through footnoting (Swales, 1990). The positioning of citation can give greater emphasis to either the reported author or the reported message. In addition, the degree of adaptation in terms of ‘paraphrasing’ or re-working of the text, has implications for academic argument. Copy-and-paste is “an affordance of the digital medium that has profound consequences in the ways texts are composed” (Adami, 2012, p. 131) and makes direct quoting easier than paraphrasing, in all modes. It is when students battle with the conventions around citation that we realise how invisible, normative and complex they are. Becoming aware of the ways in which citation operates across modes, media, genres and disciplines is crucial to enable student access to academic argument. Quotations need not necessarily always show respect, they can also be ironic, what Bakhtin (1981) calls a ‘smirk’ (p. 68). Examples of this would be file-sharing and remix genres which appropriate music, art, film in order to make a point; or culture jamming which uses and re-works logos and brand names to pass critical commentary. Parody and irony are about ‘being critical’, but are not the same as ‘critical analysis’ in the sense of systematically breaking something down in order to determine the effectiveness of argument. Neither are they the same as ‘argument’, although argument can contain elements of parody or irony as moments of disjuncture or difference in the text. Williams (this volume) argues that if students play with generic conventions in the form of parody, this can lead to a ‘simple’ single point or ‘joke’, rather than a more sustained critical analysis or argument. Citation can occur in all modes, but the conventions differ and some modes are more legislated than others. For instance, the use of sources in writing is per-

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haps more tightly policed and the conventions more firmly and widely known than in other modes and genres. In music, citation could be ‘mixing’; in the fine arts, ‘collage’ (Archer, 2013). In Brenner and Archer (2014), we argue that artistic argument often involves negotiation with the authoritative conventions of the various genres. This is similar in architecture. In architecture, design or original work can use precedents which do not necessarily have to be referenced. The copying of an image through free hand drawing or using tracing paper is a practice known as ‘tracing’. Architecture tends to value practices based on ‘assemblage’ and the use of visual quotations constitutes a key feature of post-modernist architecture: “the architect selects as much as he [sic] creates” (Venturi, 1966, p. 43). Johnson-Eilola and Selber (2007) propose that the notion of ‘assemblage’ can move one away from the hierarchy that is created between ‘original’ and ‘borrowed’ texts. Given our globalised and technologised contexts, practices such as downloading from image banks, using free music and open sources have become the norm, and these practices raise questions around copyright and ‘originality’. Some of this assemblage can be seen in the students’ texts above, as in figure 5.6 where images are gathered and clustered for the sake of comparison. ‘Assemblage’ as a principle of composition foregrounds the student as the designer who brings together appropriate available resources to create new meaning. In Archer (2013), I argued that Kress’s terms, transformation and transcoding, are perhaps more apt to describe processes of citation, than ‘quotation’ or ‘paraphrasing’ as these are terms linked to writing and cannot adequately deal with the potentials of a range of modes for meaning-making. Transformation refers to the processes of meaning change through the re-ordering of the elements in a text: “same mode, same entities, in different order = new semiotic entity (= different meaning)” (Kress, 2010, p. 129). The design choices in integrating sources into text, such as changes in colour, type and size of font, create new semiotic entities with new attendant meanings (see Hiippala, chapter 3 this volume). Transcoding names the “process of moving meaningmaterial from one mode to another—from speech to image; from writing to film”. That process entails a “re-articulation of meaning from the entities of one mode into the entities of the new mode” (Kress, 2010, p. 125). These terms have a concept of change built into them and are perhaps a generative way of looking at citation and the use of sources in multimodal academic argument. The last aspect of multimodal argument that this chapter explores is the notion of ‘modality’, namely how credibility can be established in academic texts.

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Modality and Argument The term ‘modality’ refers to grammatical mood that regulates the relative certainty and trustworthiness of statements. Although, traditionally a term applied to writing, Kress and Van Leeuwen (2006) extended its use to refer to degrees of ‘truth value’ in multimodal texts, in relation to particular coding orientations or domains. According to Trimbur and Press (2015): Modality involves explaining how truth-values ascribed to statements are produced multimodally, through a range of semiotic devices and rhetorical strategies in the struggle for recognition, to set the terms for representing reality, to be seen and heard as authoritative. p. 19

Modality markers or ‘qualifiers’ modify or limit the claim in an argument by making it less sweeping, global and categorical. In academic writing, tentative modality is often the norm and is used in statements such as “it could be argued that”. Here modality is realised through the modal auxiliary ‘could’. Words such as probably, perhaps, may or might can be used to qualify an argument in writing. Similarly to writing, modality in images establishes credibility within a particular domain. In a scientific domain, for instance, abstract and decontextualised representations rather than naturalistic ones often have more credibility. Choice of image, type of image, use of colour and layering can contribute to the credibility of an image, as can the amount of pictorial detail given, the focus of the image (whether it is blurred or precise, for instance), the relations between image and writing. A way of recognising and talking about modality in multimodal academic argument is crucial as the link between modality and argument is a complex one to negotiate, and it is particularly so for those students who have not yet internalised the unspoken conventions of the discipline. See figure 5.7 as an example of a diagram that attempts to heighten modality through the type of image used, juxtaposition of images, labelling and use of black and white. This image makes an argument about a building’s response to climate. The hand-drawn schematic diagrams are used to indicate a design point and include hand-written labels. The argument is achieved through the use of crosssection diagrams, arrows and labelling which show how external forces are accounted for in the design of the building. The arrows suggest movement in space and time as air moves from the outside to different parts of the building. Arrows indicate ‘air in’ and ‘air out’, and the ways in which “louvres control air flow”. In figure 5.7, arrows are not only used to show air flow, but are

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figure 5.7 Modality in a schematic diagram

also used for labelling. In many cases, own sketches have a higher modality in architecture than reproduced images. And, in these types of schematic architectural diagrams people and objects are removed in order to make an argument, about structure and movement of air through space. This is a contrast image, used to realise argument and heighten modality. The house on the left shows poor design in relation to climate. It shows how the poor orientation of the building “means lots of hot west sun” and how the “warm air can’t escape from the building”. The diagrams on the right show how the air flows and can ‘escape’. This contrast between poor and optimal orientation strengthens the credibility of the argument for the superior design of the building on the right. See figure 5.8 as another example of the use of modality in architectural representations. The use of black and white in figure 5.8 is typical of most architectural plans and has the effect of conveying the professional dimensions of the discipline. However, this image could be considered to have lower modality in an architectural domain as it appears more as a sketch for an animation, than as an architectural design. In general, digital editing software (levels in photoshop, filters and layers) provides the learner with semiotic resources to adjust modality. Trimbur and Press (2015) argue that we need to historicise the shifting patterns of managing the variable truth-values ascribed to different modes at different points in time. They emphasise that truth-values ascribed to various modes are shaped by a struggle for rhetorical authority within the means of

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figure 5.8 Changing modality in digital arenas

representation. So, images like figure 5.8 may be gaining in credibility in certain domains, where the computer-generated nature of the design is emphasised.

Pedagogical Potentials This chapter has opened up a series of questions on ways of looking at academic argument, including questions around modal weighting, ways of organising knowledge, citation and modality. It has argued that argument as a principle of textual organisation is realised through particular ways of organising knowledge, through both narrative processes and conceptual frameworks. In this context, it is clear that there is a need to develop a pedagogy which takes into account the specific semantic, symbolic and generic mixes of different disciplines in teaching multimodal academic argument. In my own context, as coordinator of a Writing Centre in a university in South Africa, I am aware of the need to train tutors to engage with argument in different genres and modes. Writing Centre practitioners such as Lee and Carpenter (2013) have highlighted the challenges for tutors as “learning new modes of communication and understanding the dynamic of multimodal argumentation” (p. xix) and they have pointed to the need to create Multiliteracies Centres that can support and develop the multimodal practices of writing and text production in Higher Education. In order to do this, we need to explore the affordances of modes as a vital part of developing argument in texts. In the context of students learning to read

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and produce argument in multimodal texts, we need a pedagogy to develop awareness of semiotic choices and design in order to foster a critical perspective on meaning-making in context. To this end, we need to ‘recognise’ semiotic resources (Archer & Newfield, 2014) and develop metalanguages to facilitate awareness and analysis of multimodal textual constructions. This is important for enabling student access into academic argument and may help with the assessment of new and emerging multimodal genres in Higher Education. There are educational, demographic and economic incentives for being able to argue effectively and to do so in a range of modes (Huang, 2015). This chapter has not specifically addressed the ways in which new technologies have enabled shifts in the distribution of meaning across different modes. However, a multimodal approach to academic argument could extend existing curricula to account for contemporary communication practices in traditional genres, as well as new electronic spaces where argument is enacted, such as e-mails, electronic discussion boards, blogs, wikis.

References Adami, E. (2012). The Rhetoric of the Implicit and the Politics of Representation in the Age of Copy-and-Paste. Learning, Media and Technology, 37(2), 131–144. Andrews, R. (2010). Argumentation in Higher Education: Improving Practice through Theory and Research. New York: Routledge. Archer, A. (2013). Voice as Design: Exploring Academic Voice in Multimodal Texts in Higher Education. In M. Bock and N. Pachler (Eds.), Multimodality and Social Semiosis. Communication, Meaning-Making, and Learning in the Work of Gunther Kress (pp. 150–161). New York, London: Routledge. Archer, A., & Newfield, D. (2014). Challenges and Opportunities of Multimodal Approaches to Education in South Africa. In A. Archer & D. Newfield (Eds.), Multimodal Approaches to Research and Pedagogy: Recognition, Resources and Access (pp. 1–18). London and New York: Routledge. Bakhtin, M. (1981). From the Prehistory of Novelistic Discourse. In M. Holquist (Ed. and trans.), The Dialogic Imagination. Four Essays by M. Bakhtin (pp. 41–83). Austin: University of Texas Press. Barthes, R. (1977). Image-Music-Text. London: Fontana. Bezemer, J., & Kress, G. (2008). Writing in Multimodal Texts. A Social Semiotic Account of Designs for Learning. Written Communication, 25(2), 166–195. Brenner, J., & Archer, A. (2014). Arguing Art. In A. Archer and D. Newfield (Eds.), Multimodal Approaches to Research and Pedagogy: Recognition, Resources and Access (pp. 57–70). Oxon, New York: Routledge.

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Coffin, C. (2009). Contemporary Educational Argumentation: A Multimodal Perspective. Argumentation, 23, 513–530. Halliday, M.A.K. (1978). Language as Social Semiotic. The Social Interpretation of Language and Meaning. London: Arnold. Harris, R. (1995). Signs of Writing. London, New York: Routledge. Huang, C.W. (2015). Argument as Design. A Multimodal Approach to Academic Argument in a Digital Age. Unpublished PhD thesis. University of Cape Town. Hyland, K. (1999). Disciplinary Discourses: Writer Stance in Research Articles. In C. Candlin & K. Hyland (Eds.), Writing: Texts, Processes and Practices (pp. 99–121). London, New York: Longman. Jewitt, C. (Ed.) (2014). The Routledge Handbook of Multimodal Analysis (2nd ed.). Oxon: Oxford University Press. Johnson-Eilola, J., & Selber, S.A. (2007). Plagiarism, Originality, Assemblage. Computers and composition, 24, 375–403. Kress, G. (1989). Texture and meaning. In R. Andrews (Ed.), Narrative and Argument (pp. 9–21). Milton Keynes: Open University Press. Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the New Media Age. London, New York: Routledge. Kress, G. (2010). A Social Semiotic Approach to Contemporary Communication. Oxon, New York: Routledge. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal Discourse. The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication. London: Arnold. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2006). Reading Images. The Grammar of Visual Design. London: Routledge. Lee, S., & Carpenter, R.G. (2013). The Routledge Reader on Writing Centres and New Media: Digital Literacies in Multimodal Spaces. New York, London: Routledge. Matthiessen, C. (2007). The Multimodal Page: A Systemic Functional Exploration. In T.D. Royce & W.L. Bowcher (Eds.), New Directions in the Analysis of Multimodal Discourse (pp. 1–62). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum. McCloud, S. (1994). Understanding Comics. The Invisible Art. New York: Harper Perennial. Stein, P. (2000). Rethinking Resources: Multimodal Pedagogies in the esl Classroom. In tesol Quarterly, 34(2), 333–336. Stein, P. (2008). Multimodal Pedagogies in Diverse Classrooms: Representation, Rights and Resources. London, New York: Routledge. Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre Analysis. English in Academic and Research Settings. New York: Cambridge University Press. Trimbur, J., & Press, K. (2015). When was Multimodality? Modality and the Rhetoric of Transparency. In G. Rijlaarsdam (Series Eds.), A. Archer & E. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 30, Multimodality in Writing (pp. 19–42). Leiden: Brill. Van Leeuwen, T. (2005). Introducing Social Semiotics. London, New York Routledge.

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Venturi, R. (1996). Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. New York: The Museum of Modern Art.

chapter 6

Genre Inside/Genre Outside: How University Students Approach Composing Multimodal Texts Bronwyn T. Williams

Introduction The rapid development of digital media over the past two decades has led both to an emergence of new genres as well as reconsideration of existing genres. Whether it is web pages, social media sites, online videos or books, video and film, multimodality has been central to all of these developments. As digital media have made it possible for individuals to more easily create and distribute multimodal work that draws on print, sound, video and images, such texts have emphasised the fluid, flexible nature of genres. Such texts challenge us to approach questions of genre and the teaching of writing in higher education in new ways that emphasise the social nature of genre formation and reproduction. At the same time, a number of scholars have examined the role of genre in university students’ writing (Devitt 2004; Bawarshi 2003) as well as the influence on student writing of the genres they encounter outside the university writing classroom (Alvermann 2008; Knobel 1998; Dunbar-Odom 2007). Most of this research, however, focuses on print-on-paper texts, rather than the implications of genre in teaching the composing of multimodal texts. In order to teach students in higher education how to approach questions of genre effectively in their writing with digital media, it is important to consider how their experiences with, and conceptions of, genre outside of the classroom influence their approaches to multimodal genres in school (see also Hunma, chapter 8 this volume). In this chapter I discuss the challenges and opportunities the teaching of multimodal texts creates in issues of genre and teaching writing. I illustrate, through student interviews and examples from their texts, how their responses

Williams, B.T. (2016). Chapter 6. Genre Inside/Genre Outside: How University Students Approach Composing Multimodal Texts. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 114– 135). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_008

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to digital multimodal assignments in writing courses draw from their knowledge of antecedent genres. In particular, I focus on the work of students creating videos or digital storytelling in higher education. Students’ knowledge of popular culture texts such as film and online video can influence students’ composing practices, both explicitly and implicitly, in ways that students find unremarkable, but of which their instructors are often unaware. Some instructors may comment on surface features of writing they feel are influenced by social media, but miss the more subtle and complex ways in which students’ antecedent genre knowledge can shape the choices students make. When students try to make sense of the rhetorical, narrative and stylistic demands of a new multimodal assignment, they turn to the genre conventions with which they are already familiar, even if those do not always fit the requirements of an assignment. It is not surprising, then, to see students move, with little hesitation, to popular culture for content and genre conventions. When asked to write for screens, they turn to the screens they know best for reference and inspiration. Yet, the conflicts and connections that exist between students’ antecedent multimodal genre knowledge—most of which comes from popular culture—and what they create in the classroom, place in sharp focus the fluid and active social nature of digital media genres. Such connections offer us new perspectives on questions of genre and composing. I end by proposing pedagogical strategies for making productive use of the connections—and tensions—created when students’ employ their knowledge of antecedent genres in completing multimodal projects. When we engage students in a more sophisticated and critical awareness of the intersections between their knowledge outside the classroom and multimodal writing assignments, students can become more critically conscious creators of texts for our classes, and more thoughtful in engaging with digital media outside the writing classroom.

Genre, Social Relations and Writing Instruction For a number of years scholars have argued that genre must be conceived as more than simply the conventions that can be recognised in a text, but instead more productively understood as the product of social relationships and actions that are mediated through texts in particular ways (Devitt, 2004; Frow, 2005; Kress, 2003). As Bazerman (1997) argues, “Genres are forms of life, ways of being. They are frames for social action. They are environments for learning” (p. 19). Kress (2003) echoes this line of thinking when he discusses genres as one element of organising texts that “realizes and allows us to understand the social relations of the participants in the making, the reception, and

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the reading/interpretation of the text” (p. 94). The emphasis on social relations in constructing genre is also, then, a reminder of the rhetorical nature of our uses of genre. The benefit of genre is to help frame and even smooth communication between the speaker or writer and the audience. A writer knows that by employing certain conventions of language or form an audience will recognise those conventions and have a framework for interpreting the text. The audience, on encountering these conventions, anticipates and responds to the writer’s next moves—satisfied if anticipating correctly, sometimes even more delighted at being surprised. When social relationships and “actions are relatively stable and persistent, then the textual forms will become relatively stable and persistent. At that point generic shape becomes apparent” (Kress, 2003, p. 85). The social and rhetorical nature of genre perception and use necessarily make genre highly contextual, which means that as the rhetorical needs of the cultural context shift, so will the elements we perceive as constituting genres. Bazerman (1997) compares genre to landscapes of communication we inhabit and travel through. While the local landscape is familiar and constructed in our relations with people we know, “When we travel to new communicative domains, we construct our perception of them beginning with the forms we know. Even our motives and desire to participate in what the new landscape appears to offer start from motives and desires framed in earlier landscapes” (Bazerman, 1997, p. 19). Such a metaphor points to the need to adapt our performances of genre to new environments, new social situations even as our adaptations are grounded in our knowledge and experience. In writing and higher education, the importance of genre has been the focus of substantial theorising and scholarship in recent years. In the u.s., this conversation in rhetoric and composition has happened largely in terms of the first-year writing course and in questions of teaching writing in specific disciplines. The importance of genre can be seen in the documents such as the Council of Writing Program Administrators’ Outcomes Statement for FirstYear Composition (2008) and Framework for Success in Postsecondary Writing (2011) both of which urge that students learn not only to write in several genres, but also how genre shapes writing and reading. Scholarship in teaching writing demonstrates a significant conversation about how best to engage students in thinking about and practicing what seem to be generalisable genre conventions in academic writing, while trying to help them avoid formulaic approaches to the dynamic, flexible nature of genres (Bazerman, 1997; Devitt, 2004; Bawarshi & Reiff, 2010). In the u.s. university, while the first-year writing course is often the most obvious place where the attention to genre and writ-

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ing takes place, in fact student engagement—and sometimes struggle—with genre continues throughout their university education (Clark & Hernandez, 2011). The role of prior knowledge in genre and teaching writing has been illustrated in research that demonstrates how students, when asked to write in an unfamiliar genre, draw on ‘antecedent genres’ in their writing (Jamieson, 1975). When students, like all writers, attempt to employ the conventions of a familiar genre in a new context, however, they often do not produce writing that fulfils the expectations of the new genre. More recent research confirmed students’ use of antecedent genres when writing in new rhetorical situations with unfamiliar genre expectations (Bawarshi & Reiff, 2010). A reliance on antecedent genres in approaching new work may, however, lead to writing that does not satisfy a reader’s genre expectations. Often, instead, students produce writing that mixes antecedent genre conventions with new genre expectations, and may result in hybrid work that frustrates both the student and the instructor (Wardle, 2009). Such student uses of antecedent genres are not always explicitly articulated choices, but instead a consequence of relying on what they perceive as general knowledge or experience. Yet, when students have their attention drawn to their reliance on antecedent genres, they increase their overall awareness of the importance of genre as well as its contextual nature (Bawarshi & Reiff, 2010). Such research implies that students adapt to new rhetorical and generic situations more effectively when they think about genre not as a set of static forms, but as a flexible and intertextual concept. Rather than being taught genre as a set of forms to be mastered, students should be taught that genres work as networks that interact with each other and are employed most effectively in response to particular rhetorical contexts. Such an approach moves us beyond arguments about whether students should be explicitly taught specific conventions of unfamiliar genres, and instead helps us focus on how to help students work with the complex, intertextual knowledge they have of their antecedent genres when encountering new rhetorical expectations. Considerations of students’ knowledge of antecedent genres must necessarily include attention to the literacy practices students engage in out of school and the genre conventions students engage in throughout their daily lives (Alvermann, Moon, & Hagood, 1999; Dunbar-Odom, 2007; Knobel, 1998). When students can, through critical reflection, understand more clearly their existing knowledge of antecedent genres, they can recognise and adapt to new genre expectations that connect or conflict with what they already know.

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Genre and Participatory Popular Culture Most of the research in writing studies and rhetoric and composition on university students’ uses of antecedent genres have focused on the print texts that students have written or read in school. How, for example, does a student accustomed to writing personal narratives fare when trying to adapt that experience to writing an analytical paper? In terms of genre, academic printon-paper writing has remained relatively stable over the past few decades, with well-understood differences in various disciplines. Yet, as with most cultural practices that become normalised parts of culture, shifts in social, technological or economic conditions often force changes—and explicit discussion—of what had been regarded as stable practices (see Thesen, chapter 2 this volume on the changes in lectures over the past centuries). In terms of genre, the advent of digital media has disrupted social relationships of audience and author, both in terms of how those roles are determined and in terms of who can create and re-create texts. Moreover, the capability of digital media for easily creating multimodal and malleable texts, has also shaken conversations and practices about genre. To understand how such disruptions may affect the teaching of writing in universities, it is useful first to consider how digital media have influenced genre in the larger culture. Digital technologies have offered particularly vivid examples of genre development and negotiation. The flexibility of digital media, to be able to shape digital data into multiple modes, and then store and distribute it easily (Manovich, 2001), changes the speed with which new rhetorical spaces are available. As digital media provide new opportunities for composing and communicating, we see online spaces that result in new genre definitions happening much more quickly than could have happened with print-on-paper technologies (Carpenter, 2009). Not long after the sites go online, we hear people talk of a “YouTube video” or “Twitter post” in terms of their generic characteristics. Though we can argue that YouTube or Twitter are media platforms, not genres, that does not stop people, including students, from talking about the texts they encounter there as fulfilling genre conventions. At the same time, it is worth remembering that developing, online genres are not without antecedents. With any change in technology there is often an initial attempt to adapt existing genres into the new technologies (Stephens, 1998). Early movies often looked like stage plays and early webpages tended to look like newspapers or other familiar genres. Today, on YouTube many of the videos continue to use the same conventions of narrative and editing developed for film and television over the past century. For many students, as well as the culture at large, the effect of digital media on genre is particularly apparent in regard to their uses of popular culture. In

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traditional mass popular culture such as film or television, genre is a powerful force in shaping the production of texts and audience expectations. The genre considerations in mass popular culture primarily serve material and economic realities of production and consumption. Simply put, mass popular culture producers employ familiar genre conventions to keep audience members watching, listening and, most of all, buying. Audiences respond positively to movies or video games or television programs that promise to fulfil certain genre expectations, reinforcing the understanding in popular culture producers that failing to meet such expectations can result in disappointed audiences and lost business. In order to have popular culture content consumed as widely as possible, producers try to find ways to create work that fits largely within recognizable genre conventions. Such genre conventions are not necessarily dependent on narrative, however. As Altman (1999) points out about film, the narrative is only what defines the ‘syntactic’ element of a genre. Just as important may be the ‘semantic’ elements, such as particular images, music, iconography, and so on (Altman, 1999). So the kiss at the end of the romantic comedy may be as important in identifying the genre, and in satisfying the audience, as the events that led up to the kiss. In order for such semantic elements to be recognised as genre conventions they need to be adapted and repeated across multiple texts. Consequently, intertextual references can be central to popular culture texts. These intertextual references, whether they be a generic black cowboy hat or the specific image of Darth Vader to indicate a villain, circulate in the culture at large as they are picked up and reused by all of us in our daily lives. Substantial research (Alvermann, 2008; Black, 2008; de Block & Buckingham, 2007; Keller, 2013; Thomas, 2007; Williams, 2002; 2009) demonstrates that student engagement with popular culture genres, from film to television to music to video games, allow them to negotiate those genres with confidence and critical acumen. Not only can students define genres such as action-hero film, reality television show or first-person-shooter video game, they can discuss, in detail, genre characteristics such as plot, production style, setting and character. Although these comments are not always in the academic terms we use, students are able to talk knowledgably about how genre expectations shape texts. So, for example, a student can discuss how conflict is created in a romantic comedy as a necessary precursor to the resolution at the end of the narrative. The advent of digital media has resulted in the development of a more participatory popular culture that blurs the lines between producer and audience and makes more explicit the intertextual nature of genre. While large corporations still produce mass popular culture, individual audience members now

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have the ability to respond to, appropriate or re-create these mass popular culture texts. Indeed, for many young people, participating in popular culture is not only a possibility, but an expectation (Jenkins, 2006; Knobel & Lankshear, 2008; Williams, 2009). In terms of genre, the growth of practices of sampling and remixing are particularly noteworthy. Any individual with a computer can now sample and remix a video, or post a song or photo on a social media page to create a collage or narrative of identity. Consequently, any text a person encounters online becomes a resource for what de Certeau (1984) discusses as ‘textual poaching.’ Students, when reading texts, are also always open to the possibility of appropriating and reusing all or part of those texts for their own purposes. In a culture of sampling and remix, conceptions of originality, or of any text as final and definitive, become much more fluid and unstable. Students talk of anticipating popular new films, as they have for years, but also of the memes and YouTube parodies that will inevitably follow. The ability to participate in these practices requires understandings of genre conventions, both in mass popular culture and in online settings. A remixed parody of a film only makes sense if you understand the genre conventions of the original movie. A student pondering how others will respond to the music she likes on her Facebook page is thinking about the connotations of genre choices in the larger culture (Williams, 2009). Enjoying a meme—an image altered or provided with a humorous label—about a popular television series, and then passing the meme along, not only requires genre knowledge of the original program, but also knowledge of the genre conventions of memes. In all these examples and more, sampling and remix have become central elements in the circulation of the syntactic and semantic elements of popular culture. The acts of sampling and remixing shape genres in two ways. First, the use of sampled material becomes a genre characteristic, seen for example in online genres such as memes or “YouTube poop” videos in which a film or television program is recut to create new effects with the dialogue. In fact some people refer to online “remixes” as a video genre. It is this intertextual participatory popular culture of sampling and remix that students are seeing all day on their computers and mobile devices, as soon as they leave school, and that shapes how they approach composing multimodal texts (de Block & Buckingham, 2007; Knobel & Lankshear, 2008; Schreyer, 2012). Whether in school or out, popular culture is attractive to students for sampling and reuse for a number of reasons. First, the use of popular culture is perceived as a low-stakes activity. Students feel they have control over making meaning of popular culture, rather than having their interpretations evaluated by authority figures of parents and instructors. Many students also regard popular culture as ‘unauthored’ in both the sense that they often do not recognise the

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individual author of a video game or television program, and that the content is owned by corporations from whom sampling poses little economic threat (Williams, 2009). Also, the ubiquity of popular culture and the repository of quickly understood and accessed cultural references it provides, makes it the content—and by extension the genre—that students turn to first when they think about electronic representations of images, video or music.

Students’ Digital Antecedent Genres While participatory popular culture has made multimodal texts part of our daily culture, multimodal texts are not excluded from academic work and school is no longer a context limited to communication by print-on-paper. As books such as this demonstrate, the composing of multimodal texts is progressively a more integral part of literacy practices in higher education. In the u.s., it is increasingly common for first-year writing courses to include some sort of multimodal assignment, such as creating a webpage or podcast or video. Some of these assignments focus on “remediating” a print paper into a multimodal text, while other assignments ask students to create “born digital” texts. Outside of first-year writing, some courses have assignments that are explicitly about composing with multiple modes, while other projects just assume that students will create texts that include images or visual information, and still others expect students to create presentations using software such as PowerPoint or Prezi. Academic work at every level—from engineering to the humanities— increasingly uses digital media and multiple modes of communication to construct and communicate work. Scholarship about using digital media to compose multimodal texts often addresses questions of genre conventions, such as videos, podcasts or the use of images (Archer, 2011; Selfe, 2009; Wysocki, 2004). Yet the issue of antecedent genres, when it is addressed, usually focuses on the experiences students may have had in already creating their videos or podcasts or webpages on their own. Little attention has been paid to the influence of multimodal popular culture genres that students encounter outside of school on students’ conceptions of and approaches to composing multimodal texts. In much of the scholarship on multimodal composing, popular culture is only occasionally referenced, and then usually not connected to questions of antecedent genres and student writing (Dubisar & Palmeri, 2010; Hodgson, 2010; Hull & Nelson, 2005). Any attention paid to issues of genre does not address students’ engagement or potential knowledge of popular culture genres or how their experiences with these antecedent genres might influence their conception and composing of

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multimodal assignments. The importance in attending to the popular culture experiences of students is clear if we realise that, in regard to multimodal texts, for many students there is no referent in terms of genre beyond popular culture texts. By contrast, over an academic career a given student encounters many print texts in school, such as textbooks, that look nothing like popular culture. Advocating an engagement with students’ knowledge of popular culture often provokes a predictable resistance, however. Many instructors believe that popular culture is at best irrelevant to education and, at worst, an obstacle to academic writing. When some instructors attend to popular culture at all, it is only as a problem to be solved or an influence to be resisted. While the focus of this chapter is not to refute such a position, there have been many scholars (Hagood, Alvermann, & Heron-Hruby, 2010; Darowski & Smith, 2010; Pahl & Rowsell, 2010; Williams, 2002; 2009) who have made the argument for engaging the discursive and rhetorical knowledge students have learned from popular culture texts. It is essential for instructors, then, to think not only about the genres they want to teach students, but to engage with students in terms of the genres they are already bringing to their writing of both print and multimodal texts. On the one hand, students’ use of antecedent genres as rhetorical and semiotic resources for their course work can result in texts that are creative and engaging. Yet, as often happens when students try to adapt one genre to fit another, tensions can develop when students try to fit the conventions of what they know into the requirements for multimodal writing class assignments. When students’ use of antecedent culture genres is not addressed explicitly in the classroom, such tensions can be bewildering and frustrating for students and instructors alike. We should engage more directly with popular culture genres when teaching students multimodal composing.

Antecedent Genres and Multimodal Writing The research for this chapter involves two different sections of the same undergraduate writing courses I taught at a Midwestern u.s. university. While I had noticed, over the previous decade, that students’ usually included popular culture in digital assignments for my courses, I did not have more than anecdotal evidence of these rhetorical and composing moves. The anecdotal evidence led me to conduct this focused, small-scale study to see the effect of explicit discussion of popular culture genres on students’ approaches to multimodal digital assignments, as well as students’ conception of genre. The course I am discussing in this chapter was an upper-level undergraduate writing course

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offered in the university’s English department, which is where writing courses are typically located in u.s. universities. The purpose of the course was to engage students in more advanced research writing projects. There were 20 students in each course, with enrolment divided roughly evenly between English majors and majors from other departments. Students in this course were typically in their third or fourth year at the university. Most had completed the two-semester sequence of writing courses in their first year at the university (or had transferred in the credits from another institution). The students had a wide range of experience with multimodal composing. Most students’ experiences with multimodal texts were of reading, sampling and reposting on social media sites—which is a form of composing as well. The examples in this chapter are from student digital texts created for those courses and end-of-term interviews with six students in each course. During the interviews we talked at length about their composing practices, their conceptions of genre, and the relationship they perceived between their print research writing and their multimodal composition. The students also had their texts with them and pointed to specific examples in the texts to illustrate their ideas. The focus of this chapter is on the students with whom I conducted interviews. It is important to note, however, that I saw similar genre moves from other students in each section. While the limited focus of the research, on two sections of one course, requires that I not overstate the conclusions that can be drawn from the project, the results were sufficiently dramatic to offer implications for how we might consider discussion of genre and multimodal texts. In addition, in classes I have taught since conducting this research as well as in additional research not covered in this chapter, I have continued to see the same results as in this study. The focus of the course was on evolving conceptions of literacy—including, but not limited to digital media. As the final project for the course, I assigned the students a researched essay, to be completed in print, about literacy practices in an area of interest to them. The assignment was a traditional, universitylevel research essay of about 15 pages that was to draw on peer-reviewed sources to create and support a focused argument about the area of literacy practices they wanted to study. At the same time I assigned the students a digital text based on the same research. The digital, multimodal assignment was cover the same subject matter as the research essay, but to take into account the different affordances offered by digital media in communicating their message. Students were allowed to choose from any digital media and genres for this assignment and student choices ranged from original videos, podcasts, remixed videos and machinima. At the end of the term, I also required the students to present their work to the class and to talk specifically about the differences they found in composing for print and for digital media.

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In the first of the two iterations of the course, during the first year of the study, we discussed genre conventions of multimodal texts in terms of the assignment and other academic or student examples of videos, but I did not include any explicit examination or discussion of the genre conventions of multimodal texts in popular culture with which the students were familiar. We discussed concepts such as design, composition, camera angles, editing and so on, but all within the context of the class or examples from academic or course-based examples. We discussed concepts of genre, but within the context of the academic writing the students had done or encountered in classes. The next year, in the two later iterations of the course semester, I engaged students in more explicit conversations about popular culture genres and the antecedent genres students knew from outside the classroom. We began with discussions of what they understood about genre from their experiences with popular culture. I asked students to bring to class examples of popular culture texts with which they were familiar and we discussed the genre conventions of the various texts. We then moved on to talk about specific genre conventions in examples from popular culture. For example, we watched television advertisements from around the world and talked about what genre conventions we could see in common, which were different, and the considerations of audience, style, and culture that shaped such conventions. Finally, we discussed how the genres that dominate popular culture, and the conventions they typically employ, did or did not fit with the expectations of the assignment and the rhetorical context of the course. When students in these writing courses were assigned a multimodal composition, most of them turned first to popular culture texts as the antecedent genres on which to base their work. While this was true of most of the multimodal digital projects the students produced, it was particularly evident in video, digital storytelling and podcast projects. The students in both courses stated that it seemed obvious for them to draw from popular culture screens in order to make sense of how to do their own writing for screens. The students’ widespread use of popular culture antecedent genres involved certain moves and assumptions about the nature of multimodal texts, as well as how audiences would interpret the texts. Some of these assumptions worked within an academic context, while others were more in tension with what was expected in the assignment. In the first course, in which the students did not engage in more explicit considerations of their popular culture antecedent genre knowledge, their use of popular culture content and conventions tended to be less complex and reflective. Even for the stronger writers in the class, the critical analysis that marked

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their print-on-paper research projects was not as frequently reflected in their digital work. In interviews, most students said they understood that the multimodal text was to provide the same kind of critical engagement as the print research essay. Yet, their use of popular culture genre conventions sometimes complicated their abilities to take a more critical stance. One example of how these genre conventions functioned for students involved their use of parody and irony in their projects. Ask university students about what videos they watch online, and you will often get an answer that involves parody or irony. Many of these same students, then, turn to parody and irony when creating digital multimodal texts. Mark, who created a movie trailer parody where he remixed movie clips of teachers, said that doing a parody was the first thing he thought of because he had seen so many online. “This was my first idea. I tried to think of something different, but I didn’t have anything better than this. I watch a lot of these so I had ideas of how it would look,” he said. Mark sampled and remixed the clips and added ominous music and his own voice-over narration to create a mock trailer for a disaster movie in which the teachers are unprepared—and then overwhelmed—by the digital media revolution coming their way. He not only used the kind of editing patterns, from slow cuts at the beginning to more rapid cutting as the action began, but also used the narrative genre conventions—and clichés—of movie trailers complete with starting the video with the words, “In a world …” Mark said that part of what made the trailer parody appealing was that he knew the conventions of the genre so well. No, I didn’t have to do any research. I watch trailers all the time and I know them inside and out. It didn’t take any time at all to know the outline of what I wanted to do. What took time was finding the right clips and music, and the editing. Mark’s description of his confidence in understanding the genre conventions, and the ease with which he moved from thinking about what kind of text he would create, to actually doing the research and composing reflects the kind of genre knowledge and confidence we expect from experienced writers. In a similar example, Annabelle produced an animated slide-show that looked like and parodied a children’s book. She narrated the text of the book, about the file-sharing practices of a teen, adopting the rhyme and meter and voice of a children’s book. The animated slide-show with narration recalled the genre conventions reading children’s books on such popular u.s. children’s television programs as Reading Rainbow. Yet, in her narration, Annabelle included references to gangster rap and Hannah Montana that, while done in the style

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of a children’s book, were clearly meant as parody. In talking about how she composed the text, Annabelle said she thought that she had wanted to create a text that reflected the condemnation about file sharing teens felt they heard from adults. She said, When I was thinking about the morality that grown-ups are always talking about to us, I got to thinking about all those children’s books that end with morals. Teaching you to do the right thing and all that. She added that as soon as the idea of the children’s book came up she knew she wanted to parody the children’s television genre conventions, “because that’s what I remember of those things as a kid, with the little piano music going on and the sweet narrator and all that.” In addition to parodying the style of the program, the images Annabelle used were sampled from popular culture to be read ironically. When she mentioned the father and mother in her story, for example, she used images of the parents from the animated television program Family Guy. Not only are the images she used of the Family Guy mother and father out of keeping with a children’s book—the father is being chased by an airplane in an image reminiscent of North by Northwest and the mother is dressed in a bikini—but the intertextual references to the program, where the characters are hardly portrayed as responsible and loving parents, are also ironic. In talking about her choices in composing the text, Annabelle said that the use of images was only intended to amuse her audience—“I wasn’t making any point with those. I just thought it would be funny, you know. They’re not what you’d see in a children’s book, so that’s funny.” When asked why she decided to use images from a television program rather than, say, stock images of parents, she said that the Family Guy images were what first came to mind and that “I knew people would get the joke.” Annabelle’s use of popular culture in this instance reflects a familiar assumption among many of the students that the conventions and content of popular culture could be counted on to provide common references and interpretations among the students’ audiences. Annabelle assumed that her audience shared her intertextual knowledge, both of children’s programs such as Reading Rainbow, but also of the connections to sitcoms such as Family Guy. Many other students who used popular culture content or genre conventions also assumed such common, intertextual readings and that they would be able to use popular culture texts and conventions without comment or explanation. Some students also assumed that individuals would have the same responses to popular culture images, even if others did not care of the original text. Annabelle seemed surprised that

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some of her fellow students did not like Family Guy and found the images offputting, even as she acknowledged she might feel the same way about other texts. Not only did the students feel the permission to sample and reuse popular culture content for the reasons I noted above, but they also used such material without a sense that it needed to be explained or cited. Like the material they see online, the students appropriated and reused popular culture content, counting on the juxtapositions of the material itself to serve as adequate explanation for the use of the material. They assumed they were addressing an audience with a general knowledge of the original text, and with an interpretive ability to fill in any gaps in meaning given the context of the genre. As Annabelle said, Everyone knows Family Guy. That’s not a problem, though I suppose if you didn’t you’d still understand that I was trying to be funny by using a cartoon drawing image. People would figure it out. I would figure it out. Such an approach to appropriating and reusing other texts is quite different from the kind of explanation and citation that is expected in academic writing. While both endeavours are intertextual and rely on audience familiarity with genre and common texts, there are significant differences in the work of explanation and citation. The assumption of a common audience can be a problem, however. Another student, Maria, used irony and parody in which she inserted herself into the film How High. She placed herself at the end of a scene in which the main characters had been disdainful of higher education to make it seem as if they were more enthusiastic about her discussion of digital media literacy practices. For students in the class who knew the film, which had a cult following but was not widely popular, Maria’s work had more resonance. Other students understood the general idea, but did not make the intertextual connection to the other film. Yet, Maria had assumed that the film would be more widely known. Again, because this text was presented with little explanation or citation, it was less successful, both as parody and as a text for the course. In talking about their work, both Maria and Annabelle also talked of the students in the course as the primary audience for their multimodal texts, while I, as the instructor, was the primary audience for their print essays. As Maria put it, “I know it was for class, and you’d grade it. But I really was thinking about doing it for the other people my age. And I wanted them to like it.” The perception was clear among many of these students that multimodal texts, even when created for an academic course, were more connected into the world of their peers,

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and into popular culture outside the university. By contrast, print-on-paper texts were the domain of serious, academic work to be assessed by a professor. Given the pervasive use of irony in popular culture, and the particular popularity of irony and parody online from sites students talk of visiting regularly such as College Humor and The Onion, it is hardly surprising that students found irony familiar and appealing. All three of these students, along with many others, talked about their familiarity and affection for parodies that they watched online, in television, and on film. As with Mike’s discussion of movie trailers, students would talk with enthusiasm and ease about their understanding of how such texts worked. Mike also made a comment that was echoed in the comments of many students when he said, “Since I already knew movie trailers so well, I also knew that doing one myself would take less time and I wouldn’t have to learn something from the ground up to get this done.” Mike also mentioned that, by working in a genre he understood, he thought he had a better chance at earning a good grade. Like most of us, Mike chose a genre he felt he understood and could work with effectively, rather than take the risk of attempting a genre in which he had less experience and felt less confidence. Students’ comfort employing irony and using images, editing and words that work against established genre conventions, is not necessarily simplistic, however. Irony and parody require textual and genre awareness. Before students can create parodies or treat texts ironically, they must be able to step back from the texts, understand their forms and conventions, and then work to create a text that is read against those conventions. When critics of popular culture maintain that young people only use popular culture for simple, emotional pleasures, they miss the kind of nuanced genre and intertextual understandings students must have of these texts in order to create parodies and use irony (Williams 2002; 2009). Such critics also miss the confidence that students such as Mark and Annabelle have in their ability to understand and manipulate and even challenge the genres they know well. Yet, when faced with the research essay, Mark and Annabelle, as well as other students, were significantly less confident about the genre conventions and their abilities to work with those conventions to convey their ideas. Of course, irony is not the same as critical analysis. One of the potential problems with irony and parody is that they create an oppositional reading of text, primarily for the sake of a joke. Certainly, some of the texts that students produced, such as Mark’s movie trailer parody and Maria’s film parody, worked primarily toward a single, humorous point. In this way, parody can be a closed genre system in terms of how it may work with the other texts students com-

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pose. This is not say that all parody and irony are limited to single jokes. From Jonathan Swift to Stephen Colbert, there have been many who have engaged in the complex, critical work of satire through their use of irony and parody. It is possible to engage students in the work of parody that results in more complex critical engagement with texts and issues (Seitz, 2011), including their work with popular culture genres.

Working with Students’ Antecedent Genres Although students’ turn to parody and irony can, if it only leads to a single joke, be a problem when students turn to popular culture to shape their texts, understanding how and why students draw on antecedent genres from popular culture has implications for how we teach the composing of multimodal texts in higher education. First, it is important to keep in mind that students, like all of us, will draw on their knowledge of antecedent genres when trying to compose in new genres. One of our first moves as teachers, then, should be to find out what students’ regard as the antecedent genres for the work they are being asked to complete. While this should be something we talk with students about as a matter of routine, it often is ignored because there is the assumption that the antecedent genres students are turning to are the academic, discipline-specific ones with which we want them to be familiar. This assumption is often paired with the belief that acknowledging and engaging with any non-academic genres that students know from outside of school is unproductive and not relevant for work in the classroom. Yet, if we ignore the range of antecedent genres students work from, all we do is allow them to work with those in uncritical and unreflective ways. Students will draw on popular culture genres, whether explicitly or implicitly (Williams, 2002), the question is how do we address this in a way that helps them better complete an assignment, and come to a more complex and nuanced conception of genre. In the second section of the course, I made the discussion and analysis of students’ antecedent genres an explicit part of the class. After introducing the multimodal assignment, I talked to students about the kinds of texts that such an assignment would bring to mind, had them bring examples of those texts to class, and studied the genre conventions of these texts. In discussing a remixed video parody, for example, we talked about the conventions, audience assumptions, style, authorial position, and other genre elements present in the text. We then turned to the assignment for the course and had a similar discussion of how genre worked in the context of this academic assignment.

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Not only did such conversations prompt the students to think about genre in more complex ways and how multimodal texts might engage academic demands of critical distance and analysis, but they also assisted in making explicit the ways in which genres help us negotiate social relationships. As students began to compose their multimodal texts, we continued to talk about genre, where conventions might work and where they might productively be ignored or modified. The result of these more explicit conversations about popular culture and academic genres was both more thoughtful uses of popular culture genre conventions and content, as well as more complex and critical multimodal texts. Discussions of sampling and citation, for example, led students to use sampled popular culture work more deliberately and with a clearer rhetorical purpose, as well as to imagine ways to cite such work in multimodal texts. Although I included a requirement in the digital project some form of citation, students’ questions and conversations about the nature and purpose of citation for their digital projects went far beyond what they usually discussed for citation practices in their print papers. They displayed an interest in questions of authorship and attribution, as well as the rhetorical purposes citations might serve, in talking about their digital texts. In addition, students’ texts, even when using parody and irony, moved beyond a single joke to work that tried to do more critical intellectual work. For example, Nadia created a remixed video that was a parody of Apple computer advertisements. But more than making a single joke about the fanatical devotion of some Apple consumers, she juxtaposed images of hip, young Apple users and a narration about the importance of being on the cutting edge of technology, with images of workers in factories in China manufacturing Apple products. The use of irony and parody was still present in her project, but she used the project to do more than a simple mocking of consumers to raise the issues of worker conditions and global economic forces. She said, At first the idea I had was to mock Apple ads and the people who fall for them. But when we talked in class about what this project needed to do fit academic genres too I started thinking about what else there was to say about Apple and remembered I’d heard about a controversy about their factories. At that point Nadia said she wanted to do more research into the stories about Apple factories in China. The research about the factories not only changed her multimodal project, but shifted the focus of her research essay, which had just been focused on the costs of digital technologies, to address issues of global

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capital and labour. Nadia was not alone among students in the latter classes who both thought more carefully about genre in composing multimodal texts and also made more explicit connections between their multimodal project and their print research essays. The other advantage in more explicit conversations with students about genre and genre influences is that it allows another way in to conversations about affordances and multimodal writing. I agree with scholars (Keller, 2013; Selfe, 2009; Wysocki 2004) who have advocated the importance of discussing multimodal composing in terms of ‘affordances’—the ways in which digital media now allow them to make choices, depending on the rhetorical context, about how to compose and present a message. The discussion of such choices should be done in a way that gives thoughtful consideration to the affordances offered by of different modes and media (see also Bell, chapter 7 this volume). To discuss genre is necessarily to discuss social relationships, power, audience and a myriad of other factors that shape writing. Alan, for example, made a machinima—a video in which he used the video from a computer game to create his own video—about the effect of anonymity on online communication. Alan was eager to create this kind of video, but struggled at first when I asked him to explain the affordances such an approach would offer. Eventually he decided his video could provide a metaphor for the kinds of anxiety and fear some people feel in online forums, and used the video from a war-based computer game to create such a metaphor with images of people running away from the perceived threats of anonymity online. He also decided that, rather than use the video to repeat information from his research essay, he would use it as a complement to the print text. Whereas the print text would cover the research, the video would address the emotional impact, “because that’s what video does best,” he said. Alan said he was inspired to take such an approach after we discussed the idea of transmedia texts (Jenkins, 2006) in which one issue or narrative is addressed in different texts in different media which can stand alone, but also work in concert. Finally, the students in the second class demonstrated a more flexible conception of genre in general. The students in the first class, who did not discuss antecedent genres explicitly, were more likely to be what Bawarshi and Reiff (2010) call “boundary guarders” and regarded genres as stable templates to be applied with less attention to context. The students in the second class, who engaged genre more explicitly, were more willing to combine and bend genre conventions and to see genre as contextual and malleable. In this way, they were more like what Bawarshi and Reiff (2010) term genre “boundary crossers” and used a wider variety of genre strategies and more flexible use of their knowledge of antecedent genres. As Bawarshi and Reiff (2010) have pointed out,

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students who perceive genre as more flexible and dynamic are more likely to transfer genre knowledge from one situation to the next. What is also interesting is that a number of students, like Nadia and Alan, also talked about how the attention to genre in class not only influenced their work on the course projects, but was also changed how they thought about issues of genre and audience when they engaged with texts outside of school. For example, Nadia, like a number of students, talked about the how the discussion of appropriation and citation of digital sources in an academic context made her look differently at the remixed work she encountered online, and wonder about whether it was important to consider issues of authorship with participatory popular culture texts.

Conclusion If we want students to think about genre in a more flexible, critical way that responds to changing rhetorical contexts, we must understand our students’ environments for learning through genre as not bounded by the walls of our classrooms (see Björkvall, chapter 1 this volume). Students will draw on popular culture genres when turning to multimodal projects, whether we encourage them to or not. The response to this reality should not simply be to expose them to new genres, however. Instead we need to help them learn more about the social, intertextual nature of genres and how we negotiate between the antecedent genres we know, and the new genres we are confronting. In doing so, we can help students come to a more critical understanding of what they already know about genre and multimodal texts from their vast experience with popular culture, as well as have a more nuanced sense of the genre conventions of print and multimodal academic writing. If students work with genre in deliberate and thoughtful ways, they will understand more how the genre conventions that may work in one text, for one audience, may need to be altered or adapted in a different context. It is well accepted in rhetoric and composition that teaching students static forms or genre checklists results in imitation, but rarely the ability to adapt such knowledge to new genre challenges in the next piece of writing they will encounter. We cannot teach students one kind of academic writing—whether for print or digital texts— that could address the variety of writing situations they will encounter in the university, not to mention their lives outside the classroom. The goal of teaching writing in the university must be to develop students’ abilities to negotiate unfamiliar writing situations. If, when students encounter unfamiliar writing situations, they can think about them rhetorically in terms of audience,

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purpose, genre, style, medium, ethos and so forth, they can begin to negotiate how best to write effectively in that situation. Learning to think about writing and reading as rhetorical acts requires a flexible and thoughtful approach to genres, past and present.

References Altman, R. (1999). Film/Genre. London, British Film Institute. Alvermann, D.E. (2008). Why Bother Theorizing Adolescents’ Online Literacies for Classroom Practice and Research? Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 52(1), 8–19. Alvermann, D.E., Moon, J.S., & Hagood, M.C. (1999). Popular Culture in the Classroom: Teaching and Researching Critical Media Literacy. Chicago: National Reading Conference. Archer, A. (2011). Dealing with Multimodal Assignments in Writing Centers. Writing Lab Newsletter, 35(9–10), 10–13. Bawarshi, A.S. (2003). Genre and the Invention of the Writer: Reconsidering the Place of Invention in Composition. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press. Bawarshi, A.S., & Reiff, M.J. (2010). Genre: An Introduction to History, Theory, Research, and Pedagogy. West Lafayette, Ind., Fort Collins, co: Parlor Press, wac Clearinghouse. Bazerman, C. (1997). The Life of Genre, the Life in the Classroom. In Bishop, W. & Ostrom, H. (Eds.), Genre and Writing: Issues, Arguments, Alternatives (pp. 19–26). Portsmouth, nh: Boynton/Cook. Black, R.W. (2008). Adolescents and Online Fan Fiction. London: Peter Lang. Carpenter, R. (2009). Boundary Negotiations: Electronic Environments as Interface. Computers and Composition, 26(3), 138–148. Clark, I.L., & Hernandez, A. (2011). Genre Awareness, Academic Argument, and Transferability. wac Journal, 22, 66–78. Council of Writing Program Administrators. (2008). Outcomes Statement for First-Year Composition. Bloomington, il. Council of Writing Program Administrators. (2011). Framework for Success in Postsecondary Writing. Bloomington, il. Darowski, J.J., & Smith, T.G. (2010). Movies, Music, and More: Advancing Popular Culture in the Writing Classroom. Southlake, tx: Fountainhead Press. De Block, L., & Buckingham, D. (2007). Global Children, Global Media: Migration, Media, and Childhood. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. De Certeau, M. (1984). The Practice of Everyday Life (Rendall, S., Transl.). Berkeley, ca: University of California Press. Devitt, A.J. (2004). Writing genres. Carbondale, il: Southern Illinois University Press.

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Dubisar, A.M., & Palmeri, J. (2010). Palin/Pathos/Peter Griffin: Political Video Remix and Composition Pedagogy. Computers and Composition, 27(2), 77–93. Dunbar-Odom, D. (2007). Defying the Odds: Class and the Pursuit of Higher Literacy. Albany: State University of New York Press Frow, J. (2005). Genre. London: Routledge. Hagood, M.C., Alvermann, D.E., & Heron-Hruby, A. (2010). Bring it to Class: Unpacking Pop Culture in Literacy Learning. New York: Teachers College Press. Hodgson, J. (2010). Reculturalizations: ‘Small Screen’ Culture, Pedagogy, & YouTube. Enculturation, 8. Retrieved 8/2/2015, from http://enculturation.net/reculturalizations. Hull, G.A., & Nelson, M.E. (2005). Locating the Semiotic Power of Multimodality. Written Communication, 22(2), 224–261. Jamieson, K.M. (1975). Antecedent Genre as Rhetorical Constraint. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 61, 406–415. Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York: New York University Press. Keller, D. (2013). Chasing Literacy: Reading and Writing in an Age of Acceleration. Logan, ut: Utah State University Press. Knobel, M. (1998). Everyday Literacies: Students, Discourse, and Social Practice. New York: Peter Lang. Knobel, M., & Lankshear, C. (2008). Remix: The Art and Craft of Endless Hybridization. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 52(1), 22–33. Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the New Media Age. London: Routledge. Manovich, L. (2001). The Language of New Media. Cambridge, ma: mit Press. Pahl, K., & Rowsell, J. (2010). Artifactual Literacies: Every Object Tells a Story. New York: Teachers College Press. Schreyer, J. (2012). Adolescent Literacy Practices in Online Social Spaces. In Williams, B.T. & Zenger, A. (Eds.), New Media Literacies and Participatory Popular Culture Across Borders (pp. 61–73). London: Routledge. Seitz, D. (2011). Mocking Discourse: Parody as Pedagogy. Pedagogy, 11(2), 371–394. Selfe, C.L. (2009). The Movement of Air, the Breath of Meaning: Aurality and Multimodal Composing. College Composition and Communication, 60(4), 616–663. Stephens, M. (1998). The Rise of the Image the Fall of the Word. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Thomas, A. (2007). Youth Online: Identity and Literacy in the Digital Age. New York: Peter Lang. Wardle, E. (2009). ‘Mutt Genres’ and the Goal of fyc: Can We Help Students Write the Genres of the University? College Composition and Communication, 60(4), 765– 789. Williams, B.T. (2002). Tuned In: Television and the Teaching of Writing. Portsmouth, nh: Boynton/Cook.

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Williams, B.T. (2009). Shimmering Literacies: Popular Culture and Reading and Writing Online. London: Peter Lang. Wysocki, A. (2004). Opening New Media to Writing: Openings and Justifications. In Wysocki, A. (Ed.), Writing New Media: Theory and Applications for Expanding the Teaching of Composition (pp. 1–23). Logan, ut: Utah State University Press.

chapter 7

Writing against Formal Constraints in Art and Design: Making Words Count Simon Bell

Introduction All texts are multimodal to a degree, even modestly word-processed ones such as traditional print essays. These offer multiple modes such as font, colour, margins and paper. Jewitt argues that such ‘visual marks’ are interpreted and organised by ‘print-based reading and writing’, and that such multiple modes elevate them above mere ‘decoration’ (2005, p. 315). For example, changing fonts in poetry might change line breaks on the page, disrupting the author’s intended visual structure; some fonts might emphasise capital letters, thus perhaps emphasising a left-hand edge at the expense of internal rhythm. This chapter argues that in art and design, multimodal writing does not liberate words to be more loose-limbed, but in fact does the opposite, creating layers that might be heightened and / or disaggregated modes of meaning, or modes of expression, or any combination of either. Synonyms, for example, might now have to be found to fit precise spaces because of particular layout constraints. In the same way, some websites with rolling text need words and compositions of words which must be read and understood in particular timeframes. Images whose meanings depend on complementary or explanatory text need correspondingly carefully chosen words to echo or to contradict them because the images could be read at face value. Such critical functions may well decentre art and design students expecting a less word-focused writing task when undertaking new multimodal writing. My background and interest in art and design have convinced me that writing helps my students develop cognitively, epistemologically and intellectually, and that such developments are transferable and transmutable. Art and design students’ portfolios can seem clumsily self-referential and limited—given the

Bell, S. (2016). Chapter 7. Writing against Formal Constraints in Art and Design: Making Words Count. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 136–166). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_009

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increasing and demanding divergence of today’s markets—if they lack the critical reflection to give them agile relevance. However, my research indicates that many of these students consider unusual writing projects not for them, but for ‘creative’ writers in the literary sense. These students sometimes also see tailored writing briefs as condescending, feeling perhaps that they are not being given the opportunity to tackle complex intellectual issues head-on like other students. Sometimes, too, art and design students find comfort in a familiar writing genre because learning a new one is challenging (see Williams, chapter 6 this volume). Although art and design students have not generally come to university to write,1 multimedia and varied employment opportunities make it unwise to ignore such emerging writing opportunities. For my students, these would include online writing, exhibitions, picture tagging, animations, title sequences, social media, posters, adverts, blogs, labels, captions and annotations. The writings activities are multimodal, involving factors such as time, space, image, rhythm, colour, shape, sound and mood. uk art and design institutions in recent years have tinkered with the formats and lengths of writing assignments, often avoiding the word ‘essay’.2 Around the start of the new century, some final year art and design students at Coventry University and similar institutions were given the choice between the standard dissertation and the looser, reflective practice portfolio, which encouraged students to produce logbooks of varied content and assembly. Although reflective practice appealed to many students, more chose the dissertation option. This was partly because they appreciated its clearer criteria and heritage, and partly because they thought it more weighty. Some also obliquely disclosed that they were more comfortable with the familiar format of what they saw as an essay.3 In a slightly later move to fewer modules at the University, the dissertation was squeezed out in favour of portfolio development via increased studio practice,

1 We should also remember that not all art and design students want to follow exclusively vocational routes, and that they do not all dislike writing. 62.5% (20 out of 32) respondents of a cohort of 58 final year Graphic Design undergraduates at Coventry University’s School of Art and Design agreed in a 2011 questionnaire that they should be ‘encouraged to write’. 2 In my experience, the term ‘essay’ is contentious, variably understood and inconsistently applied. In order to avoid any confusion and disapprobation, I will refer to the student written project work in this chapter as ‘texts’. 3 In 2007–2008, 106 out of 110 Coventry University School of Art and Design final year Graphic Design and Illustration undergraduates I taught chose the dissertation ahead of reflective practice.

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but students subsequently successfully called for its reinstatement. From my experience, there is emerging evidence that some art and design PhD students are now struggling with their theses because they chose reflective practice as undergraduates. In this chapter I discuss six art and design student projects set at Coventry University. The projects all combined text and imagery in some way, and were all characterised by either very short or form-constricted texts. In all cases, freedom was tempered with restriction and restriction was mastered by freedom: the one could not be achieved without the other. The students were free to write their text, to choose their imagery, to choose their space, to use their space, to leave their space empty, to redistribute their words within tight limits, to be inconsistent; but they were also restricted by font characteristics, by awkward and intractable spaces, by controlling spaces, by certain imagery, by uncertain imagery, by mixed-provenance imagery, by precise word counts. There were no concessions for lack of content: content was the driver for any innovation, and this was made clear and discussed in the seminars. .

Writing against Constraints: Form and Content in the Short Story and Flash Fiction Unlike the usual humanities essay (see Gourlay, chapter 4 this volume), the writing projects had almost exaggeratedly opposed freedoms and restrictions, and called for the reconciliation of increased tension between demands of form and content. Koestler’s notion of creativity as interlocking ‘two previously unrelated skills or matrices of thought’ (Mithen, 1996, p. 58) is central here. Mednick and Mednick claim that the ‘more mutually remote the elements of the new combinations, the more creative is the process or solution’ (cited in Dacey and Madaus, 1969, p. 56), and Koestler summarises his bisociative stance as the ‘juxtaposition of formerly unrelated ideas’ (cited in Boden, 1992, p. 5). However, we should heed Boden’s warning not to read Koestler’s stance as mechanistic, a ‘mere automatic mixing of ideas’ (1992, p. 23). This supports Koestler’s own urge to use ‘intellectual illumination— seeing something familiar in a new, significant light’ (1976, 383, emphasis in original). The projects I discuss draw heavily on the short story, novella and flash fiction, whose forms are hard to delimit. Some delimit by length (Hawthorn, 2001, pp. 13, 14; Renshawe, 1998, para. 2); others muse on materials (Hershman, 2009, p. 168). Poe seizes on time to read, tacitly pointing to at-a-glance structure as well (cited in Hawthorn, 2001, p. 51), and Gray on modes of characterisation and

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action (1992, pp. 262–263). Flash fiction can have playfully precise restrictions, for example that of Esquire in 2012, which ran a contest limiting entries to 79 words—because the magazine was 79 years old that year (Sustana, n.d., para. 5). The term ‘flash fiction’ is relatively new. There are several eccentric and engaging terms for such short fiction. These include dribbles and drabbles (50and 100-word stories respectively), fast fiction, furious fiction, micro fiction, nano fiction, napkin fiction, postcard fiction, skinny stories and smoke-long stories. The term ‘flash’ is a popular catch-all in the United States (Masih, 2009, p. xxxvi). Masih claims that it was first used in 1992 (2009, xxxvi), although she also claims that the form’s origins reach back to Boccaccio and beyond, with a plethora of publications and anthologies in the 1940s culminating in a renaissance in the 1980s (all 2009, pp. xxxvi, xiii, xxvii, xxxiv). Masih focuses on the momentary ‘flash’, an illumination ‘engulfing us for a brief moment’. She argues that flash fiction condenses time, and that it aims for an ‘intense, emotional impact’ (2009, pp. xi, xiv). More conventional short stories (for example those by Katherine Mansfield) are also intense and emotional, but flash’s extra challenge is to make its compression comparably meaningful. Elsewhere, Sustana defines flash fiction as stories with ‘usually fewer than 1,000 words’ (n.d., para. 3). Flash fiction can be in any genre because of its ‘inherent creativity’ (Highsmith, 2011, para. 1), yet Johnson feels that it is ‘best written [with a] subject and storyline’ like any other short story (2013, para. 4). This discouragingly prescriptive view is endorsed by Sustana (n.d., para. 8), who argues that flash fiction should tell a ‘complete story’ (despite conceding ‘exceptions’ to this rule), but the view is then firmly tempered by Masih’s (2009, pp. xi, xxv) observation that innovative flash fiction writers ‘lean more toward slice-of-life sketches’. Masih sees such lack of consensus as indicative of flash fiction’s experimental potential, and the lack of definitive answers and wildly differing relativities (is Tom Jones a short story if Clarissa is a full-length novel?) certainly license differing modes of engagement and formal considerations. These irregularities do not downgrade the formal but create opportunities to play restrictions off against freedom—and vice-versa—reminding us that Koestler’s bisociation is apposite here: it is not easy to write short when there are slippery but forceful demands of content and form. Foregrounding the formal in the short story, O’Faolain identifies the short story’s ‘abrupt’ openings as key formal factors (1951, p. 150), and Hawthorn sees the use of repeats as bestowing the short story with a ‘heavier weight’ due to its ‘limitations [of length]’ (2001, p. 53). A good example is from Hemingway’s novella The Old Man and the Sea:

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He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and of the lions on the beach. 2004: 16

The repeats of ‘nor’ resonate with ‘no’ and ‘now’. What might be read as wasted words could equally be read as defiantly heroic words, lyrically and hypnotically making their point against numerical odds; all of which underscore the hero’s character. Bayley argues that the ‘more complete the art, the more capable [the short story] is of arousing speculation’ (1988, p. 9), thus confirming the significance of both the formal and the suggestive by making them interdependent. The short story’s suggestive qualities are an inevitable result of its formal compression (O’Faolain, 1951, p. 51; Cracknell, 2009, p. 231; Mort, 2009, p. 8), and a muchdiscussed upshot of such suggestion is subversion, as short story texts skirt round definitive meaning (Bayley, 1988, p. 49; Hanson, 1989, p. 25; Hershman, 2009, p. 160; Mort, 2009, p. 9). Rourke obliquely argues that flash fiction can resort to ‘ridicule and outrage’ (2011, p. 11); equally subversive might be Cutting’s ‘inherently and intentionally imprecise’ vague language (2007, p. 4). However, Channell argues that ‘language users plainly have no particular difficulties with vague language [and that] human cognition is well set up to process vague concepts’ (1994, p. 195). This provides a delicious balance because it appears at once to legitimise vague language in the face of its claimed subversion and to call on reader-response theory, which Harkin reminds us is still relevant and applicable to other, more contemporary forms than the purely literary (2005, p. 412). The suggestive and the subversive are useful because they can herald, and to varying degrees licence, new modes of writing, with Rourke claiming that flash fiction is facilitated by the internet (2011, p. 9). Screen formats change when texts shift from computer to tablet to smartphone, for example, as do interactivity modes such as rollovers and swipes. Screen resolutions also vary, and cannot be predicted nor considered in the same way as the manageably varying effects of particular papers. These opportunities should appeal to art and design students, and in my experience generally do. However, if we want writing for art and design students to have transferable value, we should remember that the benefits of multimodal writing can become quarantined in the writing itself (Bell, 2014, p. 107). This is because such writing can be appealingly novel and domain-relevant, preventing any incidental learning from being applied outside the confines— however conceived—of the project itself. A paradoxical solution would give more weight to each word by using very few, and by using multimodal contexts

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and devices as controls. This might also deflect any student scorn that such unfamiliarly short word counts might generate if we remember Flaubert’s contention that ‘there is only one word to express […] whatever you want to say […] you must never be content with an approximation’ (cited in Maupassant, 1971, pp. 10–11). The meaning of my chapter title is neatly underscored: the more restrictions imposed in multimodal texts (thus changing the way that words work in written texts), the more important, difficult and rewarding word choice becomes. This sharpens the focus on the words, making them work harder to produce meaning.

Background to the Writing Projects The six projects discussed in this chapter were individual writing projects for students from a variety of art and design disciplines—for example, fashion, fine art, graphic design—and from pre-undergraduate diagnostic Foundation (spanning all art and design disciplines from fine art to industrial design) through to final-year undergraduate. The first project, Blahnik, asked finalyear undergraduate graphic design students to produce a handwritten text, a persuasive fiction aimed at selling a pair of spectacular shoes. The text had to be written inside an image of the shoe, and had to make a powerful statement within a powerful image. It was given to the same students who did the Comic Sans project, which asked them to conceive a fashion magazine combining street style and haute couture. Students could use any images in any way, and had to write a representative text—for example, a paragraph of editorial and a caption. This was because the main restriction in the project was that only Comic Sans font could be used, a requirement expected to affect textual content radically because of Comic Sans’s regular use in other, less compatible contexts. The third project, Dior project, was given to first-year undergraduate fashion students, and required them to write entry and exit board texts for an imaginary, one-room, 12-item Dior exhibition in London’s Victoria and Albert Museum. The items could be anything (garments, accessories, photographs, letters) and students only had to research and describe the images and their sequence in word-processed text. Each entry and exit board had to be exactly 152 words—an apparently random figure, but actually the number of words Vogue used in a 1947 piece on Dior, and thus not without arcane relevance. It is also roughly the amount of words many museum and gallery websites use when introducing exhibitions. The fourth project, the Wallace Collection project, was also given to first-year undergraduate fashion students, asking

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them to imagine that the Collection was planning an exhibition of contemporary fashion to sit alongside artefacts from the gallery itself. The theme of the exhibition was enduring luxury, and students had to research all the images: four from the gallery and eight from the fashion world. As well as exactly 150 words of content explanation and exactly 250 words of content justification (imagined as boards at the exhibition’s entry and exit), students had to establish the exhibition’s sequence and write 12-word captions for each image. The fifth project, ‘Mannequins Are Vile’, was a contextual studies project for Foundation students. The theme was how easy it is to misread a piece of work, especially problematic if the misreading makes sense. The project called on intelligent use of space and management of points to construct an argument, because there were no initial word count, font size or image restrictions. Instead, the essay was restricted to four columns and four parts; Part 1 (misreading) was allowed two columns, Part 2 (lecture themes) was allowed one column, Part 3 (justifying choice of comparable practitioner) was allowed half a column, and Part 4 (conclusion) was also allowed half a column. The sixth and final project—the 128-word texts—was also given to Foundation students. Four briefs were offered in this project, each with a different topic, each in exactly the same format, each asking students to argue one of two opposing viewpoints provided, each viewpoint prompted by a square image placed on either side of a square box of carefully-spaced text making 128 words (this number being the arbitrary product of the spacing). The three squares were all the same size and the images were chosen to have matching registers, compositional biases and colour schemes. These texts called for research and elaboration of an apparently simple argument into a persuasive whole. The projects are not in chronological order here, but are in a cogent sequence. Blahnik used quickly-written, hand-rendered text to create a fiction within a particular and articulate image. In Comic Sans the canvas was bigger, with greater extremes of freedom and restrictions but with an intentionally unhelpful font specified. Neither project had specific word count restrictions (but it was anticipated that multimodal factors would harness any untethered writing); Dior introduced specific word counts, but the writing had a looser remit than either of the previous projects because it covered potential and expectation without any actual visual cues. The Wallace Collection project echoed Dior, but asked for text to be written to accompany actual images whose sequence and interaction had to be considered. There was also a strict word count, but it had other freedoms in that it could be distributed at will, thus reconciling individual texts (images and captions) with the demands of

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the theme and possibly over-arching texts (the collective of all the images and the captions possibly being read as one text or as randomly segmented texts). The ‘Mannequins Are Vile’ project relaxed word count and image restrictions, but tightened the use of relative spaces, meaning that word count and image choice had to be factored in; the 128-word texts relaxed word count, image choice and relative space judgements, but tightened particular word choices and consequent interconnectivity with an argument and articulate imagery. These projects were all formally assessed with grades except the Blahnik project, which was a short loosener for a bigger project. At the start of each project’s discussion, I outlined what I was looking for and what each project was intended to achieve. These were not writing projects for the sake of writing, nor were they intended to demonstrate historical or theoretical awareness in the way that traditional essays generally do. They were projects intended to increase students’ critical reflection, so that they could better understand and articulate their own portfolios’ qualities. The projects’ restrictions might be self-imposed (the students do not enjoy writing or do not think they can do it) or might be imposed by the brief, or both. There might be freedom because new formats might call on relaxation of grammatical rules, or recourse to exaggerated typographic devices, or some kind of visual / verbal shorthand. This was true in all the projects, but especially true in the 128-word texts because the shape was tight, the emerging arguments were relatively open-ended, and because in all the projects content was not supposed to be compromised by word count or other restrictions. The 128word texts needed the content and back-up research of a 1,000-word essay on the same topic. Ingenuity alone got no extra marks, but ingenuity used to accommodate and enhance good content did. Content was the spine of the assessment criteria. There were seminars in all projects to start the work. At first, these unpacked the core potential of the argument, and encouraged deeper examination of, for example, connections and meta-links between content and expression such as colour, materials, theme (as distinct from content), and sound. Students, for instance, might consider how the sound of a dress can change with different manners of wearing. Subsequent seminars discussed practice and textbased theoretical angles, such as typographic signification, provisional meaning, risk and the short story. Later seminars and workshops explored possible approaches to compress expression. Examples included bullet-point lists (with the bullets not necessarily starting fresh lines), and using bold, italic or capitals alongside or instead of roman to get a good fit or to make a mini-essay, summary or conclusion. Other examples included alternate roman, italic or

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bold lines or chunks, creating multiple, interwoven arguments; varying word lengths to produce meaningfully different rhythms. Alongside these kinds of layout and visual possibilities we discussed vague language, whose informal nature can connect, help the fit, emphasise and suggest; initialisms; slang; synonyms, antonyms and words with double meanings; and the use of suggestion or oblique content which might appear consistent with the unusual nature of the formats, and thus aspire to formal perfection. Writing loosener exercises included finding synonymic images, writing short sagas to work with the compositional bias of the magazine images (which could be form- or content-determined), imaginary dialogues between characters in magazine adverts, and single-word summaries. In these, students were asked to find a word which summed up each of three disparate images and a word which summed up all three images (and not the three words). A similar exercise asked them to find a word which was the opposite of each of three images and one which was the opposite of all three. It was difficult to find a single word with enough layered meaning or nuance which might cover all demands. This is a more extreme instance of words working hard in the short story because of its ‘incredible compression and density’ (Cracknell, 2009, p. 231)—the four words (three plus one) could all be considered multimodal, but to varying degrees.

Writing against Image Restrictions: Blahnik In this project, students had to produce a handwritten story inside the image of a Manolo Blahnik gladiator sandal. They had to persuade female students that they deserved to wear a pair of these extravagant shoes at their Graduation Ceremony to celebrate the achievement of getting their degrees. There was no guidance given for tone of voice, register or storyline. The focus was on word choice and sequence because texts had to be quickly handwritten and thus lacked the finesse and resonance of a font. The extravagant, latticelike framework of this particular shoe was at once reassuring (because it was not provided by the students and thus their choice could not be questioned), and opportune (because its pronounced visual statement offered design possibilities). The framing within the image was ‘clearly [a] multimodal principle’ (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2001, p. 3). In Figure 7.1, most of the text is carefully written in the same size and style. The writer is a proud observer, and describes how the shoes turned the ‘timid’ wearer into a triumphant figure of envy to the other women present. The text size could have been adjusted to improve fit in places, for example ‘others’ at the toe end, but such variations might have softened scrutiny

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on word choice which might have seemed unimpeachable if fitting perfectly. This chimes with Bayley’s view that the short story’s ‘complete’ art arouses speculation. The capitalised ‘gasp’, neatly aligning with the top of the heel, distinguishes utterance from narrative in comic-book style. It starts a cascade of two possible alternative routes to converge at ‘I had to take a photo’. The uneven spacing around the words, and the distribution of words into spaces, creates a staccato and irregular reading, perhaps echoing the way in which the writer / observer’s impressions surface; for example, ‘I had to take a’ is cramped, whereas its continuation ‘photo Her’ is not punctuated, but has allowed space for a full point, and its second word is capitalised as if a full point were intended. At the top, ‘women’ fits the space better than the more gentle ‘girls’ or ‘ladies’ would. This absolves the writer from what might be read as jealous pride (laced with righteous contempt) because the writer could argue that the word was only chosen to ensure a good fit. In Figure 7.2, the opening phrase describes the foot entering the shoe—a snug fit, correctly angled. The writer explains to the wearer that putting these shoes on is just the start of a lifetime’s happiness and achievement. The lower case text next could jump to the lower case text at the toe end of the foot, or could be followed by the capitalised text which could itself in turn lead to the lower case text at the toe end. In the first horizontal block of lower case text, ‘already’ is given space, trumpeting its significance. Similarly, in the second piece of lower case text, ‘this’ and ‘never’ are given space after them, whereas ‘You’, ‘have’ and ‘graduated’ are tightly spaced, perhaps a visual allusion to the pressures of getting a degree. ‘End’ is by contrast abrupt and final, whereas the first lower case phrase can be read in two ways: ‘you already have graduated’ or ‘you have already graduated’ (although the spacing and length of ‘you’ and ‘have’ probably link them enough to direct reading). Perhaps the alternative readings of this phrase underscore allusions to the maturing process necessary for a degree, a process not dependent upon ceremony but crowned by it. The combination of words mixes the staccato with the mellifluous, creating different tones of voice which emphasise differences between any discernible subtexts, such as those between the often bumpy ride to completing a degree and the rosy glow of hindsight. The student texts are not unlike fairy tales—compressed fables—which foster ‘maps’ for coping with life, yet do not generally ‘dictate a single, univocal uncontested meaning’ (Tatar, 1999, pp. xi, xiv). Thus, the stories relate to their function, but the restrictions amplify appeal (good layering for advertisers) because, as in the short story, ‘every word doesn’t only count [but] must multitask’ (Cracknell, 2009, p. 231).

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figure 7.1 Blahnik project student handwritten text inside image, foregrounding fit and sequence (uncorrected text transcribed from original in accompanying image)

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figure 7.2 Blahnik project student handwritten text inside image, foregrounding tone of voice and alternative readings (uncorrected text transcribed from original in accompanying image)

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Writing against Font Restrictions: Comic Sans This project asked students to design a fashion magazine and write representative text for it. The magazine had to combine street style and haute couture, echoing Koestler’s (1976) bisociative idea of creativity as reconciling disparate opposites. This bisociation was increased by total image and design freedom, tempered by a requirement to use only Comic Sans, which many art and design students dislike and which is hardly ever used in fashion magazines. Students often assume the ‘right’ font will do their work for them. However, in this task, I wanted the relationship between content and form opened up by forcing the students out of genre-sanctioned comfort zones, and to foster risk-taking— but tacitly. Risk-taking is relentlessly written into uk Higher Education art and design course documentation, frequently encouraged in teaching sessions, evaluated in feedback and celebrated by practitioners. The simple paradox of such measures is that risk becomes institutionalised and thus no longer a risk.4 Comic Sans had to be a prompt, not a licence. Some students predictably used very few words and others made their words very small; both ploys invited scrutiny and curiosity. An imaginative and daring alternative was to emphasise the font instead of downplaying it. For example, in Figure 7.3 (top) the words are huge and transparent. Joining the letters together tends to reinforce the phrase’s meaning, and each letter traces different types and colours of shoes for both sexes. In the simple ‘g’ of ‘gap’ we see a highheeled court shoe, a high-heeled mule and a trainer—which is haute couture, which is street style? Bridging the gap perhaps blurs the boundaries—using unpopular Comic Sans perhaps stops the message being devalued by its form being too predictable. A clipped social message through fashion and type is not fanciful. Blackwell sees the spread of computers creating a ‘revised sensibility of typography’, which suggests that the message might get through, and its shortness should not be problematic because ‘longer written and spoken forms [are being replaced by] “soundbites” of (at best) condensed or deconstructed thought’ (1998, pp. 7, 9). Capitals weave textures in Figure 7.3 (bottom), making simple word shapes and tight line spacing. Comic Sans’s near-monoline construction reduces the spottiness caused by fonts and serifs with uneven stress, and thus alleviates variations in tone of the content. Capitals also downplay the repetition of ‘to’ because they minimise letters’ differences. Together with its preceding bullet point (or centred full stop: either reading works), ‘to’ might in lower case make a

4 I have explored this in my own research and teaching (Bell, 2014, p. 100).

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figure 7.3 Two details of student texts from the Comic Sans fashion magazine project, showing radically different ways of handling the generally unwelcome font requirement

distracting logo, which could also blemish the page with spottiness. If the bullet points were to be full stops, and the writer capitalised the ‘T’ of ‘To’ and used lower case for other letters, spottiness would increase. By using bullet points and capitalising all the letters the writer can happily wave away these worries. The aggregated texture allows the writer to mix up different phrases; and although the spaces between phrases cause slight unevenness in the pattern, we are also faced by an unsettling, clown-like figure apparently taunting us to challenge such shortcomings.

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Writing against Word Count Restrictions: Dior For this project, restrictions were placed on the number of words and images but not on the font choice. Students had to research 12 images and to write entry and exit board texts for an imaginary exhibition in London’s Victoria & Albert Museum. Each board had to be exactly 152 words—students generally found this intriguing in its eccentric and unfamiliar specificity. However, its link to Vogue in a 1947 piece on Dior and its similarity to many museum and gallery website text lengths helped establish the authority of the task. The shortness of the text would probably make readers work hard to produce and / or verify meaning (Macey, 2001, p. 324). Iser’s ‘blanks’ which stimulate the reader (1980, p. 11), Fish’s notion of the readers’ ‘community’ with shared ‘assumptions’ (1980, p. 11) and Huckin’s textual silences which prompt readers to collaborate with authors (2010, p. 420) are all pertinent theoretical underpinnings for short texts punching above their weight in the shared environment of an exhibition, virtual or not. These student writers would doubtless be reassured by Lodge’s assertion that ‘text is not something that the author creates and hands over to the reader, but that the reader produces in the act of reading’ (1997, p. 194). The unusual word count requirement imposed a new condition of fluidity, and possible ambiguity, on the writing and its constituent parts. Some interesting phrases and assertions turned up in this project, for example, ‘Dior […] stunned the world’, a debatable hyperbole which could be explored in the exhibition without needing to be verified or referenced in the student text. Visitors were told in another exit board that they would be ‘gently nudged [into] appreciation’ of Dior, adumbrating a hesitation which respected visitors’ integrity and ability to make major decisions for themselves. Some students used the sequence of boards and the intervening exhibition to answer questions or to explain apparent omissions. One exit board (Figure 7.4) had just 50 adjectives bracketed between two roughly equal blocks of text at start and finish—a neat way of saying ‘some of these will work for you today, some tomorrow—the problem’s yours now’, but one that called on reader-response as the texts and adjectives were obscure in places. Another student used the description ‘teeny tiny’, thereby saying in two words what could be said in one—an example of the short story technique of using apparently wasteful repeats to enforce a point confidently. The project needed fruitful writing, an understanding of Dior and of sequence and curated imagery. The results needed to be fresh and challenging, given Dior’s fame. The tension between the entry and exit boards was heightened by the imagined experience of the exhibition. I did not want the students to describe an experience conditioned by exhibition lighting or scale, because

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figure 7.4 Dior project student text with 50 adjectives bracketed between blocks of more conventional text

this would colour their writing too much. Instead, they had to prompt and manage critical reflection on an experience whose totality could be imagined, but whose internal architecture could not.

Writing against Narrative Restrictions: The Wallace Collection This project asked students to imagine that London’s Wallace Collection was planning an exhibition entitled ‘Luxury Never Goes Out Of Date’, which mixed contemporary fashion and the collection’s artefacts. Students had to research the artefacts and select a total of 12 images, and then write text and captions. The project called for historical and contextual understanding, precise writing and use of imagery as a narrative accomplice to text. I was looking for intelligent commentary about fashion and its possibilities. As well as exactly 150 words of content explanation and exactly 250 words of content justification (imagined as boards at the exhibition’s entry and exit), students had to establish the exhibition’s sequence and write captions for each image. The caption length was 12 words per image or 144 words overall to be distributed at will amongst the images. This allowed students to expand upon any entry and exit texts’ constraints, and could alter the pace of reading by varying the word count for each image; it could reflect and / or suggest the relative importance of each image; it could intrigue readers by varying the information given for pictures which might appear to be too similar when seen without

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words, and thus lazily chosen; and it could include the images with the caption text as one complete narrative, thus blurring the boundaries between the words’ and images’ relative functions. It made it easier to vary the text register to accord with the images’ provenance and context; it could help complex combinations of images to be explained slightly more expansively, even if that meant leaving other images relatively unexplained because they now had correspondingly fewer words. It also encouraged playful work in which captions could be of different word lengths—but the same physical length—to fit uniform spaces. This project highlighted nuances of narrative in the way that images could be part of the text because of the way caption words could be distributed. A story is simply a narrative of events in time order, whereas plot arranges events according to causality (Forster, 1974, 87): visitors to the exhibition might well question why they saw what they did. The ‘intersection of verbal and visual’ (Welsh, 2007, para. 1) are tenets of ekphrasis, the ‘verbal representation of visual representation’, (Heffernan, cited in Welsh, 2007, para. 6). Ekphrasis is an ancient Greek praxis in which writers had to bring an object to life, a skill heightened because the object often never existed except in the imagination of the writer—who then had to transfer the reification to the mind of the reader (Munsterberg, 2008, para. 1). This includes sharing the ‘emotional experience and content’ of the material—probably very helpful when explaining such potentially oppositional elements as this proposed exhibition’s content.5 Welsh goes on to hint at the bridging qualities of ekphrasis to transcend the ‘physical aspects’ of the work in question, insisting that ekphrasis must remain a negotiating ‘rhetorical term’ which should not become a ‘complete and perfect intermediary’ or else the ‘entire paradigm would crumble’ (2007, paras 3, 11). Such short texts and such selective use of imagery within such an extensive setting call on rhetoric, coupled with reader-response and reception theory, to minimise reductive assumptions about the work. The best students had clear and focused conceptual frameworks, which elevated the captions above merely describing or identifying content, and made sense of varying caption lengths. Examples included the fête champêtre,6 5 A year or so before this project was launched, the Wallace Collection controversially hosted a show of Damien Hirst paintings to sit alongside its collection of largely seventeenthand eighteenth-century fine and applied arts. This writing project thus had currency and contextual legitimacy which was not overlooked by the students, and helped to cement its intellectual authority with them. 6 An eighteenth-century garden party or outdoor, bucolic entertainment in which guests were usually elegantly dressed.

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figure 7.5 Example of one of a set of student Wallace Collection texts on the theme of seductive archetypes—this one is ‘The Delicate’

where paintings by Fragonard and Watteau were contrasted with contemporary fashion photographs, fostering a debate about urban clothes in rural settings. Another explored the perception of luxury in an ecologically fragile world; this had deliberately cryptic captions with widely varying text lengths aimed at encouraging readers to connect disparate images and to rethink mindsets. In another, archetypes populated a collection revolving around seduction. There were characters such as the queen who was captioned ‘cruel and certain’; the amazon with her vanity (she conquers because she can, but this whimsy is impulsive); and the commander whose army is ‘more afraid of him than of the enemy’. Figure 7.5, captioned ‘The Delicate’, is an example from

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the collection. There was no didactic sequence to these images: indeed, to impose one might have confined the contradictions by eliciting archetypical responses—and so the student used an arbitrary sequence. This freed up the words and allowed readers to consider intellectual angles rather than just surface pairing of text and image; thus the images became part of the intellectual text of the endeavour. The project made students write very carefully and economically because of the tight word count. However, these few words had to be expansive and imaginative as well, because they had to anticipate, prompt and manage connections between the images—connections which would be differently manifested and experienced by different viewers and different readers.

Writing against Space Restrictions: Mannequins are Vile The theme of this project, and the series of contextual studies lectures leading up to it, was the misreading of students’ work. The misreading may well make good sense and comfortably sit alongside the maker’s initial reading / intent of the work. The project was for Foundation students, and required critical reflection as well as understanding of their studio work in relation to other, comparable practitioners. As seen in Figure 7.6, the physical constraints of the writing were simple: one side of a3; word-processed; four parts; four columns; no apparent word count or margin restrictions, font choice, size or mix; no restriction on images. The columns could be left unfilled or could have large type filling them with few words. Part 1 (two columns) asked students how their work might be misread, how they might prevent misreading and how they might react to it. Students also had to reference at least one other practitioner and the lectures in this part. Part 2 (one column) asked students to identify any common themes in the lectures, which turned them into a set rather than a random collection; Part 3 (half a column) asked students to explain and justify their choice of practitioner; Part 4, also half a column, was the conclusion, in which they had to explain what they learned that might improve their work. Some students changed the page orientation. Some left parts of columns unfilled, a few broke the columns up by book-ending the four columns with the two columns of Part 1. These were mature steps as these possibilities were not suggested (nor explicitly ruled out) in the brief. Students also had to consider where to break the two columns of Part 1, and the implications of the break. Some mixed font style, font size and font family; some mixed

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figure 7.6 An example of a Mannequins Are Vile student text, showing the unevenness resulting from column restrictions anchored and calmed by imagery

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justified with unjustified, and some used left- and / or right-alignment to suggest inter-column connections. There were some interesting, mature and astute insights and connections emerging from the written texts: clarity is neither automatic nor easy; university is about learning to learn; context matters; fear of misreading inhibits; art is about debates; if the maker does not understand the work then the reader probably will not either; too much elucidation exposes the artist and overconditions future output; detail controls pace and meaning; you cannot recreate work because you cannot recreate the necessary emotional investment. The means of articulating these insights were at the discretion of the students, and because the layout was so important in organising the chunks of debate, so were the particular words which facilitated it. This writing exercise demanded few minimal technical or formal skills. It is not difficult to move text around a page or to leave columns blank, but to do so in the context of an academic essay takes intellectual confidence in both the writer and the writer’s perception of the institutional: ‘is the university serious about this, and will I be able to say what I need to say to get a reasonable grade if I fool around with format and leave stuff empty?’ Acquiring formal and technical skills alone should not be the ‘prime purpose of art and design education’, but should ‘enable’ exploration and expression of ‘visual perceptions and inner feelings’ (Buchanan, 1995, p. 35). Many art and design technologies change very fast, as do students’ use of them, but this project’s simplicity and tacit reliance on reader-response and reception theory were intended to prevent desuetude crippling it. The focus on the words was simply that of allowing the student to decide when enough was enough.

Writing against Shape Restrictions: 128-Word Texts Four briefs were offered in this project, each with a different topic, each in exactly the same format, each asking students to argue one of two opposing viewpoints provided, each viewpoint prompted by a square image placed on either side of a square box of carefully-spaced text making 128 words (this number being the arbitrary product of the spacing). The three squares were all the same size, and the images were chosen to have matching registers, compositional biases and colour schemes. The text was in Times Roman, ‘arguably the most widely used typeface ever’ (Baines and Haslam 2005, p. 65), thus common enough to help students to focus on their writing. The students simply had to decide on a viewpoint and replace the dummy text with theirs. This project called for research and elaboration of an apparently simple argument into a

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persuasive whole. They needed no layout expertise, but tight expression; confident manipulation of language done with a sense of purpose; they needed to inform but to take readers’ likely knowledge into account. The texts intensified some of the previous project’s demands (word count, precise justification and spacing), but relaxed others (clear delineation between sections, content relativities). They also applied many of the theoretical angles covered above: some were like fables, some had ingenious typography, the images’ own visual language called on ekphrasis’s rhetoric as there was no space to describe the images at length. The lack of space in these written texts thus also called on reader-response, reception theory and the short story’s reliance on suggestion and subversion: the former because the writers had to hope that readers would step in to help; the latter because they had very probably never written academic work like that before, and so the use of subversion needed validating via existing practice. Thesen sees risk as ‘productive’ and celebrates readers who question; she also sees writing guides as inhibitive, and definers of risk (perhaps in course documentation) as ‘entrenched’, which these students might understand as authoritative (2014, pp. 1, 4, 11). This echoes the point about the paradox of institutionally sanctioned risk in the Comic Sans project, above. The risk of gross breach of grammatical and syntactical rules was seldom taken; similarly, no students exploited vague language.7 This could be because the writing assignment format itself was radical, or it could be because the students understood that such departures from what they might perceive as norms would put the wrong focus on the words, or could limit the meaning by drawing attention to a specific meaning: maybe they were balancing risks to ensure that they were productive. The texts in Figure 7.7 are not all a perfect fit, and demonstrate how much more difficult the project was than at first suspected. The top left text used the student’s primary research, each ‘yes’ and ‘no’ representing a fixed number of responses, like Neurath’s Isotypes. The conclusion does not draw enough out of the evidence, but the visual effect is striking and memorable, with a pervasive sense of sound. The rhythm provides mini-introductions like a theatrical drum-roll, and the first response adds to this sense of contrived reality by stretching neatly across the first line. The top right text also uses sound, but differently—we have an exuberant speaker and the writing is peppered with extra punctuation, repeats (‘business’ and ‘business’), ampersands to compress and letter spacing to expand. With dismissive panache, the writing does now

7 A more practical problem with vague language, in this instance, is that it tends to take up space, however usefully flexible it might be when trying to achieve a good fit with words.

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figure 7.7 Four contrasting examples of 128-word texts, with quite different approaches ranging from apparent fact to fiction

what Warhol did then—challenge form and expectation. It is not short on content, nor on suggested meaning: for example, silkscreen is not a particularly ‘easy’ technique, but it might appear so, especially if one is already critical of Warhol’s approach. This word thus hints at public scorn, whilst also reminding us of Warhol’s abilities and his use of assistants—not uncommon in fine art print practice—which could also be what ‘easy’ means. The word is working hard. The lower left text weaves in and out of fiction with the argument being the voice-over. This effect is intensified by the play on sound in the first two

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sentences, which have discrete meanings but can read as one. The writing has a beautiful rhythm and is cleverly bracketed by a childlike expression at the start and an adult one at the end, drawing attention to the text’s formal delimitation. The lower right text bounces back and forth between points which could read like a list. Repeats and omissions are inconsistently handled, the style is spiky and the topics jump around unnervingly, an effect heightened by the quote marks and punctuation (which at least keep readers alert). There are two rallying points, one at the start of line one and the other at the start of line three, but the essay’s unevenness helps readers start anywhere, relieving the writer from narrative concerns. The essay is intelligent, although it has a slightly tame conclusion, perhaps because of spacing and word count problems. However, the low-key conclusion could equally be read as a comment on how Warhol’s work might be valued (in every sense) if it were misunderstood—in which case the conclusion is an understated masterstroke. These texts called on skilful writing and risk-taking. Part of the skill was simply adroit crafting of words, the other part was making readers think by making them rethink meaning or search for it: a different, sharper focus. Part of the risk was simply in the format—there was little room to say what had to be said, and so students had to weigh up the choice between risking too little content or fitting the content in such a way that might be thought to diminish its value.

Conclusion Just as Kress and van Leeuwen argue that ‘introducing orchestral music into the home […] fundamentally changes [its] meaning’ (2001, p. 7, see also Björkvall, chapter 1 this volume), I argue that utilizing multiple modes in art and design students’ written assignments, by increasing the complexity or number of modes (each a kind of layering), could change the meaning of the words by adding variables—and could thus increase the importance of the words, their choice and interrelationships. But it does not mean that the students have to write better than they did before. They have to write differently. The Blahnik project had extra modes of image, space, sequence, handrendering, and perceived product value. I could simply have counted the spaces and told them to write a word-processed text of x words. This might have ended up like the Dior or Wallace projects, but the other projects had interfering modes to make them more difficult. The Comic Sans project, for example, stipulated font and fashion stance but nothing else: modes of intellectual and domain opposition were pitted against the terrors of absolute freedom. The

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Dior project had an apparently arbitrary but intriguing word count, sequence and interval. The Wallace project had a strict overall word count but needed management of interior word count freedom, picture combination and location. The Mannequins project had apparently loose but actually tight spatial and didactic zones to manage; the 128-word texts had an apparently simple frame but a complex argument calling on typographical, grammatical and syntactical ingenuity in relation to clever picture reading. In none of these projects were words bit-part players or easily replaceable by arbitrary or unforced synonyms. It is clear that the writers had to understand and balance the freedoms on offer. However, this stand-off can be over-simplified: the modes which can liberate are as likely to be simple visual ones, such as alignment or colour, as they are to be complex and less obvious, such as varied reader responses—and of course, these can all restrict as well. Some genres were crudely opposed—the fashion magazine, for example, set haute couture against street style (fashion modal opposition), and provided layout and material freedom offset by the insistence on Comic Sans (graphic modal opposition). This almost binary opposition floated up in the freedom to use easy software pitted against strict word counts, or the obscurity of the Dior word count being validated by its likely usage in websites. The entire brief of a multimodal project can embody a loose binary opposition and still produce varied, individual and unexpected results: the 128-word texts demonstrated that innovative possibilities need to be restrained with a light touch. This light touch can become heavy-handed if not understood and managed deftly, for example the possible damage to the bigger design scheme by fiddling with the word ‘to’ in Comic Sans, the single word with three contexts in the image / word summarising, and the use of ‘easy’ to describe Warhol’s silkscreens. This is a kind of layering, in which a mode can create different levels of engagement or signification. A mode can become more complex and restrictive—because it requires more closure—the more multimodal it gets. The singular ‘gap’ suggested this, as did the simple ploy of letting 12×12 words of captions become 144 words overall spread between 12 images. Pulling back from multimodal specifics in a similar project produced different kinds of layered potential, as when the fashion students had to write to an imagined exhibition, and thus had no anchoring imagery. The mix of registers in ‘teeny tiny’ suggests colloquial language being corrected by proper language, another layered (but maybe accidental) ploy. Layering can create alternative readings—indeed, should create them if the technique is not to be hollow hubris, although the reader often has to be

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alert to these nuances, as in the Blahnik project. Alternative readings in the Dior project were generated by asking questions which may or may not have been answered by the images, which had to be imagined but not reified. The images’ abstract nature was a conditioning extra mode on an existing mode, and although this needed careful writing, it also made the writing harder to criticise without careful discussion. Fixed word counts in captions often led to deeper and more unexpected readings of images in an effort not to sound trite, and the use of the images as part of the narrative in the Wallace Collection project led to an unexpected bonus in that overseas students did well: the multimodality put emphasis on the words, but evidently one which was happily manageable, or in which awkward English could be seen as a creative ploy. By a similar token, what might be taken as a tame Warhol conclusion could be read as highly intelligent if the relationship between the words and the frame—its image—is intelligently taken into account. Self-conscious use of multimodal possibilities can also take refuge in absolute perfection, which could simply be balancing textures (as in the Comic Sans clown piece, for example). The relative size of the modal ‘canvas’ is also a player: the clown piece is bigger and less focused than the 128-word texts. In these, modal manipulation can be more obvious but its effects also more easily—or at least more demonstrably—contained, whereas in a bigger piece like a magazine there is a bigger schema to handle but more refuges in which to hide inconsistencies. The Comic Sans project gave students this possibility. I argue consistently that a multimodal approach should offer some choices in order to nurture its benefits (see also Hunma, chapter 8 this volume), but that choices need grounding in order to show what the text can do. This was seen in the Wallace Collection caption writing, where tight restrictions were offset by possibility, and the students could decide the extent to which they wanted to take up the possibilities. These are difficult decisions, because once one leaves security behind, one is entering into another set of modes: those of uncertainty, and it takes a confident writer—and a complicit reader—to align these productively and unerringly. On the whole, the students enjoyed these projects, although they enjoyed them more if they were presented as unusual writing projects than some kind of unusual mixed-mode design project. Most liked disrupting traditional forms and protocols and involving the reader more, although some found the projects unnerving and others found them unnecessary: they wanted to do traditional essays instead. Many of the points raised in the projects were gratifyingly philosophical and mature, even from some who did not particularly enjoy the projects. Assessment was correspondingly demanding—I found myself

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reading and rereading these short texts, sometimes using different voices or accents or rhythms or speeds, as I tried to be absolutely sure I had not missed a delicate slice of meaning. The key to these texts is balance. It is important to keep the formal engagement interesting, but not too demanding or else the words will get lost in the mix. It is also important to balance restriction with freedom and vice versa so that they switch positions effortlessly. This gives students a chance to delimit and explore their own notions of risk and achievement—crucial in such unusual short forms, which can make further eccentricity seem forced and unnecessary. By contrast, eccentricity in longer texts can get lost if downplayed, or tiresome simply because of scale—it is a balance. I have argued that multimodal writing is only as liberating as one makes it in relation to restriction. The layering emerged from understanding modes in different ways—perhaps a sophist’s multimodality—and from seeing modes as shifting between both freedom and restriction. Short-text writing needed multimodality to give the words definitive meaning which, without modal accessories but with readerresponse, might have been endlessly debated. Easing themselves into a metaphor for art and design practice, the words neatly become part of the multimodal text.

References Baines, P., & Haslam, A. (2005). Type and Typography (2nd ed.). London: Laurence King Publishing. Barr, B. (2011). Defining Multimodal Compositions. Retrieved May 15, 2013, from http:// multimodalcomposition.wordpress.com/2011/02/06defining-multimodalcomposition/ Bayley, J. (1988). The Short Story: Henry James to Elizabeth Bowen. Brighton: The Harvester Press. Bell, S. (2014). Writing Before it was All Shakespeare. Power and Education, 6(1), 99– 108. Blackwell, L. (1998). 20th Century Type: Remix. London: Laurence King Publishing. Boden, M. (1992). The Creative Mind: Myths and Mechanisms. London: Abacus. Buchanan, M. (1995). Making Art and Critical Literacy. In Prentice, R. (Ed.), Teaching Art and Design: Addressing Issues and Identifying Directions (pp. 29–49). London: Cassell. Channell, J. (1994). Vague Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cracknell, L. (2009). Balancing Act. In Gebbie, V. (Ed.), Short Circuit: A Guide to the Art of the Short Story (pp. 231–233). London: Salt Publishing.

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Cutting, J. (2007). Introduction. In Cutting, J. (Ed.), Vague Language Explored (pp. 3–17). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Dacey, J.S., & Madaus, G.F. (1969). Creativity: Definitions, Explanations and Facilitation. The Irish Journal of Education, 3(1), 55–69. Fish, S. (1980). Is There a Text in This Class? The Authority of Interpretative Communities. Cambridge, ma., London, England: Harvard University Press. Forster, E.M. (1974). Aspects of the Novel. Stallybrass, O. (Ed.). London: Penguin Books. Gray, M. (1992). A Dictionary of Literary Terms (2nd ed.). Harlow: Longman. Hagan, J.S. (1979). Tennyson and his Publishers. London: Macmillan. Hanson, C. (1989) Introduction. In Hanson, C. (Ed.), Re-reading the Short Story (pp. 1–9). Basingstoke, London: Macmillan Press. Harkin, P. (2005). The Reception of Reader-Response Theory. College Composition and Communication, 56(3), 410–425. Retrieved July 1, 2015 from http://www.jstor.org/ stable/30037873 Hawthorn, J. (2001). Studying the Novel (4th ed.). London: Arnold. Hemingway, E. (2004). The Old Man and the Sea. London: Arrow Books (Original work published 1952). Hershman, T. (2009). Art Breathes from Containment: The Delights of the Shortest Fiction or The Very Short Story That Could. In Gebbie, V. (Ed.), Short Circuit: A Guide to the Art of the Short Story (pp. 159–170). London: Salt Publishing. Highsmith, W. (2011). Flash Fiction faqs. Retrieved July 1, 2015, from http://www .writersdigest.com/writing-articles/by-writing-goal/improve-my-writing/flashfiction-faqs Huckin, T. (2010). On Textual Silences, Large and Small. In C. Bazerman, R. Krut, K. Lunsford, S. McLeod, S. Null, P. Rogers, & A. Stansell (Eds.), Traditions of Writing Research. (419–431). New York and London: Routledge. Iser, W. (1980). Interaction Between Text and Reader. In S.R. Suleiman & I. Crosman (Eds.), The Reader in the Text: Essays on Audience and Interpretation. (106–119). Princeton, nj: Princeton University Press. Jewitt, C. (2005). Multimodality, ‘Reading’, and ‘Writing’ for the 21st Century. Discourse Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education 26(3), 315–331. Johnson, J. (2013). What is Microfiction? Retrieved July 2, 2015, from http://www .explorewriting.co.uk/what-microfiction.html Koestler, A. (1976). The Act of Creation. London: Hutchinson. Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal Discourse: The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication. London: Arnold. Lodge, D. (1997). The Practice of Writing: Essays, Lectures, Reviews and a Diary. London: Penguin Books. Macey, D. (2001). The Penguin Dictionary of Critical Theory. London: Penguin Books. Masih, T.L. (2009). In Pursuit of the Short Story: an Introduction. In Masih, T.L. (Ed.),

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Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction: Tips from Editors, Teachers, and Writers in the Field (pp. xi–xxxviii). Brookline, ma.: Rose Metal Press Maupassant, G. de (1971). Selected Short Stories. (R. Colet, Ed. and Transl.). Penguin Books (Original work published c. 1880). Mithen, S. (1996). The Prehistory of the Mind: A Search for the Origins of Art, Religion and Science. London: Thames and Hudson. Mort, G. (2009). Finding Form in Short Fiction. In Gebbie, V. (Ed.), Short Circuit: A Guide to the Art of the Short Story (pp. 4–16). London: Salt Publishing. Munsterberg, M. (2008). Writing About Art. Retrieved July 2, 2015, from http:// writingaboutart.org/pages/ekphrasis.html O’Faolain, S. (1951). The Short Story. New York: The Devin-Adair Company. Renshawe, C. (1998). The Essentials of Micro-Fiction. Pif Magazine. Retrieved July 1, 2015, from www.pifmagazine.com/1998/06/the-essentials-of-microfiction/ Rourke, L. (2011). A Brief History of Fables: from Aesop to Flash Fiction. London: Hesperus Press Limited. Sustana, C. (n.d.). What is Flash Fiction? Retrieved March 18, 2015, from http:// shortstories.about.com/od/Flash/a/What-Is-Fiction.htm Tatar, M. (Ed.). (1999). The Classic Fairy Tales. New York, London: W.W. Norton & Company Inc. Thesen, L. (2014). Risk as Productive: Working with Dilemmas in the Writing of Research. In Thesen, L. & Cooper, L. (Eds.), Risk in Academic Writing: Postgraduate Students, Their Teachers and the Making of Knowledge (pp. 1–24). Bristol, Buffalo, Toronto: Multilingual Matters. Tonfoni, G. (2000). Writing as a Visual Art. Exeter, uk: Intellect. Welsh, R. (2007). ekphrasis. Retrieved July 1, 2015, from Csmt.uchicago.edu/ glossary2004/ekphrasis.htm

chapter 8

Reclaiming the Authorial Self in Academic Writing through Image Theatre Aditi Hunma

Introduction Academic writing remains one of the key modes of assessment in tertiary institutions. Students are assessed not only on the basis of their content knowledge but more so, on their ability to critically engage with ideas and with other knowers in the field. Thus, a mastery of academic writing norms does not restrict itself to students’ ‘proficiency’ to construct grammatical sentences or to follow genre specifications. It also requires an ability to enter discursive spaces where one’s voice can be asserted among other authors, and signs of critical thinking can be displayed in the written text (see also Williams, chapter 6, and Bell, chapter 7, this volume on the ways novices approach academic text writing). Often, the term ‘voice’ is mistakenly understood as an inborn sense of self or consciousness. In this chapter, I lean towards a notion of voice as constructed and multiple, and hence prefer Clark and Ivanič’s (1997) term ‘writer identities’, which in their view encompasses different identity strands. These take the shape of the ‘autobiographical self’, which is the writer’s ‘life history’; the ‘discoursal self’, which can be understood as the writer’s discipline-specific self; and the ‘authorial self’, defined as ‘the writer’s sense of authority or authorial presence in the text’ (p. 137). My interest in writer identities stems from a broader research on innovative methods and spaces to teach academic writing to international students with English as an additional language (eal) (Hunma, 2012). I use eal deliberately rather than the loaded ‘English as a second language’ which can construct false hierarchies between first and second language speakers (Pennycook, 2001). It would be more useful, as Norton (1997) suggests, to pose the following questions: ‘What is the learner’s linguistic repertoire? Is the learner’s relationship to

Hunma, A. (2016). Chapter 8. Reclaiming the Authorial Self in Academic Writing through Image Theatre. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 167–191). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_010

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these languages based on expertise, inheritance, affiliation, or a combination?’ The research also focused on questions around writer identities in students’ academic essays, exploring possible identity clashes, enablers and constraints from students’ previous school and home environments. The research participants hailed from various nations within the Southern African Development Community (sadc) and enrolled for courses across various disciplines at a South African university. As such, the groupings were far from homogeneous, and students from Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of Congo, Mauritius, Tanzania, Lesotho brought with them a variety of resources, or socio-cultural and symbolic capital, that would perhaps never find their way into an academic essay. From a lecturing perspective, one would agree that a writing pedagogy overlooking the tensions between texts, self and contexts could border on the ‘deficit model’ where students’ writing issues would be viewed as an illness in urgent need of remedy (Street, 1993). The participants signed up for a four session long Writers Workshop where they met with other international students and engaged with texts of different genres. The workshops were designed to introduce them not only to the academic writing conventions at the University, but also to the ways of negotiating voice within the ambit of their disciplinary discourses. While most of the participants had studied under the Cambridge education system and were fluent in written English, other layers of fluency were on the verge of gaining criticality at the tertiary institution in question. Here I allude to the conventions of academic writing in undergraduate studies, where critical thinking and argumentation are just some of the many concerns students need to address. In first year written essays in particular, I noticed a sense of loss, a strategic performance of the ‘discoursal self’ counter-balanced by a downplaying of the ‘authorial self’ in academic writing (Hunma, 2009), which at times could be equated with a lack of critical thinking. This begs the question: How does one reclaim the ‘authorial self’ when the academic writing genre seems to privilege a reproduction of scholarly views rather than knowledge making in explicit ways? It would appear that a reliance on traditional methods or prescriptive approaches to nurture students’ authorial self in writing, falls short of achieving the set goals as students may become overly preoccupied with the required template. In this regard, I suggest alternative moves in which theatre performance, especially ‘Image Theatre’, can bring the self back to the centre of claims to knowledge and one’s experiences of the social world. ‘Image Theatre’ was first introduced in Brazil in the 1950s by Augusto Boal as part of his Theatre of the Oppressed to enable individuals, often living in informal settlements, to rise above disheartening circumstances or social

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constraints such as poverty, squalor, disease and domestic violence. It was a language in its own right, allowing participants to ‘voice’ their thoughts through the language of theatre, especially when the dominant language, Spanish, also their additional language, restricted their ability to be heard meaningfully. The chapter takes the shape of a theoretical and empirical discussion around the ways in which recourse to multimodal approaches such as ‘Image Theatre’ can be valuable in nurturing or reclaiming voice in writing or otherwise, where voice features at the nexus of academic texts, the institutional discourse, the socio-academic context and the self. In this, the chapter closely subscribes to the principles of the New Literacy Studies School where academic literacies are viewed as a set of social practices contingent upon context, where the meanings of texts are co-constructed, and where voice or student agency and institutional discourses are in constant negotiation (Lea & Street, 1998). One may wonder whether ‘non-traditional’ students, those who are not yet insiders to the local academic system, can negotiate such meanings at first year level. I believe that this question is misguided for it unwittingly reinforces deficit views. It could be rephrased as ‘what prevents some students from making critical moves in their writing and what supports agentic ventures?’ Curry and Lillis (2004) argue that academic writing conventions are seldom made explicit to ‘non-traditional’ students. This proposition would suggest for instance, that while students may be critical thinkers, their lack of awareness of what is permissible, might push them to ‘play safe’ in writing and regurgitate the lecturer’s or particular author’s views. The proposition is also likely to result in the privileging of genre approaches to the teaching of writing, and of the ‘academic socialisation’ model (Street, 1993), championed by constructivists, whereby students are assimilated into the academic norms of the discipline. While teaching the rules is invaluable, it is restricted in its scope to nurture critical thinking, for at its extreme, it reifies form over content and reproduces genre. In fact, the academic socialisation model cannot by itself rescue voice, unless perhaps one views genre as a generative category, as Schryer (1993) does, when he states that genres are ‘stabilised for now’ but likely to change. Once the genre conventions are introduced, pedagogues need to imagine other productive spaces where different writing voices and critical thinking can be rehearsed. In this light, what ‘Image Theatre’ affords is two-fold: firstly, it sheds light on students’ hopes and anxieties vis-à-vis social and institutional pressures; secondly, it acts as a pre-text for meaningful engagement with academic texts and concepts. I posit that it is only once these expectations and anxieties are shared in a performative manner, that writing itself can become more liberated in its form and the licences that it takes.

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I further argue that critical thinking in writing is not lacking in first year students, but often tends to be muzzled when contextual pressures to be correct take the upper hand, especially in the case of foreign students who are straddling different worlds and managing multiple transitions. New genres of expression, such as theatre, can, to some degree, mediate between students’ emerging identities and the writings they are expected to compose. I first offer examples of how form regulates the ‘authorial self’ in mainstream essays, before delving into the role Image Theatre can play in mediating between self, context, institutional discourses and academic writing.

Analysis of Writer Identities in Mainstream Essays An analysis of participants’ mainstream essays indicates that the ‘discoursal self’ was more prominent than the ‘autobiographical’ and ‘authorial’ selves.1 I present an example before discussing the ways in which Image Theatre could be used as a scaffolding strategy to bring out the authorial self in academic writing. Tahini’s Academic Report Tahini shared a biology field trip report where she was required to assume the subject position of novice researcher in the field, collecting data and reporting findings to the academics in her discipline. Her group was therefore required to display accuracy and rigour in the presentation of data, as well as adequate mastery of the scientific report style, which was still new to them. She scored 72% (a lower first division) in the biology field trip report written as a group. The tutor’s comment on the discussion section that she wrote was that it could have been more thorough and analytical. Tahini also reported that the quality of the work would have been better had there been better cooperation among group members. Autobiographical self: In the discussion section entitled ‘Comparison of intertidal algal and animal life in False Bay with other regions along the South African coastline’, Tahini was expected to compare and discuss the differences in the algal and animal life in the different regions. A glance at the essay structure, however, showed a brief listing of the differences in the animal life in those 1 ‘autobiographical self’ = writer’s biographic background; the ‘discoursal self’ = writer’s understanding of her/himself in the disciplinary context, ‘authorial self’ = writer’s perception of her/his own authority in the (con)text (see p. 177–178 for a more elaborate definition and Clark and Ivanič (1997): p. 137).

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regions, with brief explanations of the environmental conditions enabling or inhibiting the growth of those creatures. Due to the listing structure, there was no necessary link between the paragraphs. In terms of the ‘autobiographical self’, one could not infer from the descriptions that the group members had actually spent time in the field. The information was presented in a factual manner. While the Eastern coast is dominated by algal forests, the Western coast consists of kelp beds, which may extend to as much as 3 km. The autobiographical elements were less evident in the text. Tahini did mention in her profile her fascination with ‘microscopic organisms’. Perhaps that could account for the painstaking descriptions of the types of creatures in the discussion section, and the lack of space for actual discussion. The lack of engagement could also be a result of her high school academic experience. High school was mostly a race towards good marks and bursaries, failed to teach students the language, but instead forced them to follow a certain writing pattern where no personal opinion and thought can be put into words. The best students are those who diligently follow the method imposed by teachers, themselves governed by an impenitent system, a vicious circle impervious to any sort of criticism. (From Tahini’s profile) Her comments convey that she was displeased by the way the school system stifled students’ voice. Her tone became more incisive as she said, ‘I believe that high school was only a means to access an acceptance letter from the university’. She was determined to learn the ropes of academic writing now to fill in any possible lacunas, since ‘I realized how much I didn’t learn about language and writing skills at school’. The influence of her prior schooling experience in the text could be viewed as part of her ‘autobiographical’ or ‘discoursal self’; hence a possible blurring of the categories of Ivanič’s clover model. This said, from Tahini’s comments, one could expect her to display the ‘discoursal’ elements required by her department, perhaps in excess, to compensate for her perceived lack of ‘writing skills’. Discoursal self: As expected, the ‘discoursal self’ was very evident in the text. The field trip report as a whole was mostly constructed in the passive voice, especially when the group members had to describe what they did, observed and found. Here, they successfully assumed the subject position of the novice scientist, where the discovery or finding takes precedence over the individual responsible for it. This is unlike the social sciences, where the researcher or

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writer is as important as the findings made, because these are inevitably tinted and transformed by his/her gaze, subjectivities, beliefs and theoretical stance. Here is an example where the group members effaced themselves from the research process and made the results take precedence. The results were noted down on a data sheet. This project is divided into two parts. The first one compares … On other occasions, as shown, the use of the passive voice gave inanimate objects such as the project or the report an active voice, all in the effort to mask the authors’ actual identities or more simply their inevitable but seemingly intrusive presence. Thus, in such disciplines, the passive voice and nominalisations created a semblance of ‘objectivity’; and the project of furthering knowledge was deemed larger than the sum of individuals or experiences creating it (see Halliday & Martin, 1993 on how nominalisations turn events, actions, and so on, into quantifiable objects; see also Parkinson & Adendorff, 2004). Perhaps the other elements of the student’s writer identities were muted because of the strictures of the scientific reporting form. One could not assume the silences, or lack of discussion in the text to be ‘deficits’ on the student’s part. In fact, in the light of Tahini’s prior essays in the workshop, that assumption becomes implausible. Authorial self: As discussed, the limited freedom to assert oneself in the first person or show agency over the actions one did take, could lead to a hushed ‘authorial’ voice in the text. Yet, there were covert ways of taking ownership of the content. One of them is to tabulate the differences and to explain their implications as Tahini did on behalf of her group. The Littorina zone is the highest region up the shore and the most exposed one, whereas the Infratidal zone is the most sheltered one and closest to the water. table 4

Region

Littorina Infratidal

The summary of figures from the Results section

Mean number of species

Standard deviation for number of species

Mean biomass

Standard deviation for biomass

Mean size

10 91.6

0.972 1.912

302.544 17356.752

68.035 1572.298

18 137.12

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The above table shows that there is a big difference between the number, biomass and size of species in the Littorina and Infratidal zones. The differences arise due to a variety of factors, including, temperature, exposure to sun, wind, nutrient availability water currents and wave action. She used the table as a starting point to make the claim that there was a ‘big difference’ in the number and size of the species. The table hence became a basis for validating some of her initial observations and gaining credibility. The table also allowed her to stretch the observations and assume the causes for this ‘difference’. However, had she spent more time discussing the salient figures in the table, she would have wielded greater authority over the content. She was penalised for not engaging with the data in depth. This would perhaps have required that she took up the subject position of statistician, or applied mathematician, which she might not be ready to impersonate. It is ironic that the more the student immersed herself in the discipline and the more tools she had to manipulate data, to deepen the analysis and develop an authoritative text, the less authorial presence she had to negotiate her position. In fact, had she analysed the data more deeply, she would have used more detailed calculations or scientific terminology, which would align her more with the ‘scientific’ project, but perhaps reduce her agency as a knowledge maker. I separate out authorship and authority since it is often once the writer has gained the subject position of ‘author’ (and have authorship) that he/she can wield ‘authority’ over the text. In this case, the scientific writing genre required from Tahini the dexterity to juggle both technique and the possibilities of self-as-author. However, we notice that soon enough, in her case, both the ‘authorial’ and ‘autobiographical’ elements were overtaken by the ‘discoursal’ aspects of the scientific text. It is possible that the claims for objectivity, characteristic of many scientific texts, took precedence over possibilities for ‘authorial’ presence. Deconstructing the ‘Discoursal Self’ in Academic Writing Why the pre-eminence of the ‘discoursal self’? Bangeni and Kapp (2006) suggest “students have complex motivations and pressures within and beyond the institution that are not clearly visible to us as academics” (p. 82). As mentioned previously, writing can become performative and critical when new alignments are forged between the writer and the text and/or context. It becomes performative, when the student-writer begins to question the cited author’s intent. In other words, writing critically involves taking ownership of one’s script and honing a cautious yet powerful ‘authorial’ pres-

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ence. Writing remains predictable when students rigidly conform to what they understand to be discourse conventions. Using the stage metaphor, participants explained that lecturers and more broadly the department were like the playwrights or rule setters, abstract entities that remotely controlled students’ text production process. Joe: Lecturer. Because sometimes they tell you to go to the library, to get these books. The department also sets the rules. It tells you, ‘write a two thousand word essay’. It would appear that as a result of strict departmental rules, the script was seen by some participants as a way to be accepted within the discipline, but more importantly to gain marks. The focus was more on delivering a legitimate text or product, than on mastering the stages in the writing process. The competitive nature of tertiary education made students absorb and internalise the university’s rhetoric of throughput, pass and retention rate. Participants explained the role of the academic script as follows: Joe: To persuade people. Tahini: To show your opinion. To get marks. Simba: To correct our ideas. As shown, participants shared different views, but still associated the functions of the script to concerns about the academic transcript, ‘to get marks’, and more subtly ‘to correct our ideas’. They believed that there was one correct answer that would yield more marks, as opposed to seeing the essay as a lively arena where different meanings are contested. This could be because they belonged to the Science and Engineering faculties respectively where answers were mathematically computed. Simba did take an ‘African Studies’ course as an elective, but could not escape the quasi-scientific discourse of a right and a wrong answer. I suggest that we may need to resort to other multimodal pedagogies to reclaim the ‘authorial self’ in academic writing. What theatre might enable, are new subject positions through which students can think critically about their socio-academic identities as well as what they begin to produce as texts in the academy.

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Image Theatre as Multimodal Critical Pedagogy Inspired by Freire (1970)’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, the Brazilian theatre director and activist Augusto Boal explores the power of performance in unravelling new meaning potentials and shifting social structures to enable greater human agency. In Boal’s (1979) Theatre of the Oppressed, praxis gains centre stage. It is an integral feature of the genre, for utterances can be nothing but embodied, and action is active expression, seldom passive. As Mutnick (2006) notes, “the people-to-people contact in the realm of theatre […] and the relation of actor and audience—for Boal, all ‘spect-actors’—creates an exigency that is not viscerally present in written communication” (p. 42). Boal’s Image Theatre technique in particular requires participants to create stills with their bodies of the issue (‘real image’), the ‘ideal image’ and the transitional images that would take them from the current issue to the desired, ‘ideal’ outcome. One could imagine these real and ideal images in the same way as Giroux describes photographs. For Giroux (1992), the practice of photography achieves a similar aim of framing the “possible and desirable” in terms of social order (p. 93). He states that, “photography makes the dead nervous by its ceaseless demand for intelligibility”. In other words, its meaning is forever volatile and dynamic, waiting to be stabilised through particular usages and offering the possibility to challenge the known, the actual, and conjure the possible and desirable. One could imagine the images produced by students in the same light, as dynamic photographs constantly morphing and challenging rigid structural constraints imposed by academia or their new social context. In fact, images could have more impact than their real counterparts because they frame and focus the gazer’s attention on the object of scrutiny and erase all extraneous objects from view. For Baudrillard (1994), the image begins to precede the real—“It is no longer a question of imitation, nor duplication, nor even parody. It is a question of replacing the signs of the real for the real” (p. 2). The image becomes real in a performative sense and infiltrates into the present, demanding active responses from the audience. In a study on multimodality and multiliteracies in post-Apartheid South Africa, Stein and Newfield (2006) demonstrate, through a series of examples, how multimodal pedagogies making use of visual, written and performance modes re-structure the learning space and students’ alignment with it in more democratic ways. Archer (2006) focuses particularly on the potency of symbolic objects in a ‘less regulated curriculum space’ to enable eal students to learn experientially through a wider repertoire of resources for expression. Image

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Theatre, I argue, would be one of the embodied resources at students’ disposal to express their current marginal positions. Since identities only become visible when enacted, such performance tools could fare better than speech and writing in addressing students’ psychosocial and academic challenges. Kress (1996) argues that the new generation is increasingly exposed to other semiotic modes especially visual ones, and that individuals do not relate to writing cognitively in the same way, adding that they have more enhanced “visual analytic skills and muscular coordination” that do not apply to the encoding and decoding of written texts (p. 193). Pedagogic investment into other semiotic resources becomes necessary, on the one hand, to address the socio-academic issues that may inhibit students’ ease of expression in academic writing, and on the other, to allow them to create meaningful pre-texts for writing.

Image Theatre Activities The Image Theatre technique was introduced in the Writers Workshop series designed for international students, in the first part of a session on critical thinking. Participants were divided into groups of four and asked to brainstorm a social or academic issue confronting them in their first year at the South African university. Each group then presented a still on the issue, through a collective immobile pose or human sculpture. The other groups were asked to explain what they witnessed. This was followed by a verbal explanation of the issue by the performing group. This image was called the ‘real image’. The group was then asked to produce an ‘ideal image’ of the situation. This required them to step out of the immediate stasis triggered by the situation and imagine a better outcome. Once again, this new ‘image’ was followed by explanations and feedback. Finally, the group was asked to imagine two transitional frames that would allow them to move from the ‘real’ to the ‘ideal image’. This necessitated much creative and critical thinking and turned participants into active problem solvers. Like writing, performance is seen as a projection of students’ different identities and the contexts in which they find themselves. Writing itself cannot be taught in isolation, for that would entail neglecting the identity issues that first year students experience in a new country or learning context. Therefore, to analyse students’ performance of their identity issues in a way that was commensurate with the analysis of their writing, I employed an extended version of Clark and Ivanic’s (1997) clover model of writer identities thus far only used to analyse written texts.

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figure 8.1 Clover model of writer identity clark & ivanič, 1997

I suggest that performance be treated as an extended text and be analysed like the written texts in the study, using the ‘clover model of writer identities’ (Clark & Ivanič, 1997). The stretching of the clover model was possibly also hinted by Clark and Ivanič (1997) when they questioned, “How far are the aspects of writer identity which we have described also aspects of identity in general?” (p. 160). I describe how the autobiographical, discoursal and authorial self could be applicable in the analysis of the performance. Clark and Ivanič (1997) define the autobiographical self in writing as “the writer’s life-history and sense of her/his roots” (p. 137). In the case of performance, the autobiographical self would surface mainly in the participants’ choice of the scenario. The performance is an enactment of their story, of their

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socio-cultural and academic experiences at the university. It depicts their past and present journeys and their projection of an ideal situation and identity in the future. The discoursal self in writing is defined as “the writer’s representation of her/himself in the text” (Clark & Ivanič, 1997, p. 137). In this case, the actor’s discoursal self would be evident in his/her use of movements, gestures, props and facial expressions. The more visible the gestures, the closer her alignment to the role of stage actor. In this case, the conventions defining the discoursal self, do not hamper creative expression to the same extent as it could with academic writing. In fact, the expectation is to be outgoing, to think outside the box, to take initiative and find creative solutions. If participants are shy, then they are asked to enact their shyness or make someone else in their group enact it. They are told that this learning site is a safe space where they can express themselves without being judged. The value of the performance is its ability to bring forth participants’ emotions and anxieties. The victories and vulnerabilities are precisely the themes of their stage act, and there is little room to be passive, as the discoursal self relies on performance. This emphasis on action makes the discoursal self overlap in interesting ways with the authorial self. The authorial self in writing is defined as “the writer’s sense of authority, and authorial presence in the text” (Clark & Ivanič, 1997, p. 137). How do actors demonstrate their authority and authorial presence in drama? One of the ways of doing so is by themselves crafting the defining moments of the narrative in the scenario and guiding the co-actors to act in particular ways. Their agency comes from their ability to decide what to add in the different frames, assign roles, and in the event of conflicting ideas, their ability to negotiate with others and reach consensus. These multiple identities are enabled through “subject positions” or the “socially available possibilities for self-hood” enabled by the context (Clark & Ivanič, 1997, p. 136). In this case, the Writers’ Workshop as a performative space provided participants with new subject positions outside of their student role, and gave them an opportunity to be actors of their own script, literally and figuratively.

Image Theatre for Identity Work This section reports on some of the ways in which Image Theatre bolstered students’ expression of identity issues. This is a crucial phase before one can address the issues of ‘authorial self’ in academic writing. Still, analysing images

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came with its own conundrum. Visual analysis, in the traditional sense, involves assessing the representational, compositional and interactional meanings of an image (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 2006). What form would it take when the artist/agent is implicated in the image/product? A Glimpse into Some Performances Adaptation to a new university environment and country was one of the main themes surfacing in five of the groups of participants. Two groups expressed how they struggled with accommodation upon their arrival. One group expressed the culture shock experienced when travelling in the crowded city. Another group shared issues of homesickness worsened by linguistic differences. The protagonist, Fiona, a student from the Democratic Republic of Congo, shared her academic and social challenges especially homesickness at university. She sought the assistance of her classmates and tutor to resolve her academic issues. In her ideal image, she was seen with flying colours. The performance ended with the family reunion. Finally, one group focused on their experiences of different greeting conventions across countries. Different groups were filmed during their performance. The stills are presented below. They are analysed to highlight emerging identity issues as they get performed in the three stills: ‘real image’, ‘transitional images’, and ‘ideal image’. Greeting Styles The group I focus on in this study comprised of Tahini, Joe and Simba, three first year international students from the Science, Engineering and Humanities faculties respectively. They enacted their Image Theatre performance in the quad outside a formal boardroom, normally used for administrative or pedagogic purposes. For our purposes, the quad allowed enough room for two groups to perform and be seen by the others. Students dragged chairs and other props from the boardroom to make their performance more believable. Their performance was focused on greeting conventions. Real Image Greeting conventions across different countries differ. In this still, Tahini, Joe and Simba from different sadc countries greeted one another in different styles. Tahini motioned for a hand shake, Joe for a tap and Simba for a friendly fist. Their facial expression showed an odd mix of joy and confusion. It was a quid pro quo in the making, indexing moments they personally encountered at uct when greeting people verbally. Hence, the picture projected strong autobiographical elements, being a valid though humorous recount of their experiences and emotions when first arriving at the university. In a discussion

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figure 8.2 Different greeting styles

session after the stills, the participants explained what this act signified for them. Simba: Like sometimes, they’ll say ‘what’s up?’ or ‘how’s it?’ What do you say? Joe: Yeah, it’s like that you know. Tahini (grinning): And you can’t tell them your whole story … This was a sign of what Burn and Parker (2003) observed in their research, where participants’ brought along knowledges and their present experiences began to infiltrate in the design of the image. It appeared that though the participants were facing one another and shared a common desire to greet, their gestures were dissimilar and not necessarily understood and reciprocated. Figuratively speaking, they still had one foot in their native land and that they were still attached to the modes and objects invested with socio-cultural capital there. The issue here is not actually one of home and foreign territory, but of the symbols that confer power to those within the territories. What are the effects of migration on the value of those symbols? As Blommaert (2005) points out, when people travel, conventions travel less well. In fact, they can lose purchase in the land of adoption. The cultural shock, as expressed in the image, could signal the fact that in our globalising nation states, the rich diversity of peoples is often taken for granted, leaving individuals confused and suspicious of the ‘other’. The homesickness experienced by Fiona, a Congolese student, was partly because she was struggling to make new friends in Cape Town. Her reason was that she was not fluent in English, and

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that her code was not well received. In Clark and Ivanič’s (1997) terms, there seemed to be a disconnect between some participants’ autobiographical self as performed in the new context, and their prior discoursal self, whose conventions at times failed to apply. Fiona: They don’t understand my accent. It’s so hard. Sometimes you don’t have the words. Participants admitted that unless they shared their cultural resources with one another, it could not become common knowledge. Joe: You have to try, make an effort to understand their customs. When greeting conventions differed, they also threatened the successful beginnings of communication, however fluent their English. This was because the peculiar greeting gesture not only became an index of difference, but an assertion of ‘negative face’ or worse of a ‘face threatening act’, in cases where it unknowingly offended or demeaned the other (Goffman, 1975). Ideal Image The ideal image was a show of fists by all three participants. The fists were here a sign of bonding rather than resistance. Certainly, its significance across cultures would differ and could lead to misunderstandings if not mediated by dialogue. For instance, in South Africa, the fist was a symbol of resistance during the Apartheid regime, and of bonding among followers of the Black Consciousness movement. The image showed that participants had come to an agreement about the greeting convention to use. Though they still stood at different angles, they all converged towards the midpoint. One could read this act as performative of a growing acceptance of the other, without losing touch with one’s own identity bearings. Also, the lowered fists were less confrontational than raised fists, which were also iconic of the Black Consciousness movement in South Africa. Transition Images The movement from the real to the ideal image required the sharing of different greeting conventions and agreement on the use of a common one. First, they each tried one another’s greeting styles. The negotiation process was not always straightforward as no single convention was superior to the other. At some point, one of the participants, in this case Simba, on the left, had to take the initiative and suggest that they greet in a specific style. Through this,

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figure 8.3 The fist as a common gesture

he assumed a significant authorial role. He was not only taking a decision for himself, but on behalf of his co-actors, when he suggested the fist, often considered a masculine and aggressive gesture. Simba: How about handshake [pause] or the fist? Like that [tightening Joe’s fingers into a fist]. It required courage on his part, openness on their part and certainly a desire not to confront or withdraw, but to resolve the issue. In this case, the camaraderie forged between the participants from previous sessions allowed for an easy transition to the ideal image. Student Reflections In the follow-up discussion, most of the participants’ comments related to strategies to cope with socio-academic issues outside the workshop space. Participants stated that they would step out of the situation to consider possible alternatives. They describe it in the discussion excerpt below. The session also boosted their courage to ask questions in tutorials, seeing that as one of the transitional images to help them succeed in their studies. Hence, the performance sessions urged them to place current challenges in perspective and see the bigger picture. It would take willingness and courage on their part to explore and adjust to the different academic conventions. Here is an excerpt of the discussion:

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figure 8.4 Transitional image 1

figure 8.5 Transitional image 2

Joe: Sometimes, in the big lectures, you don’t know what they’re saying. Simba: Yeah, here you can ask questions. Researcher: And tutorials? Simba: Yes that helps. Still you have to make an effort. Tahini: Yeah, it’s not that you’re shy but you have to stand up and talk in front of all those people. Joe: You have an ideal image, right? You know you need to succeed in this. Then you’ll work hard. Simba: Yes, ask your lecturer questions if you are not sure.

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Through the discussion, one could witness participants’ growing willingness to take initiative, to assume their new academic identity with more confidence and take all necessary measures to achieve the ideal image. Academic success was seen as a product of hard work, but also increasingly of one’s ability to communicate with others in the academic community of practice and acquire the tacit norms and discourses that would ease their integration within a highly competitive and contested academic space (see also Thesen, chapter 2 this volume). Gee (1990) notes that ‘telling the rules’ is not a solution to making students insiders to the norms of this community. Rather, we have to let him become a fully accepted member of the group, and to do that we have to really accept him, accept his home, his community; we have to understand him, appreciate him, and be aware of the Discourse-bound nature of all practices in and out of school. gee, 1990, p. xviii

Those who advocate the teaching of genre (Swales, 1990; Devitt, 2004; Carter et al., 2004) differ around the degree of explicitness that could be achieved. One possible reason for this is that as much as genres are discipline-specific, they are also context-dependent, and if students came from different prior academic backgrounds, mere instruction about genres or immersion into the discipline would not suffice. The use of performative modes could be one way to reach a common ground of understanding between international students and staff members, so that the latter could learn about and accept international students’ diverse backgrounds and brought along knowledges as resources, instead of merely acculturating those students to the academic community’s norms and practices (Singh & Doherty, 2004). In the workshop evaluation forms, participants identified the links between theatre and identity. They stated that “the session boosted my confidence”; “helps you discover something about yourself”; “feel at home”; “images help break communication barriers”; “develop communication skills”; “demonstrations help in continuing with the activities”; and “they are helpful in analysing data from different angles”. Confidence and communication skills were stressed by the participants, though as one would admit, words were barely used during the Image Theatre performance. The performance in fact extended the commonplace understanding of communication as a string of utterances available for uptake. It cannot be denied that communication was necessary to transcend the real image and achieve the ideal image. This said, in the absence of smooth ver-

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bal or written interaction, the use of theatre ‘as a language’ (Boal, 1979) could prove worthwhile. Image Theatre, in many ways, bears the same spontaneity as speech (Chafe, 1982) or of writing when it functions visually/semiotically (Kress, 2006). Chafe (1982) also mentioned that speech is characterised by the frequent use of the first person. Theatre parallels this feature by investing the self in gestures, movements and at times, utterances. These are endorsements of the ‘I’, for there would be no acting, no gesture, no movement without the actor. The performer rises above the mere utterance of ‘I’ by actually performing it. Thus, through theatre, participants acquired other tools to express themselves, should they fall short of words. Also, they were beginning to display a more confident and reflective persona that could later enable them to articulate their thoughts in words. While one should be wary about generalising from the above theatre experiments, it would appear that the theatrical methods could assist participants in trying out subject positions within new contexts, as well as forging confident social and academic fronts. The effects of theatre hence ranged from relational benefits such as improved communication skills to greater self-awareness. Also, the theatre experience allowed the protagonist, and at times the co-actors as well, to take ownership of the script, to direct the actions of subordinate actors and influence the outcome of the play. Much of the affordance of Image Theatre stems from the fact that the stage is a performative space where meanings can be questioned and where there is room for various interpretations of the script and at times, for spontaneous improvisations. Hence, theatre operates in the shaky terrains of “undecidability” and “urgency”, to quote Derrida (1992, p. 87), where each ensuing performance is bound to be differant and unique. It is this capacity for novelty and agentic assertions that allows theatre to be a fertile ground for creative and critical thought, and particularly so, in Boal’s provisional form of theatre, where the solution is always forthcoming and co-generated by actors and audience, or “spect-actors”. The stage hence becomes a performative space, where theatre as a mode of expression allows for the revisioning of links between texts, self and context of production. The texts, here bodily movements, become indexical of individuals’ challenges and their adaptation to their new socio-academic contexts. When a teaching space does not assume the shape and boundaries of theatre, it may be performative through other modes such as writing and speech. This is the case if the modes impact on individuals' behaviour and events in the real world. The next section illustrates how Image Theatre as a performative mode may be used to reclaim the ‘authorial self’ in academic writing.

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Image Theatre as a Pre-Text to Resurface the ‘Authorial Self’ As mentioned, Boal (1979) is convinced that participants’ performance and brought-along objects are themselves a language, and by extension, I would argue that they can offer new subject positions to trigger critical thinking in and outside of writing. Hence, when Boal (1979) asks a question in Spanish and his learners “answer in photography”, this move by them is a legitimate one, as the focus is more on expression than form (p. 122). The performance mode is used in the eal classroom in Peru as a communicative tool until the learners acquire the language of power, namely, Spanish. In the same way, Image Theatre can be used as a pre-text and brainstorming tool to liberate students’ thinking about the essay topics at hand. For instance, when given an argumentative essay requiring students to take a stand on a particular issue and respond to an author’s position, they can be asked to imagine the situation in terms of real image, ideal image and transitional images. The cited author’s position would be the real image. The student’s position would be the ideal image that propels the essay in motion. The premises that support the student’s position would be the transitional images. The premises could be responses to other authors’ views or could be assertions made by the student. The following example is a hypothetical one, illustrating how Image Theatre could be used on an existing introductory course in the Humanities. This course introduces students to academic writing conventions while making them engage with sociological themes such as language, identity, race, gender and culture. For their first essay, students are usually asked to read Ngugi wa Thiongo’s (1986) Decolonising the mind: The politics of language in African Literature and to respond to the author's claim that ‘The dominance of the English language takes us further and further from our selves to other selves, from our worlds to other worlds’. They are required to take a position and comment on whether there is actually an intrinsic link between language and collective identity as Ngugi would hold, and whether the imposition of English does make individuals lose their roots. If students had to map different thoughts using the Image Theatre technique, then Ngugi’s view would constitute the real image. To enact the real image, students could for instance drift to different corners of the room, to show how they were cut off from their community and lost their bearings, or they could stand open-mouthed, exhibiting facial expressions of agony, to show that they struggled to speak and had actually become voiceless. The ideal image would comprise of students’ position in response to Ngugi’s claim. Students could choose to agree or disagree with Ngugi’s position, or par-

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tially do both. If a student chose to disagree with Ngugi’s position, then her position could be that one exercises choice, uses different languages strategically in required contexts, and thus, that there was no loss of identity when one opts to speak a language other than one’s home language. To enact the ideal image, the student could move between two different language groups, holding a board with English words when interacting with an English-speaking group, and a board with Zulu words when interacting with a Zulu-speaking group. To substantiate her position about language choice, she could stress that language identities or practices are actually acquired through processes of socialisation, rather than being inborn, and that they are therefore in flux and malleable. In this way, speaking a dominant language would not by itself lead to a loss of the local language or community identity associated with it. The transitional image to illustrate the process of socialisation could show an educator teaching vocabulary items to students on the board. Props could be used for this activity. Only once students have expressed their position and their premises in a persuasive manner, can they begin to write these in academic prose. It has been observed that some reasons for students’ writing block may be that they do not yet have the end in mind or have run out of premises. This activity challenges them to place their views upfront as the ‘ideal image’ and work backwards to give due credibility to their claim through a list of premises, as expressed in the transitional images. It is noteworthy that this technique as is would work best in Anglophone writing contexts where students are expected to present the author’s views and state their position in the introduction. An Image Theatre task in such contexts would require students to come up with real and ideal images, before brainstorming transitional images. In contrast, in some Francophone writing contexts, students seldom present their position in the introduction. Their essays are faithful to the original meaning of the ‘essai’ which means an attempt. Here, students’ arguments may in all likelihood emerge in the synthesis (conclusion) after they have examined different positions in their ‘thesis’ and ‘antithesis’. As such, an Image Theatre task here would require students to come up with a real image, transitional images and then, if possible, an ideal image, in that order. Having broadly sketched out how writing contexts may re-frame the Image Theatre task, I need to acknowledge that during the drafting process, even the so-called ‘ideal’ images (students’ positions) may be provisional ones, as students may constantly revisit their views. As such, they may oscillate between real and transitional images, until they are able to articulate their position in the final version of the essay.

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Such an activity could be performed in small groups or individually, or could be executed through a storyboard or script. The added benefit of performing one’s claim and premises in an Image Theatre format to the rest of the class, is a heightened sense of audience awareness, people whom participants must strive to persuade. As such, the performative aspects of Image Theatre could make the essay topic more relevant and interactive. Generally, Boal’s (1995) theatre techniques result in the collapse of aesthetic distance between actors and spectators and broaden the sphere of “spect-actors” (p. 13). In the classroom setting too, the audience could intervene during the performances and suggest alternative ideas, thus mirroring the scholarly practices peer reviewing, prior to the essay write-up. On the whole, Image Theatre can be extended beyond its functions of identity work to facilitate the generation of ideas for academic essays where the ‘authorial self’ seeks to be heard.

Conclusion The chapter offered a glimpse of the potential of Image Theatre as a mode to unfreeze students’ creative and critical agency in the institution as they seek to create ‘legitimate’ academic texts. Theatre allows for moments of ‘border crossing’ in the way the institution, students’ subject positions and texts are imagined and developed. Theatre allows us to conceive of the learning site as an evolving and experimental space where it becomes possible to explore fresh perspectives, challenge expected behaviours and create intrigue in form and content. One is tempted to believe that as participants became more aware of the ‘staged’ act of writing and more familiar with their audience, the rule setters and other relevant parties, they would find a comfortable balance between their ‘authorial’ and ‘discoursal’ selves in writing. In fact, at the end of a focus group activity on ‘the best academic essay of the year’, participants realised that they could be more active ‘stage directors’ in their ‘academic writing play’. This chapter also brought to the fore a different methodology to analyse the theatre mode, that would also apply to the analysis of the writing mode. This is the clover model of writing identities proposed by Clark and Ivanič (1997). When applied to theatre performance and performative writing tasks, this tool allowed one to grasp how acting as a stage performer or a writer was inevitably stage/context bound with particular conventions; and why writing in other more formal contexts did not lead to similar uninhibited displays of identities, unless these were encouraged by the gatekeepers.

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As such, one would believe that, if we require students to demonstrate signs of critical thinking in academic writing, then, we may need to revisit our traditional teaching modes, not only because students are increasingly visually inclined, but because the teaching of writing through the written mode seems to re-inscribe the pre-eminence of form over content. We may also need to interrogate our role, the barriers to students’ agency in the knowledge making project, and the subject positions made available to students to think the unthinkable in academia. Theatre can become an interactive, multimodal option allowing teachers of writing to open up new performative sites for their students to express different aspects of their writer selves, especially the authorial self. This openness can allow students to co-define the positional and spatial boundaries of pedagogic spaces, and to extend the rules and reach of such spaces for critical textual performance in academic writing.

References Archer, A. (2006). A Multimodal Approach to Academic ‘Literacies’: Problematizing the Visual/Verbal Divide. Language and Education, 20(6), 449–462. Bangeni, B., & Kapp, R. (2006). “I want to write about the Dalai Lama …”: Literacies in transition. In L. Thesen & E. van Pletzen (Eds.), Academic Literacy and the Languages of Change (pp. 47–51). London: Continuum. Baudrillard, J. (1994). Simulcra and Simulation. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Blommaert, J. (2005). Discourse: A Critical Introduction. New York: Cambridge University Press. Boal, A. (1979). Theatre of the Oppressed. London: Pluto Press. Boal, A. (1995). The Rainbow of Desire: The Boal Method of Theatre and Therapy. New York: Routledge. Burn, A., & Parker, D. (2003). Tiger’s Big Plan: Multimodality and the Moving Image. In C. Jewitt & G. Kress (Eds.), Multimodal Literacy (pp. 56–72). New York: Peter Lang. Carter, M., Ferzli, M., & Weibe, E. (2004). Teaching Genres to English First Language Adults: A Study of the Laboratory Report. Research in the Teaching of English, 38(4), 395–413. Chafe, W. (1982). Integration and Involvement in Speaking, Writing, and Oral Literature. In D. Tannen (Ed.), Spoken and Written Language: Exploring Orality and Literacy (pp. 35–53). Norwood: Ablex. Clark, R., & Ivanič, R. (1997). The Politics of Writing. London: Routledge. Curry, M.J., & Lillis, T.M. (2004). Multilingual Scholars and the Imperative to Publish in

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English: Negotiating Interests, Demands, and Rewards. tesol Quarterly, 38(4), 663– 688. Derrida, J. (1992). Force of Law: The ‘Mystical Foundation of Authority’. In D. Cornell (Ed.), Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (pp. 3–67). London and New York: Routledge. Devitt, A.J. (2004). Writing Genres. Carbondale: Illinois University Press. Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed, trans. New York: Continuum. Gee, J.P. (1990). Social Linguistics and Literacies: Ideology in Discourse. London: Falwer Press. Goffman, E. (1975). Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience. Harmondsworth: Penguin Giroux, H.A. (1992). Border crossings: cultural workers and the politics of education. London: Routledge. Halliday, M.A.K., & Martin, J.R. (1993). Introduction. In M.A.K. Halliday & J.R. Martin (Eds.), Writing Science (pp. 69–85). London: The Falmer Press. Hunma, A. (2012). The Exploration of a Performative Space to Nurture eal International Students’ Writer Identities at a South African University. Unpublished PhD thesis. Cape Town: University of Cape Town. Hunma, A. (2009). Identities and Coping Strategies in Writing: An Ethnographic Study of First Year Mauritian Students at a South African University. Unpublished MPhil thesis. Cape Town: University of Cape Town. Kress, G. (1996). Internationalisation and Globalisation: Rethinking a Curriculum of Communication. Comparative Education, 32(2), 185–196. Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (1996). Reading Images: The Grammar of Visual Design. London: Routledge. Lea, M., & Street, B. (1998). Student Writing in Higher Education: An Academic Literacies Approach. Studies in Higher Education, 23(2), 157–172. Mutnick, D. (2006). Critical Interventions: The Meaning of Praxis. In J.C. Cruz & M. Schutzman (Eds.), A Boal Companion: Dialogues on Theatre and Cultural Politics (pp. 33–45). London: Routledge. Ngugi wa Thiong’o. (1986). Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann Educational Books. Norton, B. (1997). Language, Identity, and the Ownership of English. tesol Quarterly, 31, 409–429. Parkinson, J., & Adendorff, R. (2004). The Use of Popular Science Articles in Teaching Scientific Language. English for Specific Purposes, 23(4), 379–396. Pennycook, A. (2001). Critical Applied Linguistics: A Critical Introduction. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum. Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. New York: Cambridge.

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Schryer, C.F. (1993). Records as Genre. Written Communication, 10(2), 200–234. Singh, P., & Doherty, C. (2004). Global Cultural Flows and Pedagogic Dilemmas: Teaching in the Global University Contact Zone. tesol Quarterly, 38(1), 9–42. Stein, P., & Newfield, D. (2006). Multiliteracies and Multimodality in English in Education in Africa: Mapping the Terrain. English Studies in Africa, 49(1), 1–22. Street, B. (1993). Cross-Cultural Approaches to Literacy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

part 3 Multimodality across Domains

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chapter 9

Intersemiosis in Science Textbooks Leo Roehrich

Introduction In education, the use of images is an absolute necessity. Explaining infinitely miniscule concepts such as quantum foam, complex and rapid phenomena like the cardiovascular system, or temporally distant creatures such as dinosaurs requires the use of images to effectively develop understanding in students who are being introduced to these ideas. In nearly every textbook, the visual medium is used to assist in introducing scientific concepts to learners through such media as diagrams and flowcharts, artistic renderings, and photographs (Libo, 2004). Visual description allows for communication that is impossible with words alone. Without writing, ideas conveyed through images have a different impact. They have a symbiotic relationship, providing affordances for meaning making. The combined potential of seemingly disparate media, or intersemiosis, enables an author to explore an increased variety of communicative means to educate learners more effectively (Bednarek & Martin, 2010; Martin & Rose, 2008). To illustrate this concept of multimodal integration, the following photographs demonstrate how intersemiosis builds new meaning by incorporating multiple media. Figure 9.1 depicts a typical representation of an atom. Figure 9.1 has what many of us understand to be an atom. As readers, we may reflect back on previous science classes, remembering that the rings are electron paths, recognize the tightly packed nucleus comprised of protons and neutrons, and even perhaps take note of the hazy background. But when given a specific context, as in Figure 9.2, the meaning of the photo is redefined through the text. With the help of the text, the focus of the audience is redirected to a new interpretation of the atom, one that forces us to re-evaluate the image, and our scientific knowledge, and perhaps, makes us wonder what a probability

Roehrich, L. (2016). Chapter 9. Intersemiosis in Science Textbooks. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 195–215). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_011

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figure 9.1 adapted from berger (2009)

figure 9.2 adapted from berger (2009)

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distribution would look like. According to Berger’s Ways of Seeing (2009), a reader’s understanding of an image in writing is dependent on its co-text; the overall text creates a context within which an image is understood. Textbooks do not use written or visual communication as individual modes of expression; images displayed are conveyed in conjunction with written explanations (Libo, 2004). In spite of the separate meaning making capacity of images, visual communication never occurs independent of context. Textbook explanations can be enhanced through cross-referencing various media, allowing students to gain knowledge in ways that neither medium could accomplish independently (Fei, 2004). Multimodal and intersemiotic research has expanded to study a wide variety of fields, most notably education. As many educational texts incorporate multimodal elements, the need to actively develop explicit understanding for multimodal literacy becomes apparent. Understandably, a large portion of educational research focuses on the education of youth, kindergarten through 12th grade. However, this research focuses on the first year of university, a transitional year for many students. For new university students, the rigors of the new curricula and the need for an academic level of discourse require learners to adapt to a new communicative style, with different conventions and expectations. Although academic writing is not generally associated with the use of images, the use of visual aids in university textbooks is common. The current study intends to unveil the purposeful use of images in undergraduate, general education science texts, with the added goal of providing data that assist in pedagogical practices for academic writing and reading. Considering the prevalence of image use in the sciences, and standard general education science requirements for graduation from universities in the United States, this study explores the co-creation of meaning through intersemiosis when incorporated into science texts intended for undergraduate students in introductory courses. To discover how images are used and cohesively introduced textually, this research set out to answer the question: What is the functional use of an image in undergraduate science textbooks? To answer this question, this study employs the Systemic Functional framework of Logicosemantics to reveal patterns in functional use of images in relation to text (Salway & Martinec, 2005).

Background of Systemic Functional Linguistics The essential concept of Systemic Functional Linguistics is derived from Malinowski’s anthropological work which initially stated that among the Trobriand

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figure 9.3 A map of delicacy and metafunctions adapted from martin & rose (2008)

islanders of Papua New Guinea, language was used to perform physical actions such as catching fish or cooking, “doing” tasks. With increased knowledge of the culture and their societal interactions, he demonstrated that all communication performs “doing” tasks, ranging from physical processes such as fishing to the construction of a friendship (Malinowski, 1922; Firth, 1957). Systemic Functional Linguistics, from this essential tenet of communication, views communication as both systemic and functional: systemic because choices are made from contextual options and functional due to the purposeful nature of interpersonal communication (Halliday, 1994). Systemic Functional Linguistics approaches each level of communication from three directions, or metafunctions: Interpersonal, Textual, and Experiential. Together they comprise the entirety of meaning-making. The Interpersonal metafunction is concerned with how information is conveyed and interpreted by an interlocutor, including various concepts such as status, relationship, and other social factors. The Textual metafunction refers to the organization and flow of a text, as well as how ideas are interrelated within a single text. Finally, the Experiential Metafunction encompasses the content and subjects of the text, and how they are represented in communication (Halliday, 1994). This system is represented in Figure 9.3. The curved lines represent the three metafunctions. As each ring subsumes the next, the increase in size represents a higher level of abstraction in communication. Figure 9.3 shows the three most delicate levels: Phonology, Lexico-Grammar, and Discourse Semantics, leaving out

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the higher levels of abstraction, Register and Genre, as this research works entirely within the area of Discourse Semantics. In this model, each circle, as the level of abstraction increases, includes the entirety of the more delicate circles below; therefore, Lexico-Grammar, the total communication observable at the clausal level, includes all aspects of phonology, while Discourse Semantics subsumes both Lexico-Grammar and phonology under its paradigm (Halliday, 1994; Martin & Rose, 2008). The level of Discourse Semantics focuses on “above the clause” communication through the building of ideas and connection of concepts between clauses and throughout a text (Halliday, 1994). This research works within the Experiential area of Discourse Semantics utilizing an intersemiotic modification of the Logico-semantic framework.

Integrating Text and Image Communication exists in a myriad of semiotic forms. Multisemiotic research has been carried out from a variety of Systemic Functional perspectives and applied to many extra-linguistic communication formats such as musical beat (Bednarek & Martin, 2010), image (Bednarek & Martin, 2010; Fei, 2004), architecture (O’Toole, 2004), and various others. Systemic Functional Multimodal Discourse Analysis (sf-mda) explores features and patterns of production in various communicative forms within the context of the instance of communication. This research focuses on one area of sf-mda, the field of Intersemiosis. Intersemiotic analysis operates with the understanding that multiple formats of communication frequently co-create meaning within a single text; presentations merge voice with slides, ballet pairs music with dance, and textbooks combine text and image (Fei, 2004). Figure 9.4 visually demonstrates the way in which textbooks seamlessly integrate multiple types of communication to form a single cohesive text. On a grammatical level, the production of each semiotic medium is unrelated, though the instruments, the use of the human body for production, and standard aesthetic conventions differ between the forms. Nonetheless, as levels of abstraction increase, when considering the overall authorial voice of a text, neither text nor image appears incompatible on the same page. The two semiotic forms are both natural, and expected, communicative means. Image and text are inter-referential, with text linguistically explaining photographs, and artist’s depictions explaining written ideas. Effective intersemiotic communication results in a cohesive textbook page wherein the genre of the textbook is built through multimodal expression (Fei, 2004).

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figure 9.4 A visual description of Intersemiosis adapted from fei (2004)

Intersemiotic Logico-semantics: Finding Function Logico-semantics, being part of the Discourse Semantics stratum, describes how clauses are related, or interrelated, at an “above the clause” level. Logicosemantics, intersemiotically, explores the logical relationship shared between images and text. This research derives its system from the Systemic Functional frameworks of Halliday (1994) and Martin and Rose (2008), with visual design research produced by Berger (2009) and McCloud (1994). Both Berger and McCloud posit that when combining text and image, one medium provides a reference point for the other. Extrapolating this concept into a Systemic Functional perspective, much like the dependent relationship between a dependent clause and its independent counterpart in a sentence, image and text are interdependent, with one medium depending on the other for context, or both media being independent but connected by context. Figure 9.5 visually demonstrates the intersemiotic expansion network. This network outlines the various choices available regarding the logical connection between image and text, as well as the semantic relationship which details the functional purpose of the intersemiotic relationship. The meaning of an intersemiotic relationship, as defined by the categories in Figure 9.5, shows the variety of ways in which an image and writing are used together within a single text. Semantically, The expansion between image and text falls under three primary designations: Elaboration, Enhancement, and Extension (Table 9.1) (Halliday, 1994).

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figure 9.5 The Logico-semantic framework adapted from the works of halliday (1994), martin & rose (2008) and mccloud (1994) table 9.1

Expansion Types

Expansion type

Probe

Elaboration (=)

Does it add examples, clarify details, or restate information? Enhancement (×) Does it add circumstantial elements i.e. causal, conditional, temporal, or spatial details? Extension (+) Does it provide a re-evaluation based on new information?

The probing questions from Table 9.1 help to define which type of Expansion relationship the image and text share. The Expansion type Elaboration provides an extended definition of the text by allowing an audience to more deeply understand the essentials of the adjoining image. Additionally, Enhancement in images provides details that a prepositional phrase and some conjunctions

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provide for text e.g. in, at, on, if, because. Alternatively, Extension, in intersemiosis, allows an image to offer a means of re-evaluation to the accompanying text. Defining these relationships between image and text demonstrates the specific use of an image within context. For example, in Elements of Ecology (2006) Smith and Smith use images of marshlands and rainforests in an introductory chapter describing various typical regions. The relationship between the images and the written text is defined as Elaboration due to the examples of ecological locales provided by the images in reference to the text (Salway & Martinec, 2005). Further subcategorization of intersemiotic relationships gives greater clarity to image function. Understanding the type of Expansion that an image/text connection is categorized as allows us to search for patterns in the use of images. For greater specificity, this analysis goes one level deeper to inspect these categories of intersemiotic purpose further. To clarify, each Expansion type has multiple subcategories which allow for greater specificity of designation. Table 6 lists the subcategories from each type as well as the indicator which determines the category of intersemiotic relationship (adapted from Halliday, 1994; Salway & Martinec, 2005). Table 9.2 provides a means for understanding the categorization process by which this study was conducted. These probes allow for the ability to examine potential patterns in production of images. To further illustrate these relationships, the following tables include examples of intersemiotic Expansion. Table 9.3 shows that there is a close relationship in content between the text and image within Elaboration-type Expansion. In reference to Exemplification, the image provides a possible “mosaic” representation of deforestation. This example mosaic shows a single representation of a forest and the areas which have suffered deforestation. The text introduces the concept of deforestation depicted as a series of squares, and the related image shows just one of many forests to which it can be applied. Clarification differs from Exemplification in that, rather than showing one version of what the text is describing, the image is allowing the writing to draw attention to a particular feature of the image which clarifies the meaning of the text. Exposition differs from both by restating the text in a visual way; the reader is given two strategies for reading the same information. In table 9.4, examples are provided for the three subcategories of Extension: Addition, Variation, and Alternation. In essence, each of these three types can be summarized by a simple conjunction; and, or, and but, respectively. In the Addition example, the basic elements of the text and image are shared, connecting the two, but the primary focus of the text discusses cycles and hertz while the image conveys the concept of wavelengths, which are related

intersemiosis in science textbooks table 9.2

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Subcategories of Expansion

Type

Indicator

Elaboration Exemplification Is the image an example? Exposition Is the image a redundancy or restatement? Clarification Is the image integral to the explanation? Enhancement Manner Temporal Spatial Causal Conditional

Does the image describe “how”? Does the image describe “when” or show time period? Does the image show location? Does the image show the cause or result? Does the image show a potential outcome?

Extension Addition Variation Alternation

Is the image independent yet additive? Does the image provide opposition? Does the image provide an option or options?

to, but not a restatement of, a cycle. The previously mentioned “or” nature, or Variation, is shown in the possibility presented by the image in collaboration with the text. This particular text offers us a variety of ways to interpret the image. Similarly, Alternation also presents a new means of interpreting an image; however, this interpretation does not permit a variety of options, instead it only offers one option, an option which negates what is depicted. On the surface, the Bohr model atom appears to be a cohesive section of the book, but when reevaluated through text, the “corporate logo” atom is shown to be outdated and inappropriate for a modern textbook, providing the reader with an alternative view of the image. This research, while incorporating the entirety of the Logico-semantic network, had only limited examples of Enhancement within the data. For this reason, Table 9.5 only includes two subcategories of Enhancement: Manner and Spatial. These two categories of Enhancement use the image to answer circumstantial questions regarding the text. An Enhancement: Manner relationship shows the audience the ways in which the complementary text occurs. The excess sun from the Manner example from Table 9.5 are shown to occur during fun, outdoor activities. This image shows how the text occurs. Spatial

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Elaboration type

Text

Exemplification

Representation of a forested landscape as a mosaic of patches in various stages of successional development.

Image

adapted from smith & smith, 2006

Clarification

The corona at maximum has a more rounded shape

adapted from unsöld & baschel, 2002

Exposition

Convection in the atmosphere is the consequence of differences in air density.

adapted from moran & morgan, 1997

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intersemiosis in science textbooks table 9.4

Examples of Extension

Extension type

Text

Addition

Passage of one complete wave is called a cycle, and a frequency of 1 cycle per second equals 1.0 hertz (Hz)

Image

adapted from serway, 1992

Variation

The atoms could be surface impurities emitted by thermal excitation, or they may even be ions emitted in the presence of a strong applied electric field. adapted from serway, 1992

Alternation

This simple picture of the atom makes a nice corporate logo, but the idea of an atom with electrons orbiting a nucleus as planets orbit a sun was discarded nearly a adapted from serway, 1992 century ago.

relationships provide a visual representation of location for where the textual element takes place. In this case, humidity is occurring in a forest or jungle. The image displays a backdrop for the textual information.

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table 9.5

Examples of Enhancement

Enhancement Text type Manner

Image

However, mounting evidence indicates that too much sun can cause serious health problems including skin cancer adapted from moran & morgan, 1997

Spatial

Because water vapor concentrations are very high, even the slightest cooling during the early morning hours results in dew or fog, which gives such a region a sultry, steamy appearance. adapted from smith & smith, 2006

Parameters of the Study This theoretical underpinning, intersemiotic logico-semantics, is the basis for analysing the means by which authors use images within their specific field. The samples for this study were taken from undergraduate level general education science curricula in the United States, ten in total (Brady & Senese, 2004; Comins & Kaufmann, 2005; Fastovsky & Weishampel, 2009; Harden, 1998; Hoelzel, 2002; Martin, 2001; Moran & Morgan, 1997; Smith & Smith, 2006; Silk, 2001; Unsöld & Baschek, 2002). These books were chosen based on their use in university courses. The scientific fields for these samples vary from book to book: biology, physics, meteorology, geology, ecology, astronomy, and paleontology, generalizing undergraduate science course books based on general education requirements. In order to avoid subject bias, ten images were chosen from each book at random with no more than two photos from one chapter.

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figure 9.6 Percentage used among elaboration types

Additionally, within the sample texts, each image was designated a figure number, which was the reference point for determining the accompanying text. The text taken for analysis encompassed the entirety of the figure referencing paragraph, as well as the caption, if available. Revealing these purposes required applying the Intersemiotic Logico-semantic probing questions to the image and text to determine the relationship between the integrated media.

Results and Discussion of Analysis The logico-semantic network, which categorizes relationship types, with the probing questions outlined in Table 9.2, overwhelmingly suggests that these particular scientific textbooks use visual aids as a form of Elaboration. Ninety percent of image/text relationships are predicated on the use of an image as a form of explanation. The remainder of image use relationships have images used as Enhancement at eight percent and Extension at two percent. This tendency toward Elaboration, though important, is not enough to understand the function of the image in text. Elaboration is a category of image/ text relationship which is defined by its further explaining the α medium. Each purpose, however, is more specifically defined through further probing. Figure 9.6 demonstrates a high percentage, forty nine percent, of images used in this study are used for the purposes of Clarification, with only twenty eight percent used as Exemplification and twenty three percent used as Exposition. The distinctive use of Clarification type expansion over other types of Elaboration indicates that images and text are heavily reliant on integration as

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figure 9.7 Visual medium divergence

Clarification, which, by definition, is added explanation. Unlike Exemplification, which provides examples, and Exposition, bald restatement, Clarification refines details from the α medium. The statistical interdependence required for Clarification demonstrates an author’s implicit knowledge that text is insufficient to communicate specific scientific ideas, and remedies this insufficiency with an alternative means of communication, in this case, an image. Although Clarification is the most used functional purpose, based on these results, for images in science writing, there appeared to be another underlying pattern in the results. The sample images included both photographs and drawings with accompanying text. Of the one hundred sample images taken at random, fifty seven are photographs and forty three are drawings. When viewing these results, taking visual medium into account, further patterns in use emerge. In reference to the figure above, Clarification still holds an important place among images, still comprising over forty percent of intersemiotic function, regardless of visual medium type. Other macro-categories of Expansion, Extension and Enhancement, are still rarely used. However, accounting for the remaining percentages, there is a divergence in function. According to this data, photographs have a higher likelihood for use as examples in these particular textbooks. Whether this is because photographs are more conducive to exemplification or lend more credibility as an example source is not explained

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figure 9.8 Danger in Photography adapted from moran & morgan, 1997

figure 9.9 Simplicity in Sketching adapted from moran & morgan, 1997

by these results, but data indicate that authors are more inclined to use a photograph as an example than a drawing to demonstrate a specific example of a concept. Conversely, photographs are less likely than a drawing to demonstrate a visual restatement. This may be due to the fact that reality lends credibility to an image, but is also very complex. A realistic depiction of a situation can convey information in its truest form visually, and with great impact. In fact, as in the Moran & Morgan (1997) example from Figure 9.8, the impact of an image in relation to the dangers of sunlight is severe. The people photographed are all in danger, and as readers, we recognize the danger and understand the effects of sunlight on the skin. Conversely, the use of a drawing gives an author the tools to simplify the complexity of reality, while making the invisible visible. The drawing in Figure 9.9 takes a concept which is impossible to see in its entirety and allows a reader to witness the process as well as simplify the process, making it both understandable and visible.

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figure 9.10 Overwhelming use of Elaboration

These findings indicate that drawings have a greater versatility than a photo due to their ability to capture a visualization which is not visible to the eye, such as convection currents or black holes but may not have the impact or credibility given to a photograph.

Conclusions and Implications In examining intersemiotic relationships and interpretive language, American undergraduate level science textbooks display strong patterns in reference to specific uses of images as Elaboration and how they are described by the author. The regular use of images as elaborative explanation is not necessarily surprising, as introductory science textbooks are generally designed to explain scientific concepts. The use of images as Elaboration allows for a visual representation to provide examples, assisted explanation, or a visual restatement of written text. The inclusion of additional and related information, in this case, visually, makes sense as a staple within introductory science writing. The noteworthy aspect of this is the overwhelming tendency toward Elaboration over Extension and Enhancement (Figure 9.10). Extension, adding information which is external, and Enhancement, adding information which is circumstantial, are less appropriate in function for this writing style than Elaboration. Elaboration expands initial meaning through the use of internally relevant information, taking a statement and expanding it more deeply.

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When producing an introduction to science writing, as the authors from these examples have, they inherently chooses images which further explain the concepts outlined in the chapter. Textbook writers use images to inform and engage readers. This dual requirement further demands effort on the part of images to meet both expectations. These requirements are seemingly polarized, but the intersemiotic connection eases the difficulty, and simply allows for more tools that a writer can use to produce text. These results also show consistent purposeful inclusion of images with regard to their use in explaining the unexplainable in undergraduate textbooks. Often, complex concepts hinge entirely upon the integration of image and text for effective explanation. Consciously or unconsciously, these authors of science textbooks incorporate intersemiotic communication in a generally standard means of production. The consistent use of images as a form of Elaboration demonstrates that authors not only understand the difficulties students have with introductory science, but also that images allow these ideas to be more effectively conveyed. Currently, education, especially esl, focuses on reading skills such as the building of vocabulary, skimming and scanning techniques, and organizational strategies for reading. Intersemiosis, as an emerging field of study, has yet to be incorporated into standard instructional practice. Directing reading focus to include multimodal considerations has exciting educational consequences (Jewitt, 2005). Explicit knowledge of intersemiotic conventions in evaluation and function permits students to understand why an image is used, how to read it, and what language is being used to integrate an image (Bezemer & Kress, 2008). Explicit understanding of image function allows readers to make conscious connections between image and text. These connections make gaining knowledge of science more attainable. Focusing on text alone leaves a reader with only partial understanding of the purpose of that page. Reading multimodal texts includes the processing of multiple types of communication. By incorporating multiple learning styles, an author is able to teach a wider audience. When a student of introductory science courses reads a chapter, the student initially sees the page as a whole, perceiving locally decontextualized images alongside unread text. A reader must read to accurately place these images in context. Recognizing the language of intersemiosis, introductory phrases, and indirect reference, students see the relationship, and are better prepared to mentally integrate semiotic resources for effective reading strategies. Explicit instruction on how to read these signals gives students the tools to increase their reading effectiveness (Fei, 2004; Jewitt, 2005). When looking critically at integrated media, and applying explicitly taught features of intersemiotic conventions, students are able to translate this reading knowledge

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figure 9.11 A grouping of plants adapted from smith & smith

into writing knowledge, to integrate the media with purpose independently and convey complex intersemiotic messages. In a photograph like Figure 9.11, many possible opinions are possible without being prescribed an interpretation. If asked to describe what that environment would feel like, an individual would answer based on their personal experiences and background. Some people may have positive impressions of forest life, some have negative. Some have experienced cold, dry forests, and others have experienced hot, humid jungle. An author, when intending to convey a message, wants each reader to experience the image in the same way. Figure 9.11 comes with the description “Because water vapor concentrations are very high, even the slightest cooling during the early morning hours results in dew or fog, which gives such a region a sultry, steamy appearance.” By constricting how a reader sees the image, the writer is better able to illustrate the ecology of the jungle. This understanding of intersemiotic writing eases the fear of writing with pictures. For many students, writing is already a minefield. Grasping the conventions of academic writing is a common struggle for native speakers and English language learners alike (Cook, 2008; Schleppegrell, 2004). Manipulating language in such a way as to present authority and credibility is a delicate

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balance; adding graphs, photographs, diagrams, and any other visual aid can be a daunting experience. Instructing students on purposeful intersemiosis gives them a more varied toolbox with which to communicate to an audience. This explicit knowledge of intersemiotic writing alleviates the pressure of purely textual explanation and creates confidence in the use of visual communication. Student writing which uses images can seem disjointed, with images being seemingly unrelated; while most writers do not insert random images into their text, a student’s lack of intersemiotic knowledge forces these images to appear random, when in fact, student writers simply have yet to reach successful intersemiosis. Intersemiotic Expansion, when comprehended by learners, gives students explicit options for image use, and allows them to make decisions as to the function of the image in the text. In understanding the various Expansion types, students are capable of making a clear decision from a selection of options; it empowers them to use the tools at their disposal. The various available choices for intersemiotic expansion in science writing, according to the results, focus on different types of Elaboration, with sparing use of other types. When students are explicitly taught that Clarification, Exemplification, or Exposition are the primary means of integration for photographs and drawings, potential for successful intersemiosis increases and permits an increased opportunity to integrate their professional identity with the practices of their field. Beyond writing, required multimodal production is increasing in the academic arena. Paper and poster presentations, video and live performance, and other modes of multi-media communication are commonplace at the college level and beyond (Bezemer & Kress, 2008; Jewitt, 2005). This increased need for intersemiotic production causes an increased requirement for a student’s explicit understanding of the conventions of production. With these types of multimodal performance requiring use of visual, written, and spoken text, students can become overwhelmed with the enormous variety of options and the precision needed for effective use. For example, many students have difficulties making presentation slides that effectively integrate speech with visual aid. Sometimes the slides include an avalanche of text; other times the slides are a jumble of images that seem to lack purpose. Cohesive integration is of utmost importance in academic circumstances. Understanding image use, intersemiotic relationships, and accompanying textual integration, not only gives readers, writers, and performers a knowledge of the conventions of their field, but it also gives them the tools to succeed in academic settings where multimodal texts are a ubiquitous aspect of the educational experience. The results of this study show the potential for purposeful use of images in text; explicit instruc-

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tion on purposeful image use provides students with creative and informative tools for the construction of dynamic writing and academic texts.

References Bednarek, M. & J.R. Martin (Eds) (2010). New Discourse on Language: Functional Perspectives on Multimodality, Identity, and Affiliation. London/New York: Continuum. Bezemer, J., & Kress, G. (2008). Writing in Multimodal Texts: A Social Semiotic Account of Designs for Learning. Written Communication, 25(2), 166–195. doi: 10.1177/ 0741088307313177Pennsylvania: Sage Publications. Berger, J. (2009). Ways of Seeing. London/New York: Penguin. Brady J., Senese, F. (2004). Chemistry: Matter and Its Changes (4th ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons, Inc. Comins, N., Kaufmann, W. (2005). Discovering the Universe (7th ed.). New York: W.H. Freeman Company. Cook, V. (2008). Second Language Learning and Language Teaching (4th ed.). London: Hodder Education. Fastovsky, D., Weishampel, D. (2009). Dinosaurs: A Concise Natural History. New York: Cambridge University Press. Fei, V. (2004). Developing an integrative multi-semiotic model. In K. O’Halloran (ed), Multimodal Discourse Analysis: Systemic Functional Perspectives. (pp. 220–246) London: Continuum. Firth, R. (1957). Man and Culture: An Evaluation of the Work of Bronislaw Malinowski. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Halliday M.A.K. (1994). An Introduction to Functional Grammar. London: Edward Arnold. Harden, D. (1998). California Geology. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Hoelzel, A. (2002). Marine Mammal Biology. Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Science Ltd. Jewitt, C. (2005). Multimodality, “Reading”, and “Writing” for the 21st Century. Discourse: Studies in the cultural politics of education, 26(3), 315–331. doi: 10.1080/ 0159630050020001 Libo, G. (2004). Multimodality in a biology textbook. In K. O’Halloran (ed), Multimodal Discourse Analysis: Systemic Functional Perspectives. (pp. 196–219) London: Continuum. Lirola, M. (2010). How to apply sfl in classroom practice: An example in Bilingual Education Programs in the usa. The Buckingham Journal of Language and Linguistics, 3, 205–219.

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Malinowski, B. (1922). Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An account of native enterprise and adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Martin, A. (2001). Introduction to the Study of Dinosaurs. Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Science, Inc. Martin, J.R., & Rose, D. (2008). Working with Discourse: Meaning beyond the clause. London: Continuum. Martin, J., & White, P. (2005). Language of Evaluation: Appraisal in English. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Martinec, R., Salway, A. (2005). A system for image-text relations in new (and old) media. Visual Communication. (pp. 337–371) London: Sage Publications. McCloud, S. (1994). Understanding Comics New York, ny: Kitchen Sink and Harper Collins. Moran, J., Morgan, M. (1997). Meteorology: The atmosphere and the science of weather. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Serway, R. (1992). College Physics (3rd ed.). Orlando, Florida: Harcourt Brace Publishing. Smith, T., Smith, R. (2006). Elements of Ecology (6th ed.). San Francisco, California: Pearson Education, Inc. O’Toole, M. (2004). Opera Ludentes: The Sydney Opera House at work and play. In K. O’Halloran (ed), Multimodal Discourse Analysis: Systemic Functional Perspectives. (pp. 11–27) London: Continuum. Schleppegrell, M.J. (2004). The Language of schooling: A functional linguistic perspective. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. Silk, J. (2001). The Big Bang. New York: Harry Holt and Co. llc. Unsöld, A., Baschek, B. (2002). The New Cosmos: An Introduction to Astronomy and Astrophysics (5th ed.). New York: Springer-Verlag Inc.

chapter 10

Literacy and Numeracy Practices in Postgraduate Management Accounting Hesham Suleiman Alyousef and Peter Mickan

Introduction This chapter reports on a case study investigation into the academic practices of international students in a postgraduate Management Accounting module in the Master of Commerce Accounting program in Adelaide, Australia. The intention of the investigation was to identify and analyse the nature of literacy and numeracy practices in a selected subject in business studies. Business studies programs in higher education in Australia have attracted many international students who have contributed to dramatic growth in enrolments (Alyousef & Picard, 2011). Students from language backgrounds other than English, however, encounter new discourses, which challenge their comprehension of (written) information and their access to professional business practices. The texts of business practices are multimodal, realised in speech and writing together with tables and tasks. From a social semiotic perspective (Halliday, 1978; Mickan, 2014), students need to manage not only the linguistic but also other semiotic resources such as tables, graphs and computing programs which constitute business practices. That is, students’ understanding and applications of information compressed in tables and texts is a requirement for membership of the business community. The analysis of practices in Management Accounting in this chapter employs a multidimensional framework (Alyousef, 2012) in order to articulate the interrelated representation of knowledge in written texts and tables.

Alyousef, H.S. & Mickan, P. (2016). Chapter 10. Literacy and Numeracy Practices in Postgraduate Management Accounting. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 216–240). Leiden: Brill.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi: 10.1163/9789004312067_012

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Literature Review Academic literacy studies have mainly focused on the language of verbal texts. This has influenced pedagogies around literacy instruction, which focus on a generalised concept of academic language use and on language for specific purposes. Language is the significant resource in building disciplinary knowledge (see also Gourlay, chapter 4 this volume) and in the development of discourse resources for working in specific disciplines. Halliday’s (1978) description of language as a social semiotic identifies the role of language in the construction of meaning or more specifically in the development of resources for the expression of meaning potential. This perspective situates language in social and cultural contexts of use. As a result, a multiliteracies model (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000, 2013; Kalantzis & Cope, 2012; New London Group, 1996) needs to take into account the diversity of texts in human activity. A further feature of language use in higher education and other domains of human activity is multimodality (see Björkvall, chapter 1 this volume). A multimodal perspective of writing in higher education analyses images, materials and space as semiotic resources in spoken and written texts (Bowcher, 2012). Multimodal analysis then reveals the range of meanings expressed in learners’ activities and genres (Lea & Street, 2006), and it “not only takes different modes into account but also has a strong focus on the effects of their interplay” (Pauwels, 2012, p. 250) between images and texts (see also Roehrich, chapter 9 this volume). The analysis of academic texts draws attention to language as one of the social semiotic resources in socio-cultural contexts of higher education. Whereas up to now multimodal communication research has been conducted across the fields of mathematics (de Oliveira & Cheng, 2011; Guo, 2004; O’Halloran, 1996, 1999, 2000, 2004, 2005, 2008; 2009), science and computing (AlHuthali, 2007; Drury, O’Carroll, & Langrish, 2006; Jones, 2006; Wake, 2006), engineering (Simpson this volume), and nursing (Okawa, 2008), tertiary business discourse has not yet been fully examined. So far, studies in the domain of business have explored the linguistic (Bargiela-Chiappini, 2009; Crawford Camiciottoli, 2010; Perren & Grant, 2000; Thomas, 1997) and the technical (Craig & Moores, 2005) characteristics of management accounting discourse produced by corporate writers or speakers, and Bargiela-Chiappini (2009) has reviewed a range of business discourse studies in workplace settings. Applications of Systemic Functional Linguistics (hereafter sfl) in the study of tertiary business discourse are, to the best of our knowledge, limited but include studies by Thomas (1997) and Alyousef (2012, 2014, 2015a, 2015b, 2016; Alyousef & Alnasser 2015a, 2015b). Thomas (1997) investigated the systems of transitivity, thematic structure, cohesion and condensations in

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a series of management messages in the annual reports of a company whereas Alyousef (2012, 2015b) investigated, respectively, the system of transitivity in tertiary finance texts and the systems of Theme and Information Structure in tertiary management accounting texts. He employed a multidimensional approach to describe the epistemologies and the participants’ learning experiences and to investigate and explore the organisation of the multimodal texts. However, the system of transitivity and the use of conjunctives in a tertiary Management Accounting course have not been documented. Most international English as an additional language (eal) students in Australia and elsewhere are enrolled in business and commerce programmes (Alyousef & Picard, 2011), and “contributions from linguists specifically dealing with multimodality in business discourse have been relatively few” (Garzone, 2009, p. 156). The present study is pertinent since insights gained in analysis of literacy and numeracy business practices and of the multimodal texts which constitute business practices would provide information for the design of support programs for students’ induction into professional business practices. In the following, we give a short overview of Systemic Functional Linguistics and introduce how it is applied in our study.

An Overview of the Context and Document Analysis Halliday’s (1985) sfl sets out a range of linguistic resources for handling and interpreting multimodal socio-cultural literacy events which are mediated by written texts. The core of these resources is the lexico-grammatical stratum of language which is used to explore the three language metafunctions that construe meaning ideationally, interpersonally and textually. Ideational meaning construction works by representing and ordering our experience, perceptions, consciousness, and the basic logical relations (oriented towards the field of discourse), interpersonal meaning construction by enacting certain social relationships (oriented towards the tenor of discourse), and textual meaning construction by weaving ideational and interpersonal meanings into a textual whole (oriented towards the mode of discourse). These metafunctions correlate respectively with three register semiotic variables: field (what is talked about), tenor (how social roles and identities are constructed), and mode (how the meanings are organised). Our analysis deals with the experiential and the logical metafunctions in a Management Accounting course, analysing the transitivity and the use of conjunctives. The transitivity system in sfl represents our experience of the world through participants, processes, and circumstances. The analysis reveals

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the functioning of the lexicogrammar correlated with multimodal representation in the budgeting text. Clauses are analysed in terms of six process types: material, mental, verbal, existential, relational, and behavioural. Material processes refer to our experience of the external world and they describe processes of doings or happenings (open, close). Mental processes construe states of mind or psychological events (think, feel) whereas behavioural processes refer to physiological and psychological behavior (breathe, cough, smile, look), verbal processes refer to speaking actions (say, speak). The process of being, that is relational, signals identifying and classifying features. The existential process is realised by There-construction, and it signals the existence of something/someone. Each process has its own participants’ roles; for example, in the material processes, there are two participant roles, namely: actor and goal. Circumstances are realised by prepositional or adverbial phrases. At the logical level, paratactic (co-ordinating) and hypotactic (subordinating) nexuses are used to expand propositions. A paratactic relationship is established “when two or more independent clauses are connected by conjunctive linking devices …, while a hypotactic relation is set up when a dependent clause is connected to an independent (dominant) clause by a binding conjunctive device” (Alyousef, 2016, p. 13). Expansion is formed when the secondary clause expands the primary clause through the use of one of the three main sub-types of expansion: elaboration, extension, and enhancement (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004). In a series of studies across disciplines Mickan (2014) examined academic literacy from the perspective of epistemology. The analysis of language was situated in the context of the social practices of disciplinary and professional communities. The studies addressed the question of what are the practices and discourses which constitute discipline specific knowledge. A multidimensional framework (Alyousef, 2012; Mickan, 2014) was adopted to account for the complexity of the multisemiotic or multimodal nature of academic disciplines. The documentation included analysis of subject profiles, of subject content descriptions, of program events such as lectures (see also Thesen, chapter 2 this volume) and tutorials, and assignments tasks and assessments. A multidimensional framework was developed to record participants’ multimodal academic practices. Based on Halliday’s (1985) sfl, the characteristic features of the texts, diagrams and tables in university postgraduate courses were analysed. The study which generated the data used for analysis in this chapter was designed to describe the academic literacies of disciplines in higher education. Business studies was one of the disciplines studied. It included documentation of Management Accounting. Accountancy documents require understanding the texts constituting particular business literacy and numeracy practices. Subject specific epistemologies such as Budgeting are constituted with defining discourses which are embedded in different modes of representation. The

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analysis of the graduate attributes and learning outcomes stated in the Course Profile (The Business School, 2010) comprises part of the description of the epistemology of the subject. The Course Profile (ibid) sets out the multimodal tasks students needed to manage in terms of graduate attributes and learning outcomes (Table 10.1). The Management Accounting curriculum related each graduate quality to its corresponding objective(s) or indicator(s): 1) knowledge and understanding, 2) learning outcomes and 3) communication skills. For example, the graduate quality underpinning students’ ability to make budgets in this assignment was exhibiting “knowledge and understanding of the content and techniques of a chosen discipline at advanced levels that are internationally recognized”, “skills of a high order in interpersonal, teamwork and communication”, and “a proficiency in the appropriate use of contemporary technologies” (see also Williams, chapter 6 this volume, for the demands that students meet when joining the academic community). Embedded in the attributes and outcomes described in the Course Profile (Table 10.1) are assumptions about the nature of business practices and the management of semiotic resources for meeting program requirements. Management of information in business accounting included selection of “relevant information for a variety of decisions to be made in managing any organization”; “Formulate and use standards and budgets for planning and control purposes” and “Identify relevant costs for decision making purposes”. Interpersonal communication skills were measured in terms of students’ ability to examine diverse sources of information pertaining to management accounting, to identify and discuss relevant information in a group setting, and to present information in a manner that will assist managers in their decision-making roles. The graduate attributes suggest the multisemiotic nature of business practices. Included are expectations that students employ a range of contemporary management accounting technologies. The analysis which follows is of one of the assignments in Management Accounting.

Management Accounting Assignment The assignment analysed in this section was designed to measure students’ competence in ‘budgeting’. The task was to prepare documentation in the form of a Budgeted Balance Sheet for a company “Frame-it” to support a finance application. The components of the assignment are listed below: 1. 2.

Sales budget (4 marks) Cash receipts budget (4 marks)

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table 10.1 The graduate attributes and learning outcomes related to the assignment adapted from the course profile (ibid, pp. 2–3)

1. Knowledge and Understanding

This course seeks to give an understanding of the ways in which management accountants can provide relevant information for a variety of decisions to be made in managing any organisation.

2. Learning Outcomes

Students should be able to 1) Appreciate how management accounting information can assist management in their planning and decision-making roles (Learning Outcome 2.1); 2) Formulate and use standards and budgets for planning and control purposes (Learning Outcome 2.3); and 3) Identify relevant costs for decision making purposes (Learning Outcome 2.5).

3. Communication Skills

Students should be able to 3.1 Examine diverse sources of information and identify which components of that information are relevant to the decision to be taken. 3.2 Present information pertaining to accounting, management, and social issues in a manner that will assist mangers in their decision-making role. 3.3 Identify and discuss relevant information in a group setting.

4. Graduate Attributes

1) Knowledge and understanding of the content and techniques of a chosen discipline at advanced levels that are internationally recognized; 2) Skills of a high order in interpersonal, teamwork and communication; and 3) A proficiency in the appropriate use of contemporary technologies

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table 10.2 Projected manufacturing costs for each product in 2011

Projected Manufacturing Costs Metal Strips s: 2/3 metre @ $3 per metre l: 1 metre @ $3 per metre Glass Sheets s: 1/4 sheet @ $8 per sheet l: 1/2 sheet @ $8 per sheet Direct Labour 0.1 hours @ $20 per hour Manufacturing Overhead 0.1 direct labour hour @ $10 per hour Total Manufacturing Cost Per Unit

3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

s Frame

l Frame

$ 2.00 $ 3.00 2.00 4.00 2.00

2.00

1.00

1.00

$ 7.00

$ 10.00

Production budget (6 marks) Direct material budget (10 marks) Cash disbursements budget (6 marks) Summary cash budget (6 marks) Budgeted schedule of cost of goods manufactured and sold (4 marks) Budgeted profit and loss statement (3 marks) Budgeted statement of retain earnings (3 marks) Budgeted balance sheet

The assignment was framed in a written text with information about sales, history and costs of the company. It was also framed by tabulated data students needed to use to construct the nine supporting schedules that led in the end to the compilation of the tenth schedule, namely the Budgeted Balance Sheet. The categories ‘Metal Strips’ and ‘Glass Sheet’ in column one (Table 10.2) are italicised in order to facilitate readability. The tutor provides students with further information related to sales history and expectations, for example: “Your study of the organizations accounting system has revealed the following information. 1. Sales in the fourth quarter of 2010 are expected to be 50,000 s frames and 40, 0000 l frames.” Students are also provided with the manufacturing overhead costs (Table 10.3).

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table 10.3 The manufacturing overhead budget for 2011

Manufacturing Overhead Budget

Indirect Materials Indirect Labour Other Overhead Depreciation Total Overhead

2011

Qtr1

Qtr2

Qtr3

Qtr4

Year

$10,200.00 40,800.00 31,000.00 20,000.00

$11,200.00 44,800.00 36,000.00 20,000.00

$12,200.00 48,800.00 41,000.00 20,000.00

$13,200.00 52,800.00 46,000.00 20,000.00

$46,800.00 187,200.00 154,000.00 80,000.00

$102,000.00

$112,000.00

$122,000.00

$132,000.00

$468,000.00

Finally, the tutor provides students with the projected balance sheet for Frameit Ltd (Table 10.4). The balance sheet typically consists of the three main categories assets, liabilities and equity. Each sub-category is assigned to its respective main category. The main categories are given more prominence (or salience) than the sub-categories by their placement at the beginning of the line. The same applies to ‘current’, ‘non-current’ and ‘total equity’. Table 10.4 represents technical knowledge in the field of Management Accounting. In financial reporting, the terms ‘current’ and ‘non-current’ are synonymous with the terms ‘short-term’ and ‘long-term’, respectively, and are used interchangeably. Experience is reconstrued in accounting texts as disciplinespecific and the successful construction of financial statements is determined by students’ understanding of the taxonomic relations that exist between the three main categories. The schedules condense in nominal groups the actions of accountants, which are multisemiotic and which signify professional practices. The tables and text constitute multimodal tools students needed to employ in order to successfully accomplish the ten requirements.

Analysis of Management Accounting Assignment The corpus for analysis comprised two group assignments written in English (6,239 words). Utilising sfl as a framework, the experiential and the logical dimensions included in the students’ assignments were examined. The purpose of the analysis was to provide an explanatory account of how texts are typically constructed and how they relate to context of use.

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table 10.4 Frame-it Ltd projected balance sheet

Frame-it Ltd Projected Statement of Financial Position as at 31 December 2010 Notes Current assets Cash at bank Accounts receivable Inventory: Raw materials Finished goods Total inventory Total current assets Non-current assets Plant and equipment (net of depreciation) Total assets

$95,000.00 132,000.00 59,200.00 167,000.00 226,200.00 $453,200.00 8,000,000.00 $8,453,200.00

Liabilities Accounts Payable Net Assets

99,400.00 $8,353,800.00

Equity Ordinary shares retained Earnings Total equity

5,000,000.00 3,353,800.00 $8,353,800.00

Two assignments were written by two groups: Group 1, Abdulrahman, Abdullah and Steve, and Group 2, Omar and Peter. Each group received a distinction mark: 45 and 45.50 out of 50 respectively. Group 1 had three 2-hour meetings and Group 2 three 3-hour meetings in order to accomplish the assignment together. The total number of words in Group 1’s (Abdulrahman, Abdullah and Steve) text was 2024 words (1416 in tables and 608 in the footnotes and the memo) while it was 4239 words in Group 2’s (Omar and Peter) text (1495 in tables and 2744 in the explanatory text).

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Group 1 concisely presented its findings in 14 tables, in addition to a 206word memo and 402-word footnotes. The compositional makeup of the report in Group 1’s text shows that tables were an essential and major component. Group 2’s orthographic text surmounted tables in terms of the total number of words, as each table was accompanied by explanatory text. The tables were constructed with a lexicogrammar with a high level of abstraction. In the next section we employ a Systemic Functional Multimodal Discourse Analysis (sf-mda) (O’Halloran, 2008) to reveal the multimodal meaning making processes which students need to manage to become full participants within their community of practice.

Analysis of the Ideational Meaning: Experiential Meaning and Logical Relations In the assignments, the experiential world the texts referenced was mathematical calculations, often budgeting schedules, including the production budget, budgeted profit and loss statement, and the ‘Budgeted Balance Sheet’. The writers assumed that they share with their reader specialist or expert knowledge, as evidenced by their use of simple nominal groups which had technical meanings such as total equity, total liabilities, accounts payable, accounts receivable, and depreciation. The participant roles in the two texts were occupied by abstract (or inanimate) lexis (or terminology). The two texts also included some terms, which did not assume an expert’s knowledge such as ‘raw materials’, ‘finished goods’, ‘inventory’, and ‘borrowing’. For example, the participants’ roles in the ‘Budgeted Balance Sheet’ is realised by both general and disciplinary-specific abstract technical lexis, as shown in Table 10.5. The first accounting literacy practice for constructing the balance sheet is to insert the name of the entity, the title of the statement and the date (Table 10.5). The remaining entries are set out as a table. Then the main categories assets, liabilities and equity are listed. Next, each sub-category is assigned to its respective main category. Group 1 inserted a footnote, y, next to the subcategory ‘Plant and equipment’ in the table to show their calculations. It also inserted the footnote z to write an explanatory note. Accounting students are expected to assign a given classification to its respective category. The complexity is related to the logical interconnections between the lexical strings in the balance sheet: What does the lexical string ‘accounts receivable’ mean? Is it assigned to assets, liabilities or equity? Or, is it assigned to current and non-current assets or liabilities? For example, the meaning-making processes for current assets include listing the sub-categories

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table 10.5 Group 1’s Budgeted Balance Sheet

Frame-it Ltd Budgeted Statement of Financial Position as at 31 December 2011 Notes Current assets Cash at bank Accounts receivable Inventory: Raw materials Finished goods Total inventory Total current assets Non-current assets Plant and equipment (net of depreciation) y) Total assets

$204,500.00 192,000.00 83,200.00 235,000.00 318,200.00 $714,700.00 8,920,000.00 $9,634,700.00

Liabilities Accounts Payable Net Assets

143,400.00 $9,491,300.00

Equity Ordinary shares retained Earnings Total equity

5,000,000.00 4,491,300.00 $9,491,300.00

y) Plant and Equipment Calculation: Plant and equipment 1 Jan 2011 (is) 8,000,000.00 add: Purchased plant and equipment (is) 1,000,000.00 less: depreciation for the year (is) z) 80,000.00 Plant and equipment 31 Dec 2011 (net of depreciation) (is) 8,920,000.00 z) No depreciation for the robot in 2011 because it will take most of year (2011) to train staff and gain benefits in 2012.

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table 10.6 Types of conjunctive ties in the two groups’ texts

Sub-category

Types of cohesive ties

Total

Percentage

Elaboration

Appositive Clarification

3 22

2.27 % 16.67 %

Extension

Additive Variation

31 0

23.49 % 0.00 %

Enhancement

Temporal Manner/comparative Causal Concessive/conditional

26 38 10 2

19.70 % 28.79 % 7.57 % 1.51 %

132

100.00 %

Total

in the order of their liquidity (highest to lowest), thereby giving a clear picture which ones can be easily converted to cash. As Halliday (1993, p. 132) states, implicit conceptual structure and internal relationships “make demands on the writer to ensure that the text provides the semantic information that the reader needs in order to construct the taxonomies, decode the metaphors, and follow the argument”. Both groups successfully compiled the balance sheet. They did not face difficulties in the logical metafunction that is construed in the relations between the categories and the sub-categories. The experiential metafunction realising the field of discourse was represented in the text by the students’ lexical choices within the transitivity system, that is, the use of participants and process types (material, mental, verbal, existential, relational and behavioural). The logical metafunction concerns the representation of the relations between one process and another, that is, between clauses. This is achieved through the conjunctive relationships that are investigated first. The conjunctive devices in the two groups’ texts are summarised in Table 10.6 The finding showed that the highest enhancing sub-component in the two groups’ texts was manner conjunctive devices (in accordance with, as, based on), as in “Direct labour is calculated as [Enhancement: Manner] shown …” (Group 2 text). The extending sub-component additive conjunctions (and, also, in addition) ranked the second among the other sub-components. The extend-

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ing sub-component alternative conjunction (on the other hand, whereas, nevertheless) was not employed. Only one sub-component of extension devices was used by both groups in the orthographic text, namely the additive conjunctives, as in: Other raw materials, such as [Elaboration: Appositive] cardboard backing, are insignificant in cost and [Extension: Additive] are treated as indirect materials. (Group 1 text) No depreciation for the robot in 2011 because [Enhancement: Causal] it will take most of year (2011) to train staff and [Extension: Additive] gain benefits in 2012. (Group 1 text) Included is the Budgeted Balance Sheet for the period ending 31 December 2011 and [Extension: Additive] supporting schedules used in the calculations. (Group 1 text) For [Elaboration: Clarification] the s line, q1 2011 sales were calculated at 55,000, based on the instructions where 50,000 units were budgeted in q4 2010 and [Extension: Additive] were projected to then [Enhancement: Temporal] grow at 5,000 units per quarter. (Group 2 text) Of these sales 60% were sold on credit, and [Extension: Additive] 80 % of those sales were collected in q1 resulting in a sum of $ 264,000. (Group 2 text) In addition, [Extension: Additive] 20% of the credit sales from the previous quarter were included, which amounted to $ 60,000. (Group 2 text) The transitivity analysis revealed the students’ use of the management accounting language and their understanding of the field through the selection of the discipline’s technical lexis for participants, process types, and circumstances. Table 10.7 presents the process types used by the two groups. The transitivity analysis of the experiential metafunction in the two texts revealed that over 78% of the process types were relational identifying, while the second most frequently occurring process type was material. It also revealed that over 72% of the process types were implicit relational identifying processes that are expressed in financial tables. These processes were used to identify the value of key accounting terms. A relational identifying clause adds further information, and since it takes the form x equals y it has a thematic

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table 10.7 The frequency of process types in the two written assignments

Process type

Absolute Values in values percentages

Material

Explicit Implicit Total

260 0 260

16.22% 0.00% 16.22%

Relational Identifying

Explicit Implicit Total

101 1162 1263

6.30% 72.49% 78.79%

Relational

Attributive

13

.81%

Behavioural

5

.31%

Existential

6

.38%

54 0 54

3.37% 0.00% 3.37%

2

.12%

Mental

Verbal Total

Explicit Implicit Total

1603

100%

equative structure (Halliday, 1967). This structure is linked by a relationship of identity, expressed by some form of the verb be that links the Rheme with the Theme, and has two identification functions: “a ‘thing to be identified’ and an ‘identifier’, that with which it is to be identified” (ibid, p. 224). So, for example, the meaning of the clause “Sales units for s q1 55,000” in Table 10.8 below is realised semantically as “Sales units [Token, Identified] for the s Line in Quarter 1 is [Process: Implicit Relational Identifying] 55,000 [Value, Identifier]”. A tutor may also elaborate by saying “the number of units sold for the s Line in the first Quarter is 55,000” since this interpretation is congruent with the spoken mode of accounting budgets. Unlike the spoken mode, messages are condensed in the Sales Budget through the deletion of action processes, human

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table 10.8 Group 2’s Sales Budget for s and l Line

Sales budget s q1 Sales units Selling price per unit ($) Total revenue ($)

55,000 10 550,000.00

q2 60,000 10 600,000.00

q3 65,000 10 650,000.00

q4

Total

70,000 250,000.00 10 10 700,000.00 2,500,000.00

Sales budget l q1 Sales units Selling price per unit ($) Total revenue ($) Total Sales ($)

45,000 15 675,000.00

q2 50,000 15 750,000.00

q3 55,000 15 825,000.00

q4

Total

60,000 210,000.00 15 15 900,000.00 3,150,000.00

1,225,000.00 1,350,000.00 1,475,000.00 1,600,000.00 5,650,000.00

actors, and the sequences of clauses. The total number of the implicit relational identifying clauses in Table 10.8 is 35. The discourse of the multimodal budgeting schedules is highly metaphorical since their components use the implicit relationships between Token and Value to refer to the participants in a relational identifying clause. Mental processes rarely occurred in the two texts. “This [Actor] gives [Process: Material] a figure of $ 30,400 for the s line and $52,800 for the l line [Goal]”/ “Budgeted accounts receivable [Actor] are taken [Process: Material] from the cash receipts budget [Goal] in Table 2 [Circ: Location, Spatial]”. “In order to determine [Process: Mental] the budgeted cost of goods sold [Phenomenon]”/ “and were projected to [Process: Mental]”. Behavioural, existential, and relational attributive processes were minimally used in the two texts. Attributive processes are used for classifying technical terms into taxonomies, as in “Other raw materials, such as cardboard backing [Carrier], are [Process: Relational Attributive] insignificant [Attribute]”. Word classes and sub-classes are construed by attributive clauses. “Other raw materials” are assigned the characteristic of being “insignificant”. Temporal (“in each

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quarter”, “over 2011”, “in the same quarter”) and spatial (“in Table 4”) circumstances were the most common types in the two groups’ texts. Whereas temporal circumstances specify the duration of time, spatial circumstances specify spatial location. There were instances in which processes such as ‘calculate’ and ‘show’ were relational identifying, rather than material or mental processes, due to the existence of modality and the explicit marker of Value ‘as’ (Table 10.9). The nuclear participant, the Assigner, is unspecified in the passive constructions above. This seems to be a characteristic feature of accounting discourse since the aim is to emphasise the process rather than the agent who is performing the action. The most frequently used words in each text were calculated (Table 10.10), using Textalyser (2004). Groups 1 and 2 used the spelling variants Qtr and q for the word Quarter respectively. As the two texts shared a common field, 8 out of the 10 most frequently used key words in the texts were similar, though the frequency of occurrence for each word in the Group 2’s text exceeded Group 1. This was ascribed to the fact that the Group 2’s text contained 2215 more words than did Group1. The accompanying text in Group 2 writing was subordinate to the tables through the use of markers that refer readers to information in other parts of a text (colon, see Table, as shown in the Table). As a result, Group 2 used the words ‘table’ 48 times and ‘shown’ 37 times in contrast to none for Group 1. On the contrary, Group 1 text did not include intra-textual references between writing and the tables as the text was not accompanied by explanatory text; rather footnotes and the memo. Whereas meaning in financial tables and graphs is produced from the complex interplay between orthographic texts and numerical representations, this does not seem to apply to Group 2’s text since the accompanying text did not emanate from the writer’s reasoning of the data in tables, as shown in Table 10.11. The orthographic text surrounding the tables in Group 2’s assignment was not assessed by the tutor because it was considered redundant; it repeated the data in the tables and, therefore, it did not add new information based on the findings in tables.

Discussion of the Findings and Conclusion The assignment required students to produce nine schedules for a ‘Budgeted Balance Sheet’. As stated in the Course Profile, students needed to exhibit their

Group 2

Group 1

Process: Relational Identifying is calculated Process: Relational Identifying is calculated Process: Relational Identifying

Token: Identifier this

Token: Identifier Accounts payable Token: Identifier

194. For q1,

293.

110.

86.

58.

182. For q1,

are treated Process: Relational Identifying m) Calculated Process: Relational Identifying is shown Process: Relational Identifying is shown Process: Relational Identifying is calculated Process: Relational Identifying is calculated Process: Relational Identifying is calculated

Token: Identifier

Token: Identifier

Beginning inventory Token: Identifier Beginning inventory Token: Identifier The beginning inventory Token: Identifier The beginning inventory Token: Identifier this

51.

24.

5. and

table 10.9 Examples of relational processes used to assign a new function to the participant source: extracts from the two groups’ assignment

as the ending inventory for the previous quarter. Value: Identified as the ending inventory for the previous quarter. Value: Identified as the ending inventory for the previous quarter. Value: Identified as the ending inventory for the previous quarter. Value: Identified as beginning inventory—glass sheets—for both the s and l lines, multiplied by the price per sheet Value: Identified as ending inventory—glass sheets—for both the s and l lines, multiplied by the price per sheet Value: Identified as 20% of $717,000, Value: Identified

as indirect materials. Value: Identified as 20% of 1st quarter sales for 2011. Value: Identified

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literacy and numeracy practices in management accounting table 10.10 Frequency count and top key words in the two texts

Group 1 Text (2024 words) Word Qtr/ quarter Total Inventory Cost Sales Per Production Units Goods Cash

Group 2 Text (4239 words)

Instances Frequency Word 64 27 21 20 19 17 16 16 15 15

7.2% 3.1% 2.4% 2.3% 2.1% 1.9% 1.8% 1.8% 1.7% 1.7%

Quarter/q1/q2/q3/q4 Total Cash Table Inventory Cost Sales Shown Units Per

Instances Frequency 186 71 50 48 44 40 37 37 36 32

10.47% 4% 2.8% 2.7% 2.5% 2.3% 2.1% 2.1% 2% 1.8%

ability to “examine diverse sources of information and identify which components of that information are relevant to the decision to be taken” (The Business School, 2010, pp. 2–3). To accomplish the task students needed to interpret subject-specific texts in conjunction with tables and graphs. They needed to manage the dynamic interaction of the experiential and the logical meanings in texts and tables, which construe management accounting knowledge. We analysed the experiential and the logical meanings in the students’ management accounting texts. Our findings suggest that students were constrained by the ideological conventions of constructing budgeting tables. We also found that financial tables utilise structural condensation to encode numerical data in the most economical manner. This finding is in line with Alyousef’s (2012, 2015a; 2016) text-based studies of tertiary finance and marketing texts. The findings of the transitivity analysis show that over 78% of the process types in the two texts were relational identifying. It was also found that over 72% of the process types were implicit relational identifying processes that are expressed in financial tables. The value of technical terms is given by implicit relational identifying processes that have an underlying ‘equative’ meaning. The Token-Value direction of identification, from general to specific, is adopted. This is not surprising since these texts deal with numbers and, as Halliday and Matthiessen (2004, p. 234) note, Token-Value structure play an important role in the register of commercial and scientific discourse.

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table 10.11 Group 2’s Production Budget for s and l Line

For the s line in q1 2011, this amounted to 11,000 units, resulting in units to be started in the quarter of 56,000. This calculated was then repeated for each of the following quarters in the 2011 year. For the l line in q1 2011, total inventory needed amounted to 55,000 units (45,000 + (50,000 * 20%)). Beginning inventory is shown as the ending inventory for the previous quarter. For the l line in q1 2011, this amounted to 9,000 units, resulting in units to be started in the quarter of 46,000. This calculated was then repeated for each of the following quarters in the 2011 year. Figures for the 2011 year are shown in Table 3 below: Production budget S

Sales in units Add: desired end. inventory Total needed Less: beg. Inventory Units to be started

Q4 2010

Q1

Q2

Q3

50,000 11,000 61,000 10,000 51,000

55,000 12,000 67,000 11,000 56,000

60,000 13,000 73,000 12,000 61,000

65,000 14,000 79,000 13,000 66,000

Q4

Total

Q1 2012

70,000 250,000 75,000 15,000 54,000 16,000 85,000 304,000 91,000 14,000 50,000 15,000 71,000 254,000 76,000

Production budget L

Sales in units Add: desired end. inventory Total needed Less: beg. Inventory Units to be started Total units to be started

Q4 2010

Q1

Q2

Q3

40,000 9,000 49,000 8,000 41,000

45,000 10,000 55,000 9,000 46,000

50,000 11,000 61,000 10,000 51,000

55,000 12,000 67,000 11,000 56,000

Q4

Total

Q1 2012

60,000 210,000 65,000 13,000 46,000 14,000 73,000 256,000 79,000 12,000 42,000 13,000 61,000 214,000 66,000

102,000 112,000 122,000 132,000 468,000

Furthermore, we found that the second most frequently occurring process type in the texts was material process. Although mathematical Operative processes, such as calculate, work out, subtract and add, metaphorically realise processes of cognition, they also realise material processes since their calculation in ms Excel spreadsheets involves action. This finding contrasts with O’Halloran’s (1996, 1999, 2005, 2008) generalisation that mathematical dis-

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course is characterised with the metaphorical shifts between material and mental processes like count and work out. The study also found that the participants successfully assigned each accounting sub-category (or lexical string) to its respective main category. As a result, the taxonomic classifications in multimodal budgeting schedules contribute to the texts’ cohesiveness. Finally, the frequency of the enhancing sub-component manner conjunctive devices (in accordance with, as, based on) ranked the highest in the two groups’ texts, followed by the extending sub-component additive devices (and, beside, then). Whereas extension adds to or varies a clause message by adding something new to it, enhancement expands the utterance by providing circumstantial details such as time, place, manner, cause or condition. The findings also revealed that some mental or material processes, like ‘treat’, ‘regard’, ‘consider’ ‘show’ and ‘calculate’, were construed by relational identifying processes due to modality and the existence of the explicit marker of the Value ‘as’: “Beginning inventory [Token, Identified] is shown [Process: Relational Identifying] as the ending inventory [Value, Identifier] for the previous quarter”. Looking ‘from above’ the clauses, material and mental clauses are concerned with our outer and inner experiences respectively, whereas they model experience as ‘being’ rather than as ‘doing’ or ‘sensing’ when looking ‘from below’. As a result of this, metaphorical modality occurs through the transitivity system instead of the lexico-grammatical system. The research case study revealed that accounting discourse is not only represented by quantitative technical calculations but also by qualitative material. Students were expected to engage in interdiscursive multimodal literacy and numeracy practices resulting not only from their engagement in nontechnocentric tasks (the use of accounting discourse) but also in tasks involving technology (the use of word processors, spreadsheets). The students demonstrated their grasp of management accounting language through their selections of technical lexical strings and through resolving the logical interconnections between these strings.

Implications of the Study In Higher Education academic work involves a social negotiation process of meaning-making between context, students’ understanding of the text and their prior knowledge and experiences. The international students in this study, who were not native speakers of English and who are representative of increasing cultural and linguistic diverse student cohorts, relied on a range of past and present discourses, or ‘interim literacies’, which served as ‘building blocks’ in managing budgeting discourse (Paxton, 2007, 2011).

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The approach in this study and related studies (Alyousef, 2012, 2015a, b, 2016; Alyousef & Alnasser 2015a, b; Micakn, 2013a, b) has enabled a multipleperspective examination of academic literacies embedded in disciplinary practices. The approach is significant for the understanding of knowledge building as a complex fusion of multimodal practices. Students’ construction of meaning in management accounting is embedded in interdiscursive multimodal practices involving the use of technocentric and non-technocentric tasks. Whereas the former involves the use of spreadsheets, the latter includes the application of the general principles to the analysis of budgeting categories, the recognition and interpretation of implicit relational identifying processes in budgeting schedules, and the analysis of the taxonomic lexical logical relations between the categories. Management accounting students need to represent the logical connection between each sub-category and its main category in the schedules. The application of systemic functional analyses to subject specific texts exposes the linguistic construction of text together with visual and numerical semiotic resources. Implicit relational identifying processes play a dominant role in accounting budgets, as they present the value of technical terms (see also Simpson, chapter 11 this volume). Underpinning a study of this kind are both curriculum design issues to do with subject specific epistemology as well as research methodologies appropriate for revealing the multimodality of disciplinary knowledge—the literacies and numeracies embedded in teaching disciplinary knowledge. Analysis of the postgraduate module Management Accounting as part of a Business degree makes explicit the technicality of discipline specific knowledge and skills. Students enrolling in a new academic subject are confronted with multiple expectations represented in subject profiles, outcome statements, graduate attributes, multimodal materials, resources and assessment tasks. The pedagogic task is to make the multiple components visible and comprehensible to students. For a professional award such as accounting, students need to manage the social practices of a profession—the literacy and numeracy practices which characterise the workplace practices of an accountant. The design of curriculum requires students’ engagement and negotiation with subject specific practices aligned with the professional practices of business accounting. Employers’ expectations of graduates being work-ready require congruence between academic accountancy practices and workplace practices. The practical implications for educators relates to the elucidation of the implicit literacy and numeracy disciplinary practices. This is a curriculum design issue for Higher Education (Mickan, 2013a). It is important to make entrepreneurial knowledge and skills explicit for students through depiction and analysis of the multimodal

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practices. Knowledge building is a process of socialisation, of students’ engagement and negotiation in the multimodal practices of a particular discipline. These practices are constructed by and enacted with subject specific texts or discourses and other resources. Induction or apprenticeship into accountancy as a profession requires explicit analysis and instruction in the multisemiotic texts required for the conduct of professional practices. This chapter sets out an approach to the study of multimodality in the context of subject specific knowledge. It suggests that research into the multimodal literacy and numeracy practices is multisemiotic and therefore requires a multidimensional framework for analysis that situates language in social and cultural contexts of use in both disciplinary and professional communities.

Acknowledgements Dr Hesham Alyousef expresses his appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Saud University and to the Research Center at the Faculty of Arts for funding the current research study.

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chapter 11

Drawn Writing: The Role of Written Text in Civil Engineering Drawing Zach Simpson

“Shift Ground”: An Introduction It is now widely accepted that meanings are made in diverse ways: ways that extend well beyond verbal communication in either written or spoken forms. Taking this point as given, the question then arises as to how these ‘ways of meaning-making’ relate to each other. More specifically, research attention now needs to focus on how different modes of meaning-making work with, or even against, each other. A mode here is defined as a “socially shaped and culturally given resource for making meaning” (Kress, 2009, p. 55). Examples of mode include image, writing, layout and myriad others. Research attention increasingly seeks to understand the unique contributions that each mode makes to the meaning-making ensembles that characterise the vast majority of texts. The outcome of this work has been calls for still further research focusing upon the relationships between modes within multimodal texts (Unsworth & Cleirigh, 2009), particularly across varying genres within varying disciplines (e.g. Alyousef & Mickan, chapter 10, Bell, chapter 7 this volume, Guo, 2004). Little of this work has focused on the pedagogical implications of improved understanding of the interaction of modal resources. This chapter heeds the call for focused attention on modal integration within particular genres and disciplines in higher education. The discipline at the heart of this chapter is Civil Engineering, a discipline heavily reliant on meaning-making practices that extend well beyond the linguistic. Indeed, the Civil Engineering practitioner must be able to ‘read’ and produce a variety of text-types drawing upon any number of genres, modes and technologies: maps, calculation sheets, drawings and so on. In this chapter, the particular focus is on the modal resources at play in Civil Engineering drawings. Even more specifi-

Simpson, Z. (2016). Chapter 11. Drawn Writing: The Role of Written Text in Civil Engineering Drawing. In R. Fidalgo & T. Olive (Series Eds.) & A. Archer, & E.O. Breuer (Vol. Eds.), Studies in Writing: Vol. 33, Multimodality in Higher Education, (pp. 241–255). Leiden: Brill.

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cally, attention is given to one set of resources and its functional role within Civil Engineering drawing, namely, written text. This is done by examining one drawn text and providing a fine-grained analysis of how the written components of the text contribute to the overall meanings therein. The decision to focus this chapter on the written mode may surprise, given the extensive work that has been done on written verbal communication over the last many decades. However, as Lim (2004) argues, although semiotic resources should be given the same status within multimodal texts, this does not mean they exert the same degree of influence. As its very name suggests, the Civil Engineering drawing is one text form in which the pictorial dominates meaning-making and thus cannot be considered a second-order means of representation (Ivarsson, Linderoth & Saljo, 2009). Thus while much literature has examined the interaction of language and other modes in texts in which language carries the bulk of the semiotic load (e.g. Roehrich, chapter 9 this volume), comparatively little attention has been given to how language works in (con)texts where its meaning-making potential is somewhat curtailed, where it becomes secondary to other modal resources. It is for this reason that this chapter examines the particular functions of the written components of civil engineering drawing (see also Bell, chapter 7 this volume). This research was undertaken at a university in Johannesburg, South Africa. Higher Education in South Africa, like elsewhere in the world, is characterised by unequal access to valued meaning-making resources on the part of students in the system. The professional draughtsperson is not at the centre of this discussion; instead, this chapter focuses on the Civil Engineering diploma student and on a text produced in a first-year university diploma programme in Civil Engineering. As such, there is a pedagogical concern at stake: how do students negotiate this shifted ground in which writing becomes subservient to the image. How are students’ drawn texts informed by questions of identity and power? Are students constrained by inequalities regarding student access to valued meaning-making resources, as is the case throughout the domain of higher education, particularly as it relates to questions of language? These questions are reflected upon in the conclusion of this chapter and suggestions are provided for further research that may, in a more detailed fashion, engage with such issues.

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“Space of Integration”: Making Meaning with Image and Writing Multimodal approaches to literacy and pedagogy have drawn on a number of core concepts. One of these is the notion of the inter-semiotic relationship, which has been defined as the contribution that each mode makes to the overall meaning of a multimodal text (Jewitt, 2009). In order to determine the nature of these inter-semiotic relationships, researchers (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996; Unsworth, 2006 and many others) have generally adopted Halliday’s meta-functions of language (Halliday, 1978). These meta-functions can be— and have been—used to examine the ways in which meaning-making occurs in semiotic systems other than language. The first of these meta-functions is the textual meta-function, which holds that semiotic systems must be able to be used to construct texts. The second meta-function, the ideational metafunction, suggests that these texts must be able to represent objects, people, processes and practices extant in the world. Finally, the interpersonal metafunction dictates that semiotic systems be able to represent the relationships between participants within texts and between readers (viewers) and writers (creators). Kress (2009) argues, in simpler terms, that these meta-functions imply that semiotic systems, or modes, must be able to represent what goes on in the world, as well as the relations between sign-makers, signifieds and audiences, as texts. While these meta-functions have also been applied to describing the meaning-making potential that exists in the interstices of image and language (or, indeed, any other two or more modes), they do not provide for a specific focus on the integration of semiotic systems and of how the combination of such systems works to achieve meaning. Civil Engineering drawing, as a semiotic system, draws upon image-based resources as well as alpha-numeric resources. As such, it is necessary to employ a framework that offers a re-visioning of the “space of integration between language and image as social semiotic systems in order to provide a theoretical description of the dynamics of interaction between language and image in meaning-making” (Unsworth, 2006: 60). To this end, Lim (2004) proposes a meta-model, called the Integrative MultiSemiotic Model, as an apparatus with which texts that draw on both linguistic and pictorial semiotic resources may be analysed. This model consists of various planes along which writing and image, together, realize meanings. Table 11.1 illustrates these planes. The expression plane refers to what the text looks like, including various graphological and typographical considerations at play within the text. The content plane is concerned with what the text says, and how it says it. This refers not only to the content (in the simplest sense of the word) of the text, but also how it conforms, or not, to the grammatical conven-

244 table 11.1

simpson Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model adapted from lim (2004, p. 222)

Written Components

Pictorial Components

Expression Plane

Typography

Content Plane

Lexico-grammar

Visual Grammar

Discourse semantics

Discourse Semantics

Context Plane

Space of Integration

Graphics Medium and Materiality

Register Genre Ideology

tions of texts of its type. Finally, the context plane moves beyond the text, and examines how the text is informed by considerations of audience, value and purpose. While the space of integration operates primarily across the expression and content planes, the nature of this integration is dependent on considerations present on the context plane. Indeed, the entire text rests on the context plane, as it incorporates concerns of register, genre and ideology. All of these planes are mediated by the medium and materiality of the text. This is because the availability of media and materials determines what texts are produced and how they are produced. For example, in this chapter, a hand-drawn text is analysed. This analysis cannot necessarily be taken to apply equally to drawings produced using computer-aided drawing software applications, where the media and materials used vary significantly. Each of the planes, and how they are made manifest in civil engineering drawing, is described in the sections that follow. Lim (2004, p. 243) concedes that the Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model runs the risk of being reductionist and overly-rigid and that not every aspect of the model is relevant in every text. Despite this, “creating meaning from what we see in a multimodal text involves a complex interaction of visual elements and verbal English presented to the eye, as well as contextual and background knowledge” (Goodman, 1996, p. 69). As a model for the description of meaning-

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making involving both pictorial and linguistic resources, the Integrative MultiSemiotic Model reflects this complex interaction while, at the same time, providing a framework for analysis that is relatively simple to employ. The discussion that ensues in the remaining sections of this chapter is organized according to these planes. It is important to note that they are separated here for analytical purposes, but that such a separation is artificial as the meaningmaking process involves all three planes simultaneously. First, however, it is necessary to discuss the particular example that will be drawn upon herein.

“Truss Forces”: A Sample Drawing Assignment By way of example, this chapter draws on the text presented in Figure 11.1. This text, in its entirety, was produced by the researcher-as-participant during completion of a first year Civil Engineering drawing class. The researcherparticipant had no previous experience in the fields of Civil Engineering or Drawing. This is part of a larger auto-ethnographic study into the social semiotics of engineering education (see Simpson, 2014, for an overview of the autoethnographic aspect of this work). The figure presents a drawn depiction and calculation of the forces acting on the beams that make up a roof frame. The purpose for which students were required to produce this drawing was to introduce them to the so-called ‘graphical method’ for resolving forces in a truss (the technical term for a roof frame). This is in contrast to the analytical method that involves the use of trigonometric functions. In industry, however, neither method would be used extensively, given the abundance of software applications for this purpose. In the text, the image in the top left shows the given roof frame, with the given loadings (forces) acting on it. The component that dominates the right hand side of the page—the force diagram—is a ‘drawn calculation’ of how the loadings are transferred into the beams that constitute the roof. The table in the bottom left corner presents the results of this calculation. The ticks and mark allocation (65%) were later added by the course lecturer, by way of assessment. As can be seen in the text, written elements are evident in four places: the labelling of the loadings in the given roof frame (e.g. 15 kN), the caption for the image on the right (e.g. force diagram), the words that form the table on the bottom left, and the text of the title block in the extreme bottom right hand corner of the image. Using the Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model proposed by Lim (2004), the particular functions that each of these occurrences of writing fulfils within the context of this particular drawing will be discussed in the

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figure 11.1 Resolution of forces: text produced in first year Civil Engineering diploma course on drawing

sections that follow. It is hoped that this will elucidate some of the broader functions of alpha-numeric representation within Civil Engineering drawing.

“Invisible Language”: The Expression Plane in Civil Engineering Drawing The expression plane is the interface between the text, and all its modal resources, and the reader (Lim, 2004, p. 222). It refers to what the text looks like, and is made up of the typography (or the graphology) of the written components and the graphics that constitute the image. Lim (2004, p. 225) argues that the expression plane is perhaps the most under-theorized of the planes. This is an important omission, Lim continues, because both written and pictorial resources are only abstractions until such time as they are materialized in the form of text. In addition to this, the choices made on the expression plane contribute to the meanings of the content plane and both are mediated by the context plane. As such, the various planes are mutually engendering (Lim, 2004, p. 228).

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In Figure 11.1, it is evident that the written components of the text are presented in ways that are graphologically congruous with the drawn components. This is because the written and drawn components are produced in pencil, both are produced in the same colour, and there are no significant differences in terms of the darkness or thickness of the various components. It can also be seen that the written components are uniform in size and that they are all bordered (top and bottom) by thin, light lines. These aspects serve to ensure that the written components blend into the drawn components, such that the writing becomes ‘drawn writing’. That is to say, the strategies employed on the expression plane serve to render the written elements as partially invisible as language per se. The particular graphological materialisation of this text serves to identify the text as a drawn text, and not as a written text. And, the graphological congruity between the modal resources serves to emphasise the fact that both the alphanumeric and drawn components co-constitute this text and that neither one operates outside of or in isolation from the other. In this way, a strong sense of textual unity is created. This is crucial for the meaning of this text because the ideational or content load carried by each modal resource is similarly complementary, thus illustrating the previous point made that choices made on the expression plane reflect meanings evident on the content plane.

“Ideational Complementarity”: The Content Plane in Civil Engineering Drawing As mentioned above, the expression plane is reflective of the coherence and complementarity of the content plane. The content plane of the Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model is concerned with the strategic means by which meaning-making occurs in texts which contain both linguistic and drawn components. Unsworth (2006) argues that ideational meanings between image and language come about through concurrence, connection or complementarity. In the case of ideational concurrence, image and language present meanings that are roughly equivalent in nature. In the case of ideational connection, it is the relations between images and language (whether spatial, temporal, causal or otherwise) that become meaningful within the text. Finally, where ideational complementarity is employed, image and language present meanings that are different to one another but still complement one another, either by augmenting each other or by demonstrating divergence from one another. In any event, such meaning-making relationships are not a one-way relation-

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ship where image leads language or vice versa; instead, they are bi-directional in nature (Liu & O’Halloran, 2009). Ideational complementarity is evident in three of the particular uses of writing in Figure 11.1: the ‘force diagram’ caption or label, the force labels in the given roof frame, and the table in the bottom left. ‘Force Diagram’: Captions in Civil Engineering Drawing Captions are not merely transductions, that is, the same information conveyed in a different mode; instead, they offer direction as to how to view the image (Archer, 2012). The caption points to something salient in the image and, together, they constitute a new composition (Archer, 2012). This is the case in texts of many descriptions. For example, Guo (2004) shows that the caption for statistical graphics acts as a parallel semiotic metaphor for the visual component, thus making it possible to ‘read’ the graph. In the Force Diagram caption, the text reads “force diagram (scale 1cm = 2kN)”. The caption thus, very simply, identifies the image above it as a force diagram. Because the drawing, on its own, is not necessarily obvious to all readers, this identification does contribute to the meaning of this aspect of the text. However, this is not the sole purpose of the caption, and the expert viewer would immediately identify the image as a force diagram. Instead, therefore, the semiotic load carried by the caption is more significant as a directive to the viewer as to how to ‘read’ the image and, in particular, what to view as salient. It serves as an indication that what is important in the force diagram is the relative sizes of the various lines and not, for example, its shape. Furthermore, through its provision of a scale, the caption directs the viewer to engage with the diagram by, potentially, checking the correctness of the values reported upon in the table on the left. But, it also offers insight into the decision-making processes of the text-maker during production of the text. This is because the scale utilised has a bearing on the measurement of the magnitude of the forces in the beams of the roof frame. The larger the scale utilised (that is, if 1cm represented 4kN), the smaller the final image would appear which would in turn decrease the accuracy with which the resultant forces could be determined. A smaller scale (such as 1 cm = 1kN) would produce a larger image and, therefore, more accurate results, but would be constrained by the margins of the page. In this way, the caption draws attention to the contingent nature of this text, in that it is the product of one individual’s decisions. Therefore, differences among students’ drawn texts can reflect their differing understandings of what constitutes salient information within, in this case, the resolution of forces within trusses. As such, the drawn texts students produce are representations of

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figure 11.2 Truss diagram—enlarged view

their learning and understanding, and analysis thereof can produce significant pedagogical benefit. ‘5kN’: Vectors in Civil Engineering Drawing As was the case with the caption discussed above, the numeric labels for the forces applied to the roof frame in the truss diagram (top left—and enlarged in Figure 11.2) work in tandem with the drawn components to create meaning. Here, the use of vectors is important: in fact, it could be argued that the vector constitutes a third semiotic mode in this text. This is because vectors are based upon a semiotic metaphor in which directional arrows are seen to represent the application of a force (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996). Vectors also realise what, in linguistic terms, would be called action verbs (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996). This becomes evident when one examines the enlarged view of the force vectors in the truss diagram. In this text, meaning can only be made by ‘reading’ the textual and visual components in tandem with one another. For example, the two (or three) modes together allow the reader to draw the conclusion that: there is a force of magnitude 5kN acting on the left hand-side of the roof frame at 30° to the horizontal; at the same point, there is a force of magnitude 10kN acting vertically downwards on the roof frame (all the beams in the roof frame and the forces acting on it are vertical, horizontal or at 30° to the horizontal). In this previous sentence, I have bolded the ideational aspects of the message

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figure 11.3 Magnitude and nature of forces within Truss members—enlarged view

that are carried by the vector, underlined those ideational aspects carried by the drawn roof frame, and italicized those aspects carried by the alpha-numeric elements. It is clear to see that without any one of these components, the viewer/reader would be unable to draw the necessary inferences to make meaning from this text. Each one carries information that is criterial to the resolution of the forces in the beams: the vectors provide the point of application and the text provides the magnitude, while the drawn image presents the system under loading as the object of interest. ‘Co-contextualisation’: Inter-Modal Reference in Civil Engineering Drawing The table in the bottom left of the image (and enlarged in Figure 11.3) is a display of the results of the ‘calculation’ undertaken in the force diagram on the right. It is the most ‘writing-heavy’ element of the overall text (besides, perhaps, the title block at the bottom left, which will be discussed in the final section of this chapter). However, all of the information displayed in the table is also provided elsewhere (and with different semiotic resources) in the text. As such, the table acts as a summary of the semiotic work of the other elements of the text. For example, the first column of the table ‘names’ the various beams (or members) that make up the truss (or roof frame). However, these ‘names’ are derived from the letters in the original roof frame diagram (a through i) which are used to ‘name’ the spaces between the individual beams. In turn, the beams are named according to the spaces they delineate in the original roof frame diagram above the table. As an example, member (beam) bh is the beam

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that separates the space labelled b from the space labelled h. Such a semiotic strategy can be termed co-contextualization (Lim, 2004; Liu and O’Halloran, 2009). Through this semiotic strategy, the textual components of the roof frame diagram and the table are co-contextualised which fundamentally aids the viewer/reader in deriving meaning from these two elements. Furthermore, the third column of the table indicates the nature of the force within each beam—whether a strut (compressive force) or tie (tensile force). This information is co-contextualised through the use of small arrows in the roof frame diagram above the table. If one examines member bh in the roof frame diagram, one will notice two small arrows on either side pointing outwards—towards the ends of the beam. These arrows indicate that the force in that beam is a compressive force, or strut. This information is then cocontextualised for the reader in the third column of the table. Similarly, the magnitudes evident in the second column of the table would have been derived from the force diagram on the left, using the scale provided in the caption for that element. Thus, the written elements in this text perform a summative function, while the bulk of the semiotic ‘work’ is in fact undertaken by the pictorial elements. It is worth noting that this is in contrast to many other kinds of texts in which the linguistic dominates and the image or graphic performs a summative or illustrative function. The implications of this are returned to in the conclusion to this chapter.

“Where Writing Rules”: The Context Plane in Civil Engineering Drawing The context plane incorporates those elements external to the text, but which nonetheless have a bearing on text-making. In particular, Lim (2004, p. 224) mentions genre, ideology and register as constitutive of the context plane. Civil Engineering drawings are governed by generic conventions that reflect a particular ideological persuasion and the power relations of the academy necessitate that students adopt these conventions and persuasions or risk censure. Readers interested in such should consult Simpson (2014) for a fuller account of these issues. Nevertheless, the drawn text under discussion is not solely the creative effort of its maker; instead, virtually every element of it has been produced in such a way as to conform to generic expectations. By way of example, some of the elements are produced using 0.3mm pencil lead, others using 0.5 mm pencil lead. The decision as to which to use is rule-governed. Even that it is

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produced in pencil is a disciplinary convention. In this way, decisions made on the expression plane are reflective of constraints present in the context plane. However, the question remains as to how the written elements contribute to the overall meaning of this text on the context plane. In this regard, it would appear that the context plane is the one plane in which written elements carry significant semiotic load. This is because, if the text is to ‘speak’ for itself, its context can only be derived from the title block in the bottom, right hand corner, which is dominated by writing. The title block indicates who produced (and, perhaps, who checked and approved) the drawing, the purpose for which the drawing was made and other drawings which are meant to be considered in conjunction with the present drawing. In addition to this, it indicates the scale of the drawing, which is a vital aspect of the meaning-making process. In many title blocks, the number of revisions a drawing will have gone through is also indicated. In addition, any particular notes that need to accompany the drawing will be listed. Other information that may be provided in the title block includes references to the appropriate standards followed in producing the drawing as well as information pertaining to the finished product being drawn, such as the material from which it should be made or what kind of finishes it requires. It is thus evident that, in Civil Engineering drawing at least, written elements tend to carry the bulk of the contextual meanings within a drawn text, whereas these elements support (albeit in a crucial way) the ideational meanings within drawn texts. This underscores the notion of functional specialization (Unsworth & Cleirigh, 2009), wherein the written and drawn components each fulfil specific roles in the text as a whole. This is in contrast to traditional conceptions of representation in which language was seen to supersede all other forms of meaning (Lim, 2004). Because written and pictorial resources serve different but complementary functions and have evolved in order to be used in conjunction with one another, it is fruitless to examine one semiotic resource in isolation from another as this works against understanding how resources work together to organize meaning (Archer, chapter 5 this volume, Lim, 2004).

“Expertise Made Visible”: Implications for Pedagogy This chapter has examined the ‘integration processes’ (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000; Kress, 2000) evident within a specific kind of text: the Civil Engineering drawing. Such integration processes explain how semiotic resources of various kinds, such as written and pictorial resources, work together to enact meaning

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within texts. However, this chapter has not focused on professional drawing practice which, incidentally, almost exclusively takes place using computeraided drawing applications. Instead, attention has been given to the drawing product of the researcher-participant as a first-year Civil Engineering diploma student. Such a focus allows for consideration of the pedagogical implications of an improved understanding of meaning-making in multimodal texts, such as the Civil Engineering drawing. New Literacy Studies theorists have placed a great deal of emphasis on the fact that the conventions governing formal academic writing are ideologically grounded and that, therefore, access to the resources of such writing is dependent on access to ideologically and culturally relevant resources. It is important to understand that this is no less true in the Civil Engineering drawing classroom. This is because the drawing classroom is equally governed by conventions, practices, resources, tools and technologies and because access to these might be as discrepant as is access to institutionally valued linguistic practices. Further research, therefore, can examine the differential access to such resources amongst students entering higher education. The importance of this chapter resides in the fact that it begins the process of providing a language with which to describe Civil Engineering drawings that can help both instructors and students engage in more fruitful teaching and learning. In addition, such a language improves our ability to analyse such texts and understand the reflections of student learning present in the texts our students produce. Given this, three additional avenues for further research, each related to one of the planes of the Integrative Multi-Semiotic Model, can be identified. Kress (2010) argues that the texts students make reflects their interest in the subject matter. This suggests that such texts are likely to be more coherent and cohesive if their interest in the subject is genuine. An implication of this is that it becomes important that the drawing exercises given to students are meaningful to them within the context of their future aspirations. Practically, this may mean that drawing tasks should be located within the broader aspects of civil engineering practice that includes design and construction. That is to say, drawing should be not be seen as a mechanistic and isolated activity; instead, it should be seen as meaningful in that it is integral to the process by which structures and services are constructed for use by people in society. At the level of the content plane, it has already been mentioned that differences between students’ drawn texts reflect differences in those students’ understandings of the content of their drawings. The text drawn upon as an example in this chapter dealt with the resolution of forces within trusses which further incorporated the issue of scale. It is possible that students’ challenges

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regarding the completion of such drawing tasks may reflect underlying challenges regarding conceptual understandings underlying their drawings. Scale, for example, is a particularly difficult concept for many first year university students to grasp, and their misunderstandings of this concept may be rendered visible in the drawings they produce. For this reason, drawn texts can serve to provide useful insight into students’ learning. Finally, if decisions made on the expression plane reflect meanings evident on the content plane, it is entirely likely that those same decisions on the expression plane will also reflect uncertainties or misunderstandings on the content plane. As such, factors such as the relative neatness or darkness of lines may give indications, albeit subtle, as to the relative expertise of students, both in terms of drawing practice but also in terms of their engagement with underlying concepts and principles. This would extend to how written elements are incorporated into their drawn texts. In conclusion, the civil engineering student’s drawn texts are depictions of that student’s knowledge and expertise rendered visible. As such, the drawn text is as affected by identities, ideologies and power relations as is commonly accepted now of formal written texts. As is also the case in other texts, Civil Engineering drawings are multimodal texts, in which pictorial components are integrated with other resources such as vectors and, important to this chapter, writing. It is in the meaningful integration of these myriad resources that students’ success resides.

Acknowledgements The author thanks the editors, Arlene Archer and Esther Breuer, for feedback given on early drafts of this chapter, as well as Brandon Collier-Reed for his input into the larger project upon which this chapter is based. In addition, feedback received from the anonymous reviewers was of tremendous value in improving this chapter.

References Archer, A. (2012). Writing as design: Enabling access to academic discourse in a multimodal environment. South African Journal of Higher Education, 26(3), 411–421. Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (2000). Designs for Social Futures. In Cope, B. & Kalantzis, M. (Eds.), Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures (pp.: 203–234). London: Routledge.

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Goodman, S. (1996). Visual English. In Goodman, S., & Graddol, D. (Eds.), Redesigning English: New texts, new identities (pp.: 38–72). London: Routledge. Guo, L. (2004). Multimodality in a biology textbook. In O’Halloran, K.L. (Ed.), Multimodal discourse analysis (pp.: 196–219). London: Continuum. Halliday, M.A.K. (1978). Language as Social Semiotic. London: Edward Arnold. Ivarsson, J., Linderoth, J., & Saljo, R. (2009). Representations in practices: A sociocultural approach to multimodality in reasoning. In Jewitt, C. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of multimodal analysis (pp.: 201–212). London: Routledge. Jewitt, C. (2009). An introduction to multimodality. In Jewitt, C. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of multimodal analysis (pp.: 14–27). London: Routledge. Kress, G. (2000). Design and transformation: New theories of meaning. In Cope, B. & Kalantzis, M. (Eds.), Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures (pp.: 153–161). London: Routledge. Kress, G. (2009). What is Mode? In Jewitt, C. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of multimodal analysis (pp.: 54–67). London: Routledge. Kress, G. (2010). Multimodality: A social semiotic approach to contemporary communication. London: Routledge. Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (1996). Reading images: The grammar of visual design. London: Routledge. Lim, F.V. (2004). Developing an integrative multi-semiotic model. In O’Halloran, K.L. (Ed.), Multimodal discourse analysis (pp.: 220–246). London: Continuum. Liu, Y., & O’Halloran, K.L. (2009). Intersemiotic texture: Analyzing cohesive devices between language and images. Social Semiotics, 19(4), 367–388. Simpson, Z. (2014). Representation, resource and regulation in Civil Engineering drawing: An autoethnographic investigation. In Archer, A. & Newfield, C. (Eds.), Multimodal approaches to research and pedagogy: Recognition, resources and access (pp.: 41–56). London: Routledge. Unsworth, L. (2006). Towards a metalanguage for multiliteracies education: Describing the meaning-making resources of language-image interaction. English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 5(1), 55–76. Unsworth, L., & Cleirigh, C. (2009). Multimodality and reading: The construction of meaning through image-text interaction. In Jewitt, C. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of multimodal analysis (pp.: 151–163). London: Routledge.

Index academic discourses 197, 210–213 academic argument 80, 82, 93, 84, 85, 87, 88, 93–96, 100, 104, 106, 110 academic literacy 197 academic writing 167–170, 173–174, 188, 253 academic writing 84, 85, 88, 195, 197, 213 agency 22, 169, 172–173, 175, 178, 188–189 antecedent genres 115, 117–119, 121–125, 129– 133 argument through comparison 97, 100, 106 argument through contrast 101–103 argument through induction 100, 103–104 argument through narrative 100, 101 assemblage 107 authorial self 167–170, 172, 174, 177–178, 185– 189 autobiographical self 167, 170, 171, 177, 181

discoursal self 167–168, 170–171, 173, 178, 181 discourse 36, 80, 84, 86, 168–170, 174, 184 disruption 118 dissertation 82, 137

balance 140, 162, 164 binary opposition 162 bisociation 139, 150 boundaries 150, 154

gaze 35 Genre 58–59, 61, 64–65, 67–68, 70–71, 73–74, 79, 83, 86, 88, 114–133, 137, 139, 150, 162, 167–170, 173, 175, 184, 244, 251 genre and multimodality (GeM) model 59, 61–63, 68, 70

challenging 137, 152 citation 95, 96, 105, 106–107, 110 co-contextualization 250–251 co-presence 33 coherence 68, 70, 73–74 cohesion 70–71, 73–74 communication 26, 80, 81, 85 constraints 136, 138, 153, 156 contact zone 33 content 80, 137, 138, 139, 141, 142, 143, 144, 150, 153, 154, 159, 160, 161 contradiction 156 convention 28, 251–252 copy-and-paste 106 critical discourse analysis (cda) 32 delimit 138, 164 diagrams 53–55, 56–57, 62–63, 73, 248– 250 difference 94–96, 102, 106 digital storytelling 115, 124

eccentricity 164 ekphrasis 154, 159 English 22–23, 25, 163 epistemology 22 fables 145, 159 fairy tales 145 film 114–115, 118–120, 127–128 flash fiction 138, 139, 140 formal 139, 140, 158, 161 freedom 138, 139, 142, 143, 150, 161, 162, 164 functional specialization 252

higher education 195, 242, 253 history, absence of 34 ideational complementarity 247–251 ideology 244, 253 Image Theatre 167–170, 175–176, 178–179, 184–188 image-writing relations 97–100, 197, 243 Integrative Multi-semiotic Model (imm) 243–245 inter-semiotic relationship 243 intersemiosis 197–200, 202, 206, 210–213 intertextuality 87, 106 irony 125, 127–130 juxtaposition 138 knowledge

94, 96, 100, 101–103, 108, 127,

21–24, 80, 86, 87

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language as mode 242 layering 145, 161, 162, 164 layout structure 62, 64–68, 73 lecture as transmedial pedagogic form lecture note-taking 43 liberating 164 logico-semantics 199–202, 206–207

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Machinima 123, 131 meaning-making ensemble 241 medieval university—lection and disputatio 39–42 medium 58–59, 61, 64, 73–74, 84 meta-functions (of language) 198, 243 metacognition 53, 72, 75 methodology 29 misreading 142, 156, 158 Modal integration 199, 241, 252 modality 96, 107, 108–110 mode 55–58, 136, 139, 140, 161, 162, 163, 164, 241 monograph 53, 55–56, 58–59, 62–66, 70– 71 motivated sign 27–28 multimodality 88, 163, 164, 199, 175 multisemiotic text analysis 199 narrative 115, 118–120, 125, 131, 153, 154, 161, 163 New Literacy Studies School 169, 253 ontology

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page 54–57, 62–65, 151, 156, 158 parody 120, 125–130 pedagogy 25–26, 168, 175, 252–254 persuasive 141, 142, 159 PhD 22–24, 138 places for learning 26 popular culture 114–132 PowerPoint 24

reconciling 142, 150 reflection 137, 143, 153, 156 reflective practice 137, 138 remix 120, 123, 125, 129, 132 repeats 139, 140, 152, 159, 161 restriction 138, 139, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 150, 152, 153, 156, 157, 158, 163, 164 rhetoric 82, 88, 115–118, 122, 124, 130–132, 154, 159 Rhetorical Structure Theory (rst) 68 risk 143, 150, 159, 161, 164 Scandinavian languages (as subject) 22–23 social semiotics 96, 195–215 sound 137, 143, 159, 160, 163 space of integration 200, 243–244 spaces for learning 26 spectacle 36, 41, 47 speculation 140, 145 subversion 140, 159 suggestion 140, 144, 159 surveillance 36, 45 Systemic Functional Linguistics 197–199 text-flow 56–58, 61, 65–71, 73–74 texts 79, 80, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 136, 137, 138, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 152, 153, 154, 155, 158, 159, 161, 162, 163, 164 textual poaching 120 theatre of the oppressed 168, 175 ’Umbruch’ 21–22 uncertainty 163 vague language 140, 144, 159 vectors (as mode) 249–250 voice 106, 145, 167–169, 171, 172, 186 word count 138, 141, 142, 143, 152, 156, 159, 161, 162 writer identities 167–168, 170, 172, 176–177