Gunther Kress, a pioneer in the field of multimodality and the co-author of the bestselling Reading Images, produces a comprehensive theoretical framework for the study of the topic providing sample analyses and suggestions for further reading.

Multimodal Discourse outlines a new theory of communication for the age of interactive multimedia. Kress and Van Leeuwen show how two kinds of thought processes interact in the design and production of communicative messages: "design thinking" and "production thinking," the kind of thinking which occurs in direct interaction with the materials and media used. This book will be a key text in courses of language, media and communication willing to take on the theoretical challenges posed by multimodality, mulitmedia and multi-skilling, and it provides inspiring theoretical input for courses...

'Multimodal Teaching and Learning: The Rhetorics of the Science Classroom achieves the rare goal of explicating multimodality as both theory and practice. This is an importantly concrete analysis, derived from extended, careful, and interdisciplinary observation, which challenges our thinking about how meaning and knowledge are shaped by our modes of communication. The book appeals to a wide range of scholars and practitioners far beyond the science classroom.'
Professor Ron Scollon, Department of Linguistics, Georgetown University.

This book takes a radically different look at...

Originally published in 1979. This book studies language variation as a part of social practice - how language expresses and helps regulate social relationships of all kinds. Different groups, classes, institutions and situations have their special modes of language and these varieties are not just stylistic reflections of social differences; speaking or writing in a certain manner entails articulating certain social meanings, however implicit. This book focuses on the repressive and falsifying side of linguistic practice but not without recognising the power of language to reveal and...