Multimedia as semiotics, medium and imaginarium

Authors

  • Joaquín Moreira Alonso Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación y Facultad de Información y Comunicación; Universidad de la República/ Universidad Nacional de Córdoba http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0024-7762

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.24215/16696581e125

Abstract

Currently, “multimedia” seems to be an ordinary term with a clear meaning. It appears in specialized and mainstream media, in government and corporative documents, in advertising and colloquial conversations. Even though, a proper and specific meaning to be used in communication studies is far from being clear. In this paper, I criticize some of the canonical definitions and make an attempt to establish some useful points to start a discussion about the subject.

Firstly, I discuss the definition according to which multimedia is just the co-occurrence of different message supports in a single platform because it reduces multimedia to a simple consequence of the device, without any communication aspect. Then, I discuss the confusion between technical features of the digital media and the multimedia itself.

As any media, multimedia is much more than just the devices and technical features that make it possible. Therefore, we require a more comprehensive approach for the multimedia in the communication studies which includes a medial, semiotic and phenomenological analysis.

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Author Biography

Joaquín Moreira Alonso, Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación y Facultad de Información y Comunicación; Universidad de la República/ Universidad Nacional de Córdoba

Licenciado en Ciencias de la Comunicación por la Universidad de la República (2008, Uruguay), candidato a Doctor en Comunicación Social por la Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (Argentina) y docente investigador de la Universidad de la República. Investiga sobre semiótica, filosofía de la comunicación y cibercultura.

Published

2019-01-02

How to Cite

Moreira Alonso, J. (2019). Multimedia as semiotics, medium and imaginarium. Question/Cuestión, 1(61), e125. https://doi.org/10.24215/16696581e125