A Multimodal Discourse Analysis of the National Publicity Film of China

Abstract

Since entering the era of information, people are realizing that meanings no longer exist only in language or words, but are also conveyed by non-verbal modalities like images, sound, color, and gesture. These non-verbal means of communication are increasingly significant and get into a broader utilization in public media communication, especially in publicity film or short video. This research, based mainly on Kress. G & Van Leeuwen’s Grammar of Visual Design and Zhang Delu’s Comprehensive Theoretical Framework of Multimodal Discourse Analysis, conducts a multimodal discourse analysis on the National Publicity Film of China—China Steps Into a New Era. After a synthesis analysis from both macroscopic and microcosmic angle of the transcription of the film, this thesis comes up to its conclusion that the publicity film mainly involves two kinds of modalities: visual sense and auditory sense. Visual sense includes light, image, color, body movement and facial expression; auditory sense falls into language, music and sound. These modalities are not only simple spreading out or superposition, but interact, mingle and supplement with one another, so as to reach emotional resonance. Consequently, the communicative purpose of the multimodal discourse is realized in this way.