Multimodal Semiotics and Collaborative Design

From multimodal analysis, I draw central conceptual relations between discourse, design,
production and semiotization that I use to discuss how different modes are arranged (and
‘stratified’) within meaningful texts as semiotic resources. The analytical matrix that I generate –by
revising O’Toole’s (1994, 2004) model for social semiotics of architecture – helps uncovering the
‘semiotic spaces’ of design communication in virtual places, their three-dimensional organizations,
interaction spaces and other design elements, and the coherent patterns in their experiential,
interpersonal and textual meaning potentials. Furthermore, I aim to follow O’Toole’s approach “to
discover systematically the particular meanings of a given painting [virtual place] and to show how
the options that the artist [designer 2 ] chooses to construct these meanings are systemic” (O’Toole
1994: 125). The perspective of semiotic spaces as potential meaning and action resources also
brings forth the notions of affordances and constraints as channels of indirect communication
between the designers and the users via their products (virtual places and artifacts). On that note, I
shift the focus of analysis to the study of mediated discourses and practices.
5.3. Mediated discourse analysis and nexus analysis
For the analysis of collaborative practices, I draw on the analytical categories from the sociocultural
tradition, and analyze collaborative design through a network of contextual factors that affect signmaking
activities. This part of the analytical framework borrows concepts from a specific stream of
social semiotic studies on relationships between discourse and practice, particularly drawing the
key aspects from MDA. The unit of analysis in MDA approach is mediated action –social action
mediated through the use of cultural tools – that is realized by the meaning potentials - affordances
and constraints- of mediational means, as users deploy them in their social worlds in certain
situations (Jones & Norris 2005). I present and analyze not only the multimodal compositions of
design elements within virtual places and artifacts, but also the mediational means by which they
came into being, the social actors who participated in their making, and the processes through
which they become materialized.
Ron Scollon (2005) introduces the term ‘mediational means’ – means by the use of which mediated
action takes place – and points out the two major problems with the MDA approach’s view of
language and other semiotic systems as mediational means. Following American psychologist
James Wertsch’s logic, Jones and Norris (2005) elaborate on the structure of ‘mediational means’,
and determine two types: ‘technical tools’ (material objects) and ‘psychological tools’ (sign
systems). Although both types of tools are considered as being material, they are also psychological
and semiotic as well. Mediational means operate within (users’ meaning-makings and actions with)
affordances and constraints of the tools, as users appropriate them into their habitus with their
2 Brackets inserted by the author of the author.
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