MULTIMODAL CONSTRUAL OF THE FORCES OF NATURE IMAGERY IN CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH POETIC DISCOURSE

Abstract

The article focuses on revealing specificity of multimodal construal of the forces of nature imagery in contemporary English poetic discourse. The imagery under analysis is a result of literary reconceptualization of knowledge about the elements of nature, namely fire, water, air, and earth, as well as about a number of natural phenomena and calamities generated by them. The latter include, among others, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, snowstorms, tornados,
avalanches, heavy rains, floods, fires, and typhoons. As a consequence, writers and poets resort to creating verbal and non-verbal images of the forces of nature conveyed by a number of verbal and non-verbal means in contemporary English (multimodal) discourse. In this vein, the images of the forces of nature fall into two types, i.e. images of tranquil states of nature vs. images of natural calamities.
Multidisciplinary perspective of the research, combining theoretical and methodological concepts of multimodal cognitive poetics and digital humanities, fosters a new understanding of the force of nature image in the context of its multimodal construal in contemporary English digimodernist and other genres of a poetic discourse. It incorporates preconceptual, conceptual, verbal, and non-verbal facets.
Typology of the forces of nature imagery proceeds from the criterion of the character of environment, in which it is constructed, including specificity of means used for its construal. It embraces digital, digitalized, and installation types. Digital
multimodal images of the forces of nature are created solely in digital environment by means of digital technologies. Digitalized images emerge as a result of intersemiotic transformations from the printed format to a digital one. Finally, installation images of the forces of nature are the ones constructed in open air, namely on sea- and riversides, in the mountains and different town and city sites.