Exploring the Digital Playground of Language and Semiotics: Building a Revised Framework for Critical Multimodal Analysis of Digital Discourse on Social Media
Author
Attias, Michelle
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2019
Submitted on
2019-08-12
Pages
51
Abstract
Denne undersøgelse spørger, om de gængse kvalitative metoder til at analysere sprogbrug på sociale medier er ved at blive forældede og upålidelige—blandt andet fordi de ofte overser multimodalitet, dvs. at betydning skabes gennem både tekst, billeder, emojis, layout og andre tegn. To hypoteser styrer arbejdet: 1) Feltet for digital diskurs ændrer sig så hurtigt, at ældre konklusioner ikke altid holder; og 2) metoderne bliver mindre pålidelige, når de nedtoner multimodalitet. Studiet kombinerer tænkning fra kritisk diskursanalyse med nyere iagttagelser i digital diskursforskning via en narrativ litteraturgennemgang. På den baggrund udvikles en ny ramme kaldet kritisk multimodal analyse af digital diskurs. Rammen afprøves i en casestudie af Facebook-kommentarer for at vurdere, om den kan sammenholde sproglige, teknologiske, semiotiske (tegn og symboler) og ideologiske dimensioner af computer-medieret kommunikation. Analysen viser, at rammen kan håndtere både det store perspektiv (samfundsmæssige mønstre) og næranalyser af konkrete tekster og platformsfunktioner. Ved at se på platformens teknologiske muligheder (affordances), konteksten, selve teksten og de ideologier, der kommer til udtryk gennem dem, giver rammen fleksible fokusområder til at forstå den mangefacetterede sociale interaktion online. Studiet afslutter med en opfordring til at videreudvikle rammen: Den er foreløbig og vil vinde ved at udforske relationerne mellem analyseaspekterne og hvordan indsigter kan overføres fra online til offline sammenhænge.
This study asks whether common qualitative methods for analyzing language use on social media are becoming outdated and unreliable—partly because they often overlook multimodality, meaning that communication draws on text, images, emojis, layout, and other signs. Two hypotheses guide the work: (1) the field of digital discourse changes so quickly that earlier claims may no longer hold, and (2) methods are less reliable when they downplay multimodality. The study combines ideas from critical discourse analysis with recent observations in digital discourse research through a narrative literature review. Based on this, it proposes a new framework called critical multimodal analysis of digital discourse. The framework is tested in a case study of Facebook comments to see whether it can bring together linguistic, technological, semiotic (signs and symbols), and ideological aspects of computer-mediated communication. The analysis indicates that the framework supports both big-picture (societal patterns) and close-up analyses of specific texts and platform features. By attending to platform affordances, context, the text itself, and the ideologies expressed through them, the framework offers flexible lenses for understanding the many-layered nature of online social interaction. The study ends by encouraging further development of the framework: it is a preliminary outline that will benefit from clarifying the relations among its components and examining how insights transfer from online to offline contexts.
[This abstract was generated with the help of AI]
Keywords
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