ABSTRACT
There have been many attempts to apply the kinds of tools that the authors use to analyze language to the analysis of other modes such as images, music, layout, and sound. Some people object to this idea, arguing that different modes have their own special ways of conveying meaning, and you cannot simply ‘transplant’ ideas that have been developed in linguistics to the study of other modes. This is certainly true, but when they use words like ‘grammar’ and ‘vocabulary’ to describe the way different modes work, they are using these words metaphorically. Interpersonal meaning is communicated in images through things like framing, perspective, focus, and in the case of images with people in them, whether the people are looking at the viewer or not. In this image, the fact that there are no people is itself significant and contributes to the generally impersonal feeling of the image.
