n a profound sense, all meaning-making is multimoda

newly prominent modes and technolog

Pedagogy is a teaching and learning relationship that creates the potential for building learning conditions leading to full and equitable social participation

students and teachers and a new approach to literacy pedagogy that they call "multiliteracies."

Literacy pedagogy, in other words, has been a carefully restricted project - restricted to formalized, monolingual, monocultural, and rule-governed forms of language.

such as visual images and their relationship to the written word

Cultural differences and rapidly shifting communications media meant that the very nature of the subject - literacy pedagogy - was changing radically. This article is a summary of our discussions.

First, we want to extend the idea and scope of literacy pedagogy to account for the context of our culturally and linguistically diverse and increasingly globalized societies, for the multifarious cultures that interrelate and the plurality of texts that circulate

visual design in desktop publishing or the interface of visual and linguistic meaning in multimedia

newly prominent modes and technologies of communication; and changing text usage in restructured workplaces

yet it is by no means a finished piece

multiliteracies - a word we chose to describe two important arguments we might have with the emerging cultural, institutional, and global order: the multiplicity of communications channels and media, and the increasing saliency of cultural and linguistic diversity

Second, we decided to use the term "multiliteracies" as a way to focus on the realities of increasing local diversity and global connectedness

The article goes on to discuss six design elements in the meaning-making process: those of Linguistic Meaning, Visual Meaning, Audio Meaning, Gestural Meaning, Spatial Meaning, and the Multimodal patterns of meaning that relate the first five modes of meaning to each other.

Situated Practice, which draws on the experience of meaning-making in lifeworlds, the public realm, and workplaces; Overt Instruction, through which students develop an explicit metalanguage of Design; Critical Framing, which interprets the social context and purpose of Designs of meaning; and Transformed Practice, in which students, as meaning-makers, become Designers of social futures

These examples of revolutionary changes in technology and the nature of organizations have produced a new language of work. They are all reasons why literacy pedagogy has to change if it is to be relevant to the new demands of working life, if it is to provide all students with access to fulfilling employment.

market logic

teachers find their cultural and linguistic messages losing power and relevance as they compete with these global narratives.

not much space is offered in the marketplace of childhood that reflects genuine diversity among children and adolescents.

are now made unashamedly public

As these three major realms of social activity have shifted, so the roles and responsibilities of schools must shift

The danger of glib and tokenistic pluralism is that it sees differences to be immutable and leaves them fragmentary

To achieve this, we need to engage in a critical dialogue with the core concepts of fast capitalism, of emerging pluralistic forms of citizenship, and of different lifeworlds. This is the basis for a new social contract, a new commonwealth.

An order of discourse is the structured set of conventions associated with semiotic activity (including use of language) in a given social space

Reading, seeing, and listening are all instances of Designing.

isual Meanings (images, page layouts, screen formats); Audio Meanings (music, sound effects); Gestural Meanings (body language, sensuality); Spatial Meanings (the meanings of environmental spaces, architectural spaces); and Multimodal Meanings

They make information more useable and accessible to those who need that information, and in doing so, they advance the goals of the companies or organizations that employ them

Technical Writers & Editor