Multimodal Interaction And Interactive Meaning Construal Of Dynamic TV Public Service Ads

With the rapid development of science and information technology, it has come into a digital age which changes rapidly. The dominant role of traditional verbal communication has been altered, while visual media with audio, 3D animation or other forms of multimodes are becoming increasingly popular. Discursive world becomes more and more multimodalized. Multimodal Discourse Analysis (hereafter MDA, see Kress & van Leeuwen 1996, 2001) emerges along with the time, and becomes an essential factor to develop and strengthen the ability of multiliteracy.Public Service Ads (hereafter PSAs), as the name implies, are a kind of non-profit campaign organized to promote the progress of human civilization, civic morality, behavior and ideology, also improve and solve public issues of the society. Among them, dynamic TV PSA ranks first because of its rich emotion, short and sturdy form, strong appeal, etc. Most of the themes of PSAs are hot issues or social focuses. It is a question worth considering of how to correctly represent PSAs together with their attributes. With the upgrading of the level of PSAs, the life quality of our people will also be improved and our society will become more and more harmonious and perfect.This study is based on the theory of MDA which was developed in 1990s in western countries to analyze the interactive meaning construal in dynamic TV PSAs and complemented by Appraisal Theory to analyze the ideology conveyed in the various modes of dynamic TV PSAs. Through making use of R. Barthes'Image-text Relations and O'Halloran's intersemiosis, this study interprets TV PSAs from different perspectives. Intersemiosis of multimodal discourse provides opportunities and motivation for aesthetic appreciation, and behind the colorful screen, the rich social and cultural connotation is reflected. The present study is mainly based on the qualitative researching method together with the methods of theoretical research and corpus analysis.By the analysis of the varied modes in dynamic TV PSAs, such conclusions can be drawn as follows:Firstly, other semiotic resources such as images, music, and color etc, are also systemic and functional just like language, which can generate an interrelated or alternative network of meanings, that is, as a meaning potential;Secondly, no modes are neutral or natural, but are loaded with ideology. All the modes generate'synergy'to reflect and reconstruct social reality collaboratively, thereby influence the thoughts of the public;Thirdly, with regard to Attitude positioning, the evoked tokens generally can find their explicit corresponding expressions in verbal and visual evaluations, except for Affect values;Lastly, the present study takes dynamic screen, which is the unique characteristic of TV PSAs, into account, so it steps further than Kress and Van Leeuwan's theory which is only concerned with the static visual images. Furthermore, it also evaluates the dynamic screens and background music of TV PSAs, which is another breakthrough of Appraisal Theory only evaluating through language.