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Volume 36, Issue 2
  • ISSN 1018-2101
  • E-ISSN: 2406-4238
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Abstract

Drawing on Relevance Theory, the paper sketches out a framework that accounts for inference-making in creative multimodal texts, taking advocacy campaign posters as its case study. The analysis shows that in each poster semiotic resources are employed to create a micro-narrative exemplifying actors affected by a sociopolitical problem, whose function is to create assumptions against which a higher-order intention is recognized. The text-internal relevance within the micro-narrative is optimized by combining verbal and visual elements to communicate multimodal explicatures and implicatures. The visual elements are employed to invoke non-propositional effects that activate perceptual mechanisms to maximize emotional attachment with the issue advocated for. These non-propositional effects communicated by visual connotation carriers are essential, rather than extra, elements, contributing to the understanding of the propositional meaning communicated at the text-external level. The analysis shows that an inferential approach to multimodality is indispensable to account for (non)propositional content across different modes.

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2025-01-16
2026-09-10

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/content/journals/10.1075/prag.23042.alt
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Tracing relevance beyond codes and across modes
Pragmatics 36, 165 (2026); https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.23042.alt
/content/journals/10.1075/prag.23042.alt
/content/journals/10.1075/prag.23042.alt
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  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): advocacy posters; external relevance; internal relevance; multimodal pragmatics; non-propositional effects

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