Multimodal Semiotics and Collaborative Design

Theoretical Categories Concepts and references Analytical Implications
Social Semiotics
and Sign Systems
Triadic model of signs (object, sign vehicle and
interpretant) (Peirce’s 1998 [1894])
Second-order signification and metalanguages
(Barthes 1967, 1977, 2009 [1957])
Actively responsive understanding (Bakhtin 1981,
1986)
Rhetorical approach attribute(s) power to meaning,
instead of meaning to power.(Hodge and Kress 1988)
Meaning constructed in the ‘act of sign production
and interpretation’ (van Leeuwen 2005a)
Places are constructed
as sign systems. The
post-structuralist
approach emphasizes
the dynamic relations
of sign-makers and
the meaning
potentials. Users of
digital media also
construct their own
mediated traversals
within the semiotic
resources.
Multimodality
Mode as socially shaped and culturally given semiotic
resource for making meaning (Kress 2010)
Semiotic resources as systems of meaning at people’s
disposal (Jewitt 2009).
Modes are shaped through social interactions in
specific contexts (Kress and van Leeuwen 1996, 2001)
Multimodal cohesion as orchestration of sign systems
as multimodal arrangements (Van Leeuwen 2005)
Design translates rhetor’s intentions into ‘semiotically
shaped material’, and transform the available
resources into “means for action in the designer’s
interest” (Kress 2010: 22)
Systemic-functional model for studying architecture
as multimodal sign system (O’Toole 1994, 2004)
Hypertextual traversals and hypermodal interaction
sequences in digital media (Lemke 2009b)
Multimodal analysis
emphasizes the use of
socially available
modes and their
relations. In SL,
digitally mediated
communication in
three-dimensional
places presents specific
multimodal
arrangements. The
analysis should stress
on the contextual
functions of design
elements, and discuss
the orchestration of
modes to produce
meaning potentials.
Space and Place
The experiential perspective, defining place as an
“organized world of meaning” (Tuan 1977)
Phenomenology of spatial experiences and subjective
interpretations of place (Turner and Turner 2004).
5 categories: segregation, permenance, permeability,
separation, rhyme (Van Leeuwen 2005a)
Meta-functions of three dimensional space (Stenglin
2008, 2009)
Meta-functions in architecture (O’Toole 1994, 2004)
Task of architecture is “to bring order and relation
into human surroundings” (Rasmussen 1959: 34)
Cognitive/perceptual and physical characteristics of
sense of place in architecture (Najafi et al. 2011)
Relation between space and place is a social one, it is
the sense of place which frames interactive behavior
(Harrison and Dourish 1996)
Concepts of presence and telepresence (Steuer 1992)
Role of spatial practices in the sense of place, and the
importance of both space and place models in design
of collaborative virtual systems (Dourish 2006
Places not only
communicate
messages, but also
provide experiential
affordances and
constraints. Space
refers to the objects
and dimensions, place
contains the actors and
their meaningful
practices. Being and
acting in place is a
semiotic experience.
Architecture provides a
systematic paradigm to
analyze the social
construction of places.
However, the metafunctions
need to be
revised and
appropriated to spatial
experience.
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