Semiotics: Modality
Questions on modality from Daniel Chandler:
- What reality claims are made by the text?
- Does it allude to being fact or fiction?
- What references are made to an everyday experiential world?
- What modality markers are present?
- How do you make use of such markers to make judgements about the relationship between the text and the world?
- Does the text operate within a realist representational code?
- To whom might it appear realistic?
- 'What does transparency keep obscure?' (Butler 1999, xix)
Daniel Chandler's notes on modality
Much visual cultural experience assumes a realist orientation. There are modal cues that reinforce this, such as perspective, 3D vs. flat images, detailed vs. abstract, colour vs. monochrome, edited vs. unedited, moving vs. still images, audible vs. silent, possible vs. impossible situations, plausible vs. implausible situations, familiar vs. unfamiliar; current vs. distant in time; local vs. distant in space.
In "realistic" codes, content is foregrounded, and form recedes into the background.
What do we mean by "realistic" images? Which of the following are realistic, and what does "realistic" mean in these cases?:
