A Multimodal Discourse Analysis of Romantic Comedy Movie Posters

Abstract

Multimodal discourse analysis (MDA) is a new and prominent approach in discourse analysis with a quite rapid pace of development. According to this approach, meaning is made not only by words but also by the integration of other semiotic resources such as images, sounds and colours. This study further supports this theory by the analysis of the posters of fifteen top grossing American romantic comedies. Based on Kress and Van Leeuwen’s framework (2006), the research indicates the similarities and differences in using semiotic elements to create meaning and promote the movies. The results not only identify the patterns in designing movie posters but also examine the effectiveness of the framework in analyzing multimodal texts.