A Study On Poetic Iconicity From The Perspective Of Multimodal Cognitive Poetics

With the development of cognitive linguistics and modality,the study on iconicity has developed from semiotic iconicity to linguistic iconicity,and then to poetic iconicity,and the focus of research materials developed from unimodality to multimodality.Poetic iconicity has attracted more and more attention and adopted as one of standards for successful literature.Freeman proposed that poetic iconicity is iconicity in literature which is achieved by the application of full symbolic representations to capture and express the relationship between forms and feelings in creating a semblance of precategorial reality.It focuses on aesthetic iconicity rather than the iconic relationship between forms and meanings.Based on this proposition,the present study on poetic iconicity of multimodal literature is to be carried out in two steps,namely exploration of iconic representations and its aesthetic effects.There are some areas need to be consummated in poetic iconicity studies.Although some scholars have noticed the difference between poetic iconicity and linguistic iconicity,most analyses of poetic iconicity paid more attention to the levels of language in literary texts,divided verbal representations from visual representations,and attached less emphasis on the interaction among various iconic representations.As for research approach,the traditional approach of iconicity analysis—cognitive poetics is suitable for verbal representations analysis and cannot fully explore visual representations in multimodal literature.Besides,approaches of multimodal discourse analysis are mainly based on systemic functional linguistics which focuses on the structure of language and not fully takes readers into consideration.As an interdisciplinary critical synthesis,Gibbons' s multimodal cognitive poetics(MCP)not only uncovers the structure of different representations but considers the interaction of multimodal representations in terms of cognition and human experience as well.As for research materials,children's picture books have not drawn iconicity analysts' really attention to themselves.As the most accessible form of visual art for children,children's picture books are beneficial for the growth of children's intelligence.The linguistic expressions and pictures in it are playing the same vital role in narrations.In such case,research on poetic iconicity of children's picture books from the perspective of MCP can develop studies of iconicity in breadth and depth and contribute to the ix refinement of analysis framework and expansion of the application of MCP.It is also contributive to improving children's multiliteracy,acquiring a better understanding of multimodal works and having implication for the design of children's literature.Therefore,the present study takes a collection of children's picture book,namely the first five tales of The Complete Tales,as research materials and aims to answer three research questions in detail:(1)Do children's picture books present poetic iconicity?(2)If any,what the multimodal representations of poetic iconicity in the selectedchildren's picture books and what are the specific features of each iconicrepresentation?(3)How do different iconic representations interact with each other to bring aestheticeffects on readers in the selected children's picture books?In order to answer these research questions,the present research tailors an interdisciplinary framework in terms of function and cognition,providing guidance to actual analysis of poetic iconicity in the multimodal materials.Specifically,according to Freeman's integrated model of poetic iconicity(representation— medium— affect),systemic functional grammar,visual narrative theory and MCP will be adopted to analyze multimodal representations of poetic iconicity and its aesthetic effects.The primary research method will be both qualitative and quantitative.Besides,in order to improve feasibility and validity,the linguistic expressions and pictures are logged to form a corpus and then corpus retrieval tool Ant Conc and visual annotation software Nvivo are utilized to provide the scientific basis and technical support for the analysis process.The major findings of this study are presented as below:(1)The multimodal representations of poetic iconicity in the selected children's picture books are verbal representations and visual representations.These iconic representations demonstrate different kinds of characteristics respectively.As for verbal representation of poetic iconicity,striking linguistic devices are including the choice of function words and pronouns(widely use of third person pronoun),the system of transitivity(mainly use of material process,verbal process and relational process),the system of mood(widely use of declarative sentence;small amounts of modality)and system of theme(pronouns are widely used as topic theme;mainly use of structural theme among the textual theme).Trough selective use of pronouns,types of process,mood and theme in the verbal representation of poetic iconicity,the writer defines herself as a narrator who witnessed it first hand and organized narrations in a more direct but dramatic way.Via verbal process and relation process,the writer brings vitality and life into the story and encourages the child readers to establish true value.As for visual representations of poetic iconicity,options of [manifestation: metonymic],[unfolding: succession],[focalization: observer: unmediated],[pathos: generic],[ambience: activated: familiar],[framing: bounded] incorporate with different kinds of focus group are adopted.Besides,Potter tends to present depicted characters at the beginning to introduce the character.Via the option of [vary degree: decontextualise] / [maintain context: new perspective],the illustrator brings viewer's attention on depicted participant.Via the option of [vary degree: recontextualise] / [change context: relocate],the story is highlighted.Via the option of [focalization: perspective],illustrator emphasizes the content of see or thought.On the whole,illustrator intends to place visual elements in a compositional relation so as to manage the viewer's attention,sublimate the theme of story and achieve iconic effects.(2)Multimodal representations of poetic iconicity in the selected children's picture books interact with each other to create iconic effects and bring aesthetic effect on readers.Through observation,iconic representations in children's picture books are consisting of verbal representations and visual representations.It is found that the iconic representations and iconic effects have one common feature: multiplicity.In order to realize the objectivity of education and entertainment,verbal representations and visual representations of poetic iconicity interact with each other to bring aesthetic effects on readers through multisensory perception and cognitive process(embodiment,projection,deictic shift and immersion).More specifically,the printed iconic representations involving readers' bodies into the process of reading and further bring them into the process of meaning-making,like the action of turning pages and eye's movement.As a result,figured tans-world and double deictic subjectivity has created.This mechanism is just as Eusslin said “readers are the direct receivers of the text as well as psychological involved with the represent narrative”(2009,p.158).Besides,the writer inclines to use enumerative conjunction(first)and temporal coordinating conjunction(then)functioned as marker deictic shift.At the same time,a successive images with different context options are presented correspond to the content of linguistic expressions.By this way,readers instigate to move from one text-world to another text-world.Moreover,the distinctive visual designs are used to promote the child reader's subjective resonance,like focalization option in images coupled with personal comment in linguistic expressions.Finally,both verbal representations and visual representations of poetic iconicity are designed depend on the children's features to construct an acceptable discourse-world.(3)As mentioned above,children's picture books do present poetic iconicity.It is achieved through the interaction between two kinds of iconic representations,namely verbal representations and visual representations,to create a familiar fictional world for children and acquire iconic/aesthetic effects.As the research findings mentioned above,theoretically,it will deepen and broaden the research of iconicity,bridging cognitive linguistics and the budding disciplines of systematic functional linguistics to some extent.Moreover,they will further develop the analytical framework of MCP and prove its feasibility and applicability,which could provide some implications for future studies.Practically,systematic exploration of the multimodal representations of poetic iconicity and its aesthetic effects on readers could contribute to gain a deeper perception into the way in which poetic iconicity impact aesthetic effects on readers and help the readers get a better understanding of them,and then make a good choice of which picture books are suitable for children.Besides,the present study may also have implications for the design of educational books for young children,stimulating writers to create more and better works.