The Multimodality in a Philippine TV Interview: The Communicative Role of Non-Verbal Gestures

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

Multimodality is quite an integral part of communication as it enriches, supports, and regulates meanings of verbally delivered messages. However, its relevance and appropriateness to the type of communicative situation interlocutors are engaged into is sometimes overlooked. This article investigated the multimodality in an interview in a Philippine primetime TV show. It focuses primarily on the facial, hand, body, as well as the prosodic features and their particular functions with high regard to their turn management and feedback purposes. It furthers the endeavor to compare the different functions played by the common non-verbal gestures between and among the participants of the discourse.

METHODS

The MUMIN coding scheme of annotation that is adapted in the study involves manual annotation of the non-verbal gestures with communicative functions of the participants which include two interviewers and an interview. The data is gathered through video recording and transcribing the December 24, 2014-episode of Aquino and Abunda Tonight. It is a 15-minute primetime show in a Philippine TV network, ABS-CBN, in which the discourse, a face-to-face interview, can be labeled as structured but casual. The participants were labeled as IR1, IR2, and IE in which IR stands for interviewer and IE, the interviewee. The non-verbal gestures of the participants were manually annotated in a devised matrixed based on the tool adapted.

RESULTS

The analysis revealed that a particular functional value may be attributed by different descriptive features and vice-versa depending on the contributions of the interlocutors in face-to-face interaction. Furthermore, it was brought into light that factors such as the conversational setting and the relationship that exists between and among the participants of the discourse contribute to and are seen to have an impact on the production of the non-verbal gestures and its functions.

DISCUSSIONS

Hence, based on this finding, it is suggested that a similar study be done taking into consideration the varieties of the aforementioned factors (the i.e. formal or casual setting, personal or impersonal relationship between the participants) as well as the semiotics present in the non-verbal gestures of the participants.