More Than Words: Publishing Multimodal Research in Multimodal Ways

• In Event: Whose Modes Matter? Creating Robust, Peer-Reviewed Publishing Pathways for Multimodal Scholars

Abstract

Multimodality scholars have long argued that meaning is made not through language alone, but through the orchestration of multiple semiotic resources—image, gesture, gaze, movement, speech, sound, layout, and spatial arrangement. Yet, there is a lingering dissonance between what we study and how we publish. In our commitment to analysing multimodal texts and practices in everyday and institutional contexts, we produce research that is grounded in rich, layered, and dynamic data. Ironically, the dominant mode of dissemination in scholarly journals remains predominantly monomodal—linear, text-based, and print-centric. This disjuncture not only limits the expressive potential of our research outputs but also flattens the semiotic richness that defines the multimodal artefacts and interactions we analyse. We draw inspiration from work that foregrounds multimodal analysis software and visualisation tools (O’Halloran et al., 2014; Ruiz-Madrid et al, 2023), but we also recognise that the transduction (Kress, 2010) of moving, embodied, and sonic meaning into static images and written prose often entails semantic loss.

Drawing on my dual positionality as a researcher and editor of [TITLE OF MULTIMODAL JOURNAL deidentified for anonymity], a journal devoted to consolidating and advancing the development of multimodal research theory, methodologies, and contribute to empirical understanding of how multimodality shapes the social landscape of interaction and communication, I reflect on the practical and ideological tensions in realising a publishing model that lives out the very ethos of multimodal research. I will discuss the opportunities and challenges the editorial team experiences in starting the journal 5 years ago. As an editorial team, we have had to grapple with questions around paper types, review processes, technological constraints, and academic legitimacy—each posing its own set of affordances and limitations for multimodal representation (Jewitt et al. 2021; Adami et al. 2024). I conclude by proposing ways which the scholarly community invested in multimodality research can make advances towards a new vision of multimodal publishing.

In light of increasing digital dissemination and the proliferation of multimedia-rich platforms, I argue that scholarly publishing must reimagine its form and function. This includes rethinking submission formats, peer review protocols, and editorial guidelines to accommodate dynamic and interactive content. Such reimagining is not merely about technical enhancement—it is an epistemological commitment to honouring the multimodal nature of meaning-making itself.

Author

• Fei Victor Lim, National Institute of Education - Nanyang Technological University