The range and the communicative importance of paralinguistic means employed in contemporary English written multimodal discourse
The range and the communicative importance of paralinguistic means employed in contemporary English written multimodal discourse

Summary/Abstract: This article deals with the broad spectrum of semiotic resources which are used in modern English texts, and thanks to which they can be classed as multimodal. On the basis of the analysis which was carried out, it was possible to identify a number of distinct groups of semiotic resources in terms of certain shared features, and then to further subdivide these groups into subgroups. The primary groups are the following: segmentation; supplementary graphic effects; font and colour; non-pictorial and non-photographic graphic elements; iconic elements (images); and infographics. Each group has been described in detail, giving attention to its structure and its semantic and pragmatic value. An explanation has also been provided to illustrate why paralinguistic means are important and valuable for the purposes of communication, and in some cases, examples have been given to demonstrate the features of the semiotic resources. It has been shown that these means open up new possibilities for research nowadays, at the same time as they provide new patterns for communication. It has been possible to show that in texts which are being generated now, there are no elements that can be regarded as unimportant: they all convey meaning, and sometimes in a more significant way than those which are only verbal.

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