Written Communication Apr 2008

Composing Across Multiple Media

Jason Ranker Portland State University

Abstract

This is a qualitative case study of two students' composing processes as they developed a documentary video about the Dominican Republic in an urban, public middle school classroom. While using a digital video editing program, the students moved across multiple media (the Web, digital video, books, and writing), drawing semiotic resources from each as they did so. Using sociosemiotic and dialogic-intertextual theoretical frameworks, the author examines how the interface of the video editing program influenced the students' composing by making new types of semiotic resources available and new means of combining these resources. As they moved across these media in a nonlinear fashion, the students created an interactive context for composing that transcended the individual possibilities of each respective medium. This suggests that multimedial composing environments offer a rich intertextual landscape and unique ways of making meanings.

Journal
Written Communication
Published
2008-04-01
DOI
10.1177/0741088307313021
Open Access
Closed
Topics
qualitative research multimodality place and space

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (13)

  1. Shivener et al. (2025)
    Writing in Virtual Reality: Understanding Invention, Collaboration, and Frictio…
    Written Communication
  2. Höglund (2022)
    The Heartbeat of Poetry: Student Videomaking in Response to Poetry
    Written Communication
  3. Kim et al. (2020)
    Writing to Make Meaning through Collaborative Multimodal Composing among Korean…
    Computers and Composition
  4. Mills et al. (2020)
    Multimodal Attitude in Digital Composition: Appraisal in Elementary English
    Research in the Teaching of English
  5. Arduini (2018)
    Cyborg Gamers: Exploring the Effects of Digital Gaming on Multimodal Composition
    Computers and Composition
Show all 13 →
  1. Smith (2018)
    Composing for Affect, Audience, and Identity: Toward a Multidimensional Underst…
    Written Communication
  2. Olsen et al. (2018)
    Examining Intertextual Connections in Written Arguments: A Study of Student Wri…
    Written Communication
  3. Skains (2017)
    The Adaptive Process of Multimodal Composition: How Developing Tacit Knowledge …
    Computers and Composition
  4. Anderson (2013)
    Contrasting Systemic Functional Linguistic and Situated Literacies Approaches t…
    Written Communication
  5. Fulwiler et al. (2012)
    After Digital Storytelling: Video Composing in the New Media Age
    Computers and Composition
  6. Gilje (2010)
    Multimodal Redesign in Filmmaking Practices: An Inquiry of Young Filmmakers’ De…
    Written Communication
  7. Vasudevan et al. (2010)
    Rethinking Composing in a Digital Age: Authoring Literate Identities Through Mu…
    Written Communication
  8. Pennell (2010)
    The H1n1 Virus and Video Production
    Pedagogy

Cites in this index (4)

  1. Ranker (2007)
    Designing Meaning with Multiple Media Sources: A Case Study of an Eight-Year-Ol…
    Research in the Teaching of English
  2. Freedman et al. (2007)
    Conceptualizing a Whole-Class Learning Space: A Grand Dialogic Zone
    Research in the Teaching of English
  3. Rickert et al. (2006)
    The distributed Gesamptkunstwerk: Sound, worlding, and new media culture
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