Multisemiosis and Context-Based Register Typology: Registerial Variation in the Complementarity of Semiotic Systems

This chapter discusses some aspects of multisemiotic systems operating together within one and the same context. Semiotic systems are systems capable of carrying or even (in the case of higher-order semiotic systems such as language) of creating meaning. Multisemiotic systems are semiotic systems that operate in parallel in the carrying or creation of meaning, working together within one and the same context (for a recent overview of systemic functional contributions to the study of such systems, see Martinec, 2005, and for a recent foundational systemic functional account of multimodal documents, see Bateman, 2008; for recent collections of contributions, see, for example, O’Halloran, 2004; Ventola, Charles and Kaltenbacher, 2004; Royce and Bowcher, 2006; and for a recent text book, see Baldry and Thibault, 2006).