Semiotic resources in multimodal sociopolitical irony

The article analyzes public appellative inscriptions that emerged during the coronavirus pandemic and contain both non-verbal and verbal components. The proposed term allows emphasizing the main functions of such texts (attracting the addressee’s attention and influencing their behavior), while distinguishing such texts from other regulatory texts. From the many terms for texts with multilevel semiotic components, the term creolized text is preferred. The non-verbal means of public appellative inscriptions include a special graphic design of the verbal component (supragraphemic, i. e. a font of a different type and size, a combination of uppercase and lowercase, highlighting, etc., and topographemic, i. e. a text background), as well as pictorial means like graphic elements and photographs. The author explores the interaction between verbal and non-verbal components in public appellative inscriptions and finds that a fully identical rendition of the same content by verbal and non-verbal means is impossible. While it is possible to convey the main content of the appellative inscription (the requirement to comply with COVID measures) through an image, the latter is accompanied by texts with details. Even in cases of parallel (synonymous) use of verbal and non-verbal components, it is difficult to determine the leading component. The author also analyzes examples of mutual penetration of the verbal and non-verbal components. The author concludes that the use of non-verbal components enhances the appellative nature of appellative inscriptions. The nature of the chosen material and the idea that public appellative inscriptions can be considered creolized texts account for the novelty of the study.

This article focuses on the specific properties of the combinability of non-verbal components with each other in the modern English discourse including the characteristics of their interaction with verbal components. The structural, semantic and pragmatic features of non-verbal components as well as their universal, ethnospecific and individually meaningful characteristics are taken into account. The paper is based on the discourse methodology in analysing communicative phenomena. The complex nature of communication is presented as the unity of verbal and non-verbal components within the anthropocentric paradigm in language and speech research. This paper provides the research of the combinability of non-verbal communicative components with each other, the result of which is presented by different clusters of non-verbal components taking into account the characteristics of a discursive personality upon which depend the ways of diversifying the information and emotion through non-verbal components. The analysis of discourse-constitutive potential of kinesic, proxemic and prosodic communicative components contributes to developing the theory of discursive interaction of different code systems aimed at the investigation of communicative signs of different nature in their unity within the frames of different types of discourse.

With this paper we try to comprehend the phenomenon of creolized text as a semiotic complex existing in the unity of verbal and non-verbal components. Creolized texts, combining the verbal part with visual fragments, make up most of the texts that function in the media and virtual data. Therefore, scientific information that reveals the influence of the verbal and non-verbal parts of a creolized text on its semantic perception has pragmatic value. The term “creolized text” is analyzed in our work from the point of view of its inclusion in the paradigm of semantically close definitions: “linguo-visual complex”, “polycode text”, “complex semiotic whole”. The main stages of the study of creolized text in world and Russian science are presented in a diachronic sequence. The basic parameters of perception of the creolized text are considered. The research is intended to acquaint the reader with the main milestones in the history of the study of this phenomenon and to provide its detailed terminological definition.

The article examines language manipulating models through the actualization of implicit meanings in Russian polycode texts of advertisements for medical goods and services. The methods of cognitive-discursive analysis of Internet content are used. The source of manipulative strategies actualization in polycode content is shown to be constituted by a set of implicit meanings laid down by the creators of the texts or not controlled by them, which arise in the operating environment of verbal and non-verbal components interaction in the polycode object. Two ways of interaction of the verbal and non-verbal components are analyzed: the non-verbal component serves as a background and enhances the content of the verbal series; the verbal component is based on the literal content of the non-verbal series for the purpose of its ironic rethinking. The connection between the phenomena of manipulation with implicit meanings in a polycode advertising text and models of language anomalies of conceptual, communicative-and-pragmatic or linguistic proper type is revealed. It is concluded that the polycode nature of an advertising text, which exploits manipulative communicative strategies, enhances the attractiveness of the content and its perlocutionary impact. The study also has significant potential for law enforcement practice in terms of improving the technology of conducting judicial and extra- judicial linguistic expertise in cases when advertisement is misleading, unfair, or it contradicts public interests.

The work deals with semiotic and linguistic means of creating the comic in polycode Internet memes in modern Internet communication in Russian. The material of the study is polycode Internet memes discovered by the authors in the process of Internet monitoring of the Runet in the period from 2010 to 2023. The postulate of “two worlds exisnence”, “doubling of the reality” as the main principle of comic semiosis and its pragmatics is formulated. The paper also discusses models of interaction between verbal and non-verbal components in a comic Internet meme: non-verbal and verbal components are somehow correlated in semantic and/or emotional terms; the verbal component is logically opposed to the non-verbal one; the verbal and non-verbal components belong to logically incompatible conceptual areas. It is noted that the functioning of humorous Internet memes is based on a “language game”. As a means of creating a comic effect, such varieties of “language game” as word-formative game, semantic game, phonetic game and pragma-semantic game are analyzed. It is concluded that the Internet meme is a multi-level semiotic instrument for creating comic in the environment of modern Internet communication, actively exploiting its specific properties such as polycodeness, interactivity and intertextuality.

The article presents and analyzes the examples of creolized texts of the English-language methodological discourse in order to identify and describe the relationship between verbal and non-verbal components. The importance of referring to such a semiotically complicated type of texts in modern linguistics is discussed. The author supports the idea that the methodical discourse, which is part of the institutional one, is dialogic in nature, where the communication of the participants is a crucial thing. The success of communication is ensured by the syncretic relationship of the verbal and non-verbal components of the discourse, which helps the recipient to perceive the text more fully, to decode the meanings implemented by the author. The organization of the English-language methodological discourse is analyzed in terms of the saturation of texts with verbal and non-verbal components of information transfer and their quantitative correlation. Examples from the texts of English-language books on the methodology of teaching English are considered in detail. The purpose of this study was to consider the typology of non-verbal elements in methodological texts and to determine their relationship with the verbal part (the test itself).

The article considers creating comicality in English demotivational posters. It has been established that since the demotivator is a creolized text consisting of verbal and visual components, the comic effect it produces depends on the relationship between its parts. Three groups of demotivators have been identified regarding the role of verbal and visual components in creating a comic effect. The first group includes demotivators with autosemantic relations between the parts of the poster. The comic effect in them is created on the basis of a relatively autonomous verbal component with the help of a rich arsenal of expressive means available in the language. Phonetic, lexical and syntactic means of creating a comic effect have been systematized and described. It has been shown that their role in creating comicality is not the same. Phonetic devices only, such as rhyme, are insufficient in this case, and they always accompany lexical or syntactic stylistic devices. At the lexical level the most common devices for creating a comic effect are metaphor, pun, proverbs, comparison and irony. At the syntactic level the most frequent stylistic devices include antithesis, repetition, parallelism and chiasmus. Demotivator texts can be characterized by the interaction of phonetic, lexical and syntactic expressive means. The visual component in the first group of demotivators illustrates the verbal part and is not involved in creating a comic effect. The second group consists of demotivators with synsemantic relationships between the components. The verbal part in them is not independent from the visual part, so both components are equally important for the comic effect. The verbal component contains certain stylistic means. However, the comic nature of the situation described by the demotivator becomes clear only due to the visual component. It does not simply illustrate the verbal part, but is essential for the correct understanding of the communicative idea implemented in the demotivator. The third group includes demotivational posters with synsemantic relationships. The verbal component in them is oriented towards the image or refers to it. The verbal part contains no stylistic means. The obligatory visual component of the demotivator is of primary importance in creating a comic effect. This group is represented by two types. In the first of them, the text of the demotivator is devoid of semantic independence without correlation with the visual component. In the second type, the verbal component cannot be correctly interpreted without correlation with the image. It is concluded that the comic effect of a creolized text, such as demotivator, should be described considering the role of its components, which are in close unity and interaction. The study of the features of demotivational posters as a specific genre of Internet communication allows us to shed light on the relevant for modern linguistics problem of the polycode texts impact on the addressee.

The results of the study of video poetry as a genre are presented. The object of analysis is Ukrainian video poetry, created within the projects CYCLOP (Ukraine), "Overcoming Silence" (Ella Yevtushenko, Daryna Gladun, Lesyk Panasyuk, and others), #DigitalShevchenko, "Power of Speech", "Subjective" (Sofia Bezverkha and Marichka Yarmola), "rosdilovi" (Olga Mykhailyuk and Serhiy Zhadan), "By the way" (Natalia Parshchyk, etc.), ZEBRA festival (Germany). Ukrainian video poetry has been developing since the 2000s and was first presented as part of the CYCLOP festival, which became both a venue for a video poetry competition and a platform for theoretical discussions. The significance of poetic intonation and the interaction of reader and author in video poetry is described. Genre features of video poetry are established, and also types of genre transformation are allocated. It has been proved that video poetry is a syncretic multimedia genre, which combines verbal and nonverbal components. The verbal component is the voice of the reader or poet, as well as the melody that complements them. The non-verbal component is based on the development of a visual metaphor or game plot, it also expresses the perception of images, metaphors, etc. poem. The movement of frames in video poetry is based either on the metric-rhythmic identity of the poem (and the melody that accompanies the reading of poetry) and the video sequence, or the dissonance between the verbal and nonverbal components. Genre features of video poetry can be described as a combination of kinetic images, sound, visual metaphors, the voice of the reader, melody, and others. Genre transformations of video poetry are defined through the creation through animation, feature film script, improvisational transformation, and interaction between different arts or the use of digital technology. It is determined that an important aspect of video poetry is the interaction of the author and the recipient. Watching video poetry, on the one hand, actualizes the associations (verbal and nonverbal) in the memory of the recipient, on the other – enhances the aesthetic experience of perception of the work. It gives a powerful aesthetic and emotional effect.

The aim of the study is to identify the linguostylistic features of creating a comic effect in modern German political cartoons. The paper examines political cartoons by Klaus Stuttmann. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the linguistic and cultural analysis of the verbal and nonverbal components of political cartoons by one of the most famous contemporary German cartoonists, Klaus Stuttmann, a winner of numerous awards. Based on the analysis of Stuttmann’s cartoons from 2022-2024, it has been found that cartoons are polycode texts in which the combination of verbal and nonverbal components creates a comic effect as a specific reaction of the cartoonist to current political events. The authors propose a division of political cartoons into informational and analytical types. As a result, the characteristic features of informational and analytical types of cartoons have been identified and described. Various ways of representing prototypes and identifying cartoon characters have been revealed, as well as mechanisms for creating a comic effect based on the combination of verbal and nonverbal components.

When Mangkunegara IV was in power in the Mangkunegaran (1853-1881), he created several new art forms, one of which was Langendriya Mandraswara, which uses as its media both verbal and non-verbal components. The verbal component, traditional Javanese singing, or tembang macapat, is adapted to suit the social strata and takes into consideration the principle of politeness. The non-verbal component expresses a particular character. The integration of the two components creates a clearer, more communicative, and more aesthetic meaning.Keywords: Politeness, verbal and non-verbal components

The article is devoted to the study of verbal and nonverbal signs which form the linguosemiotic dimension of the public servise advertising discourse that contributes to the correct perception of the message by the target audience and enhances remembering. The communicative effectiveness of the public servise advertising discourse depends on the choice of verbal and nonverbal components and their interaction. Various means of artistic expression actively use in the public servise advertising discourse for the achievement the maximum effect of the message. Most of all, the meaning of the advertising message is expressed by combination of verbal and nonverbal signs. Visual and audio components of the public servise advertising discourse, which are used in close connection with verbal components, contribute the effectiveness of the advertising message. They regularly perform such functions as: informative, expressive and the influence. However, the verbal text allows to "choose the right level of perception and understanding of information." It is believed that the public servise advertising discourse, which is accompanied by images, music or other sound design, has better effect on the recipient. The advertising message can be considered as a socially and aesthetically significant discourse with its integrity, interconnectedness of its elements and formal-substantive unity. The public servise advertising discourse appeals to the humanistic values of people, attracts attention and arouses interest, sometimes by non-aesthetic means, because its purpose to change society's attitude to the problem, to provoke the right reaction and to achieve the transformation of behavior. The public servise advertising discourse has a significant potential to change social standards and moral guidelines, so it can be refered to a small group of social institutions that affects society as a whole as a form of psychogenic action; the public servise advertising discourse plays an important role in the formation of certain psychological and behavioral stereotypes. If advertising in the general is able to meet new needs, in the same time the social advertising can influence the formation of more complex mental formations, such as: worldview, aesthetic tastes, social values, lifestyle, moral values. The linguosemiotic dimension of the public servise advertising discourse in the United States includes verbal and nonverbal components which are reasonably used to attract attention, the recipient's perception of advertising information, memorization, awareness of advertising. Each type of public servise advertising discourse requires the use of adequate verbal and nonverbal signs of communication as tools of axiological ideology of society and pragmatic influence.

Nowadays tourism industry is one of the areas that facilitate the economic and cultural growth of the country. Tourism does not only open borders, acquaint with the cultural heritage, and expand “intellectual capacity”, it is a sphere where various suggestive means – subconsciously and consciously – are widely used. A tourist destination is popularized through advertising, so advertising texts in tourism advertising discourse – an institutional type of discourse focused on specifying within numerous tourism destinations and on reciprocal communication with recipients – are one of the key means of promoting tourism products. The end goal of our paper is to pinpoint the basic structure of the modern English tourism advertisement and determine the correlation of its verbal and nonverbal components, the subject of the research is verbal and nonverbal means of reproducing tourism advertisement content. The goal can be achieved through the tasks aimed at analyzing the correlation of verbal and nonverbal and at the presentation of the basic framework of the modern English advertisement in tourism advertising discourse. The results of the research proved that the peculiarity of advertising texts in modern English tourism advertising discourse is in the combination of informational, linguistic, socio-cultural, gender, and psychological components that altogether create a positively-marked tourism destination image in the recipient’s consciousness. The information in the advertisements is fragmented to avoid overwhelming recipients with “known” facts. The tourism destination advertisements have a basic structure of a visual component (arch-fragment) as a means of attracting the recipient’s attention and a verbal component: title (middle fragment), as a means of interest, and text (terminal-fragment), as the main means of suggestion. Key words: modern English tourism advertising discourse, correlation, verbal component, non-verbal component, visual component.

The article is devoted of problem definition of effective ways detection of lie, which are used for analysis in verbal components. Theoretical analysis described main ways of detection. They are verbal and nonverbal components. We have defined that nonverbal components were most criticism and are not enough reliable for lie detection, also authors of these method thought so. We have formulated the hypothesis that structure of lie massage can be change due to violation of textual cohesion during its making. During lie speaking a mental image will be different, because an author have to dream up text now, in contrast a true message. True image is in memory of individua. These factors less depend by emotional conditions, as nonverbal components, because they base on cognitive component of person. In the psycholinguistic researches we have highlighted main verbal features of lie, which were grouped in four classes. They consist of speech errors (reservation, word repetitions, word corrections), special speech constructions (contextual inserts, slang, nonpersonal constructions, description of other’s actions, unusual details), change of general structure of text (logical violence, thematical transmissions, avoid of theme), change of dualization (increase or decrease details, generalization, using direct speech. synonym). With the aim of check for hypothesis we have realized an experiment, which were analyzed true and lie messages of people. As result we found that these criteria can be used as diagnostical criteria, but they have different reliable level. In lie massages nonpersonal construction are used more often, make word correction, dualization (increase and decrease number of details). There are big violence of logic, tendential to decrease of text volume. After correlation we defined two types of liar. They are extraverted and introverted. Which have differences in communication skills, level of logic and detailed.

Dominance behavior, the attempt to direct or control others through threat, has been shown to be a generally ineffective influence tactic and results in negative affective reactions and evaluations from others. However, the nonverbal expression of dominance can be distinguished from dominant message content, and the authors propose that the nonverbal component of dominance (demeanor) may more readily convey feelings of threat and result in stronger negative reactions than the verbal component (content). Participants rated statements that varied in terms of neutral or dominant content and whether they were presented with neutral or dominant demeanor. The results indicated that both dominant content and dominant demeanor resulted in negative affective reactions and lower evaluations of competence and leadership. Results further indicated that dominant expressive behavior contributed more to the observer’s negative reactions than did dominant content. Research suggests that dominance behavior is a generally ineffective influence tactic in groups and leads to negative evaluations from others of incompetence, resentment, and dislike (Carli, LaFleur, & Loeber, 1995; Driskell, Olmstead, & Salas, 1993; Yukl & Tracey, 1992). These results led Driskell et al. (1993) to conclude that dominance behavior violates a general norm of appropriate behavior in task groups. That is, most task groups hold norms of conduct, including norms that group members should not threaten others. To the extent that dominance behavior is deemed to be a violation of these general task norms, this violation will result in negative reactions of dislike or disapproval toward the norm violator. However, little research has examined why this is the case. A dominant message (“Do this now or else!”) includes both a verbal and nonverbal component. The verbal component conveys the content of the message. The nonverbal component conveys expressive cues such as a lowered brow or loud voice. It is likely that the more emotion-laden expressive component of dominance may constitute a stronger expression of threat relative to the content of the message, and it may be the dominant demeanor that leads to strong negative reactions from others. In this study, we draw a distinction between dominant content and dominant demeanor, and we examine the extent to which negative reactions to dominance-influence attempts are determined by these separate components.

The research aims to provide a comprehensive description of the implementation of the linguosemiotic category of theatricality in the semiotically heterogeneous text of Guillaume Apollinaire’s calligrammes. The article outlines the main research units and aspects of theoretical description, provides definitions and an overview of the key parameters of theatricality in a semiotically heterogeneous text, specifically in Apollinaire’s calligrammes. Given that theatricality is a significant category in any context, determining the choice of means to achieve set goals, the consideration of the author’s strategy in constructing calligramme texts is conducted in four main directions: the linguistic aspect itself, the cognitive aspect, the pragmatic aspect, and the semantic aspect. The scientific novelty lies in the fact that, based on the analysis of the linguistic material, methods and means of implementing the category of theatricality have been identified and described at different levels of the semiotically heterogeneous text of calligrammes: lexical, grammatical, stylistic (the verbal component); graphic, semiotic (the non-verbal component). As a result, key parameters of the category of theatricality in the text have been determined, including conditional time, conditional space (mise-en-scène), persuasiveness, referential illusion, attractivity. The linguosemiotic category of theatricality, as a combination of verbal and non-verbal components, is implemented in the language of calligrammes, where text visualization is a result of the theatricalization of its language. Based on this, it has been hypothesized that the dominant parameter in the semiotically heterogeneous text of calligrammes and the fundamental parameter of the text category of theatricality is referential illusion. From this, it follows that the essential conditions for implementing the category of theatricality are emphasis and audience perception.