Multimodal meaning-making
‘Mmmm’ may not be considered by many people to be a word in the English language. But the vocal production of a sound as simple as the four Ms (‘mmmm’) incorporated in the title of this lecture can certainly be used communicatively. If accompanied by different intonation contours, it can even express different ideas. In certain contexts, it may be accompanied by eyebrow raising or, on the contrary, squinting, or manual gestures for elaboration. Saying ‘mmmm’ is an act that cannot only potentially be heard and seen by others, but also felt proprioceptively by the producer. It is this embodied experience of human expression that is the focal point of the valedictory speech of professor of Language Use & Cognition and English Linguistics Alan Cienki.
Cienki will give special consideration to some of the research he has conducted since the 1990s on spoken language and gesture. The starting point was the cognitive question of how gestures may reflect aspects of the ideas speakers are trying to express. This has led to broader theoretical considerations of what constitutes semantics and pragmatics, and the expansion of his academic interests from the field of linguistics to what can be called polysemiotic communication. Supervision of PhD candidates has broadened his horizons to include exploration of the aesthetic value of potentially communicative movements as well as research on communication with non-human animals. Ultimately, the lecture will lead to deconstructing the terms in the title, as each of the parts (multi-, modal, meaning, and making) will be shown to be complex in its own way.