MULTIMODALITY

LITERACY and LITERACY

TODAY
A “predictable practice”
Being Literate = Learning how to READ
and WRITE the written word

Readingand Writing NO LONGER the

only way by which children become
LITERATE
 Key Concepts

MONOMODALITY: One particular language for each different art.

The use of particular methods with specific vocabulary.

MODES or MEANING MAKING SYSTEMS: There are 5 systems to

create meaning: WRITTEN/LINGUISTIC, AUDIO, VISUAL, GESTURAL
and SPATIAL.

MULTIMODALITY: The combination of 2 or more modes used at the

same time within the same text.

MULTILITERACY: There are 2 aspects 1) The variability of meaning

making in different cultural, social or domain-specific contexts.
2) New forms of literacy are multimodal, especially the multimodal
representations of the new digital era.
Basic tenets
SFL (Systemic Functional Language) Halliday
Language is a meaning-making system where
individuals´ choices to accomplish their
communicative purposes are moulded by their social
context and their relationship with it.
Culture = A SET OF SEMIOTIC SYSTEMS WHICH
INTERRELATE.
Halliday focused on one semiotic system among many
other modes of making meaning in a culture:
language.
Halliday´s metafunctions are intrinsict to all instances
of communication. There are 3 situational variables
related to 3 metafunctions in all communicative
contexts:
FIELD IDEATIONAL: social activity, content or
topic / personal experience represented through
language
TENOR INTERPERSONAL: relationship among
people involved in communication / the way in which
people position themselves and others in the world
MODE TEXTUAL: medium and channel of
communication / how people organise and structure
meaning
The metafunctional aspect of SFL provided a common
theoretical basis for the development of “GVD”
PICTURE 3
 A good way to help students develop their critical literacy at
the same time they produce a multimodal text is to design and
make their own photography brief which they can use to retell
a written or oral story or to describe or advertise objects.