Problems With The Textual Analysis Of The Image

Martin, Matthiessen & Painter (2010: 292):

And since our text is a multimodal one, we need to move on. Working with Discourse Chapter 9 offers some pointers in this direction (see also Kress & van Leeuwen 1996), and we'll make just a small sortie into images here.

As Figure 7.1 shows, there are two pictures, positioned to the left of the verbal text. Inspired by IFG's analysis of information structure, Kress & van Leeuwen suggest interpreting left position as Given and right as New. Turning to the vertical axis, FitzSimons' portrait is above the landscape photo of the beach, an arrangement they interpret as Ideal above and Real below. The beach landscape is itself polarised into Ideal (sky) and Real (land and sea), and FitzSimons is positioned to the right of the top image in New position. In short then horizontally speaking we have the familiar beach and columnist as Given and the story as news; vertically FitzSimons is an oracular Ideal to the landscape's Real (a God-like figure up in the sky perhaps), and the sky is Ideal in relation to the people on the beach as Real. These textual meanings are outlined in Figure 7.3.

Blogger Comments: 

[1] For some of the problems with the discussions of multimodality in Chapter 9 of Working With Discourse (Martin & Rose 2007), see the clarifying critiques here.

[2] To be clear, in language, Given^New is only the unmarked structure. Other structures include Given^New^Given, New^Given, and New.

[3] To be clear, 'ideal' and 'real' are experiential construals — concerning ideas and things — not textual statuses.

[4] To be clear, no argument is provided as to why, in such a photograph, a sky is presented as ideal and the beachgoers as real, or indeed, how such a presentation is a choice of the photographer.

[5] To be clear, no argument is provided as to why a regular columnist should be presented as New.

[6] To be clear, even ignoring the fact that ideal and real are experiential construals, not textual statuses, the authors are here just trying to make the data fit the theory, using the inappropriate descriptions of the footballer-turned-journalist as 'oracular' and 'God-like'.