Multimodal Discourse offers a theoretical framework for the
study of communication in the modern world of multimedia. The book
helps students of linguistics, cultural studies, and communication as
well as journalists, photographers, designers, and others who work
practically in the field of communication and design, to understand and
differentiate the distinct levels of mass communication and their
interaction. The authors also give an overview of the development of
communication and discourse and show how this development is influenced
by overall changes in society and social life. All the definitions of
theoretical concepts and notions are further explained and illustrated
by a great variety of examples. Linguists have shown that discourse is
not only used and expressed in and/or by language; Kress & van
Leeuwen also apply the term to music, architecture, and many other
domains of culture. The notion of modes, however, is explained only in
a very abstract way as “semiotic resources which allow the
simultaneous realization of discourses and types of
(inter)action” (p. 21). Media, on the other hand, are described
as the material resources being used for the production. Examples of
modes mentioned by the authors are music, language, and images. The
medium is supposed to be the material, such as a book (6).