From Bakhtin to Mediated Multimodal Genre Systems

Voloshinov and Bakhtin’s expansive view of genres as concrete, historical phenomena, theirlinkage of dialogic semiotics (discourse) to the formation of individuals and societies (development), has been taken up in North American genre theory as an invitation to explore relations between genre and sociocultural theories (e.g., of Vygotsky, Schutz, Latour, Bourdieu), to see genres not as isolated texts/events but as forged within systems and chains of discourse woven into mediated activity (e.g., Bazerman; Berkenkotter; Prior; Russell), and to challenge the privileging of public texts by identifying genres that are occluded (Swales) or designed to mediate activity (Spinuzzi). Research has focused on semiotic dimensions of genres (e.g. Kress, Lemke), and situated analyses (e.g., Berkenkotter; Kamberelis; Prior) have investigated ways that literate activity involves laminated, multimodal chains of talk, visual representations, gestures, actions, artifacts, and writing. This presentation argues for the notion of mediated multimodal genre systems both theoretically and empirically.