Domingo 2014 Migrating-literacies

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DOI ./text-- Text&Talk ; ( ): –

Myrrh Domingo

Migrating literacies: multimodal texts and

digitally enabled text making Abstract: This article examines the social shaping of texts in digital environments

and proposes the notion of migrating literacies to theorize how urban youth

materialize meaning using grammars of digitally enabled design. A working defi-

nition of migrating literacies identifies digitally enabled text making as having

social, technological, and semiotic aff ordances for managing affiliations across

discourse communities. Drawing from ethnographic data, the analysis will

account for the appearance of cultural remix through the shaping of multimodalensembles and how they move across digital spaces. Key findings contribute to

the need for addressing the challenge of multimodality to understanding shiing

notions of text in an increasingly diverse and digital society.

Keywords: multimodality, literacy, text, migration, communities, digital

technologies

Myrrh Domingo: Department of Culture, Communication and Media, University of London, UK.E-mail: [email protected]

Introduction

Current research suggests that youth engagement with digital texts and popu-

lar media is central to developing critical readers and writers in the twenty-first

century (Alvermann 2008; Buckingham 2003; Doering et al. 2007; Sperling and

DiPardo 2008; Stone 2007; West 2008). Extending beyond the aff ordances of

print-based mediums, digitally enabled text making amplifies modal resources

for materializing meanings on the page. Authorship now comprises capabilities

for displaying inextricable configurations among modes such as language, oral

and written; images, still and moving; and sound, voice and music (Cope and

Kalantzis 2000; Jewitt 2008; Kress and Van Leeuwen 2001; New London Group

1996). Further, notions of texts and text making are increasingly linked with

social interaction and ephemeral practices such as writing in online environ-

ments (Domingo et al. forthcoming; Wade and Moje 2001; Wheeler et al. 2008;Courtland and Paddington 2008). A key example would be YouTube videos that

permit users to converse with viewers by posting comments or uploading video

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Myrrh Domingo

responses (Adami 2009). Such perspectives on literacy recognize the role of

print and other symbol systems as integral to meaning making, and that literate

practices are mediated through social and cultural networks (Gee 1996; Scribner

and Cole 1981; Street 1984, 1993). Other scholars have also specifically identified youth meaning making in digital contexts as promoting hybrid textual practices

(Black 2009; Buckingham 2007; Knobel and Lankshear 2008; Lewis and Fabos

2005; Luke 2008) and enabling engagement with both local and global audiences

(Ball and Freedman 2004; Cope and Kalantzis 2000; New London Group 1996).

This article aims to explore shiing notions of texts in relation to urban youth

and their digitally enabled text making. I discuss the distinctive ways in which

a group of Filipino British youth in London navigated their affiliations through

their migrating literacies, text making that accounts for shaping of social, tech-

nological, and semiotic resources for managing belonging across discourse

communities.

Theoretical frame: from dialogical crossings to

migrating literacies

Our world is becoming more profoundly interconnected with the extensive reachof digital and portable devices that principally draw on digital tools for making

meaning to global audiences (Appadurai 1996; Hull et al. 2009; Madianou and

Miller 2012). With this shi in technological orientation is also an observable

social turn in the ways that people are engaging with digital technologies (Cope

and Kalantzis 1997; Hull et al. 2013; Lam and Rosario Ramos 2009; Pahl 2007;

Mills 2009). Digitally enabled text making presents authors modal aff ordances for

making meaning beyond the primary mode of writing (Bezemer and Kress 2008;

Domingo et al. forthcoming; Jewitt 2002). Further, given that digitally enabled

text making oen integrates visuals, videos, and sounds, it is increasingly nec-

essary to account for how multimodal ensembles are made coherent using gram-

mars particular to digital environments. For example, Domingo, Jewitt, and Kress

(forthcoming) describe “modularity” as a design approach that oen character-

izes online writing. Contrary to traditional print-based texts organized in a linear

reading path (i.e., le to right and top to bottom), modularity expands choices for

organizing meanings using cohesive devices such as framing, color scheme, font

selection, among other modal resources.

To address the shi in text making from the page to the screen, I combine dia-logics (Bakhtin 1981) and crossings (Rampton 1995) with a multimodal approach

to explore how a group of youth used digital technology for social purposes. This

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Migrating literacies

integrated framework also enables understanding of multimodal text making as

process that draws from a range of semiotic and linguistic resources. For exam-

ple, according to Bakhtin (1981), all utterances are not encapsulated in a vacuum

but reside in living interaction with the social world. As he states, “The relation-ship of the author to a language conceived as the common view is not static – it is

always found in a state of movement and oscillation that is more or less alive . . .”

(1981: 302). This is to say that language is rooted in a verbal-ideological system

that indexes every generation at each social level, within varied cultural contexts

as having its own language, vocabulary, and accentual practices (Brutt-Griffler

2002; Nero 2006). In this way, dialogics accounts for how multimodal ensembles

in digitally produced texts are shiing and continually remixed in ephemeral dig-

ital environments. Further, it accounts for the language variety of the youth, like

the youth discussed in this study, and how their literacy practices are migrating

in the process of digitally enabled remixing. In the analysis, further explanation

will be given to demonstrate how dialogics features in the multimodal ensembles

of digitally produced texts.

For the youth featured in this paper, participation across discourse commu-

nities also meant having a mixed sense of linguistic identities that necessitated

migrations both physical and digital to navigate community affiliations. To ac-

count for the movement of the youth, their languages and their texts across dis-

course spaces, I also drew from notions of crossings (Rampton 1995). It takes intoaccount the ethnic dimensions of language and speech as less fixed and more

transitory in intergroup relations. For example, Rampton (1995: 317–321) noted

how the multiracial adolescents he studied in Britain participated in language

crossings to negotiate racial boundaries as they strived to assert their identities.

He found that the particular ways in which the diverse adolescents adopted lan-

guage crossings to contest racial boundaries resulted in anti-racist practices. In

this regard, he identifies social interaction as sites of linguistic exchange and of

transcultural encounter (Rampton 2002: 12). This social interactivity enabled the

development of a new dynamic of mixed youth sharing linguistic varieties as

a means for extending their communal affiliations (Rampton 1995: 224). In the

analysis, aspects of language crossings will be further examined to illustrate how

the youth and their dialogic text-making practices were migrating across dis-

course communities to negotiate their belonging and social affiliations, as well as

assert their diverse linguistic identities.

As the social and semiotic landscape continues to evolve and digital envi-

ronments expand meaning-making potentials, digitally enabled text making are

particularly productive spaces for exploring the nexus among urban youth, theirsocial language development and their multimodal literacy practices. Expanding

on notions of dialogics and crossings, I examine the digitally enabled text making

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Myrrh Domingo

of the youth and the dialogic features of their language crossings. I use the term

migrating literacies to explain their social shaping of technology as part of their

literacy practices and participation in hip-hop culture. A working definition of

migrating literacies identifies digitally enabled text making as having social,technological, and semiotic aff ordances for managing affiliations across dis-

course communities. Migrating literacies takes into consideration youth agency

and dialogic participation as predominant features of multimodal text making,

whereby youth remix and configure modes to embody social and cultural signifi-

cance. I assert that youth engaging in migrating literacies are building upon their

range of linguistic and cultural repertoire rather than shiing their practices to

only adopt the languages and literacies of a particular space.

Research method

To visibly display the dialogic language crossings of the participants in this study,

a multimodal approach will be used to analyze both the texts and text-making

processes of the youth. In the following section, I outline the multimodal analytic

process and provide an overview of the larger research context in relation to the

data to be sampled.

. Multimodal transcription

The analytic method to be applied in this paper adapts a previously outlined

multimodal approach aimed at displaying how expression of diverse identi-

ties is an inherent feature of youth design and circulation of digital video texts

(Domingo 2011, 2012). This objective necessitated the development of a multi-

modal transcription frame that would enable both a linear and layered reading of

Data reveals that the Pinoys enact migrating literacies to manage belonging and affiliation

across diverse discourse communities. I identify this practice as building upon their range of

linguistic and cultural repertoire rather than shiing their practices to only adopt the languages

and literacies of a particular context.

The multimodal analytic approach was adapted from the work of Hull and Nelson (2005),

which identified the semiotic capabilities of multimodality coupled with digital technologies

as producing new ways of meaning making for participants involved in the Digital Under-

ground Storytelling of You(th) or DUSTY. The adapted version aims to expand beyond Hull and

Nelson’s assertion that digitally enabled multimodality creates new meaning-making potential

by demonstrating how these new ways of making meaning also lend social and cultural insights

as particular to the digital textual production of the linguistically and culturally diverse youth.

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the digital data, revealing relational patterns among modes (see Figure 1). As dis-

cussed by Domingo (2011), the purposefully layered configurations of modes in

digital video provided social and cultural insights, which made it problematic to

analyze recorded speech, image, among other modes as disparate parts (Howes2009; Kress 2010; Wingstedt et al. 2010). Thus, the analytic approach is vested to

arrive at a comprehensive coding practice of temporal and spatial configurations

that visibly discern the social and cultural features of multimodal ensembles.

For example, this method revealed how Kyd, one of the youth featured in the

larger research study, coordinated his gaze and hand gestures with the rhythmic

patterns of his music to enact a hybrid hip-hop identity that mixed Filipino and

British cultures (Domingo 2011). Kyd made it possible for his audience to follow

Fig. 1: Multimodal transcription frame. This figure is a sample transcription frame from Kyd’s

music video Flow Ko. It illustrates how color codes were used to depict the interrelations among

modes using a multimodal analytic approach.

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Myrrh Domingo

the cultural shis in the music, through the rhythmic combination of sound,

music, gesture, words, among other modes. To demonstrate Kyd’s migration

across the discourses of Filipino, British, hip-hop culture and youth pop culture,

color codes were applied to distinguish modes in the transcription frame for hismusic video (cf. Figure 1). Each transcription frame contains a title bar to identify

the clip, theme of the segment, and time elapsed; time and image bars to indicate

the images that appeared temporally; and modes con fi guration bar to display the

interrelations among modes spatially.

In this paper, the same transcription frame will be applied for each digital

data analyzed. However, this paper will expand beyond the micro approach pre-

viously outlined by handling a larger collection of data. In addition to applying

the multimodal transcription frame for each data set, multimodal narratives

will also be created as a means for visually mapping relational patterns among

the selected literacy artifacts, observations, and interviews. This multimodal

narrative approach is informed by the work of Heath and Street (2008: 100) on

documenting language socialization with a comparative perspective to discern

patterns across cases in longitudinal data. Over time this multimodal approach

aff ords opportunities for comparative framing across cases. My modification con-

stituted data descriptions, observation, and reflexive notes derived from concep-

tual memos. This adaptation provides insight into the ordinary and non-ordinary

linguistic and cultural patterns of the Pinoys as they moved across the discoursecommunities of Filipino, British, hip hop, and youth pop culture.

. Procedures

I examine the language and literacy practices of my participants as well as their

uses of digital technologies not as isolated events but as an intricate process of

meaning making that unfolded over time and across social spaces, including

their online communities (Lemke 2010). Given that the Pinoys and their texts

were constantly migrating across spaces both digital and physical, it was in-

adequate to study their text making only in geographically situated spaces. While

ethnographic methods of language and literacies research (Dyson and Genishi

2005) provide insight into everyday practices as situated in social interaction,

this study extends examining these practices in digital environments by also ac-

counting for the amplification of semiotic resources and spatial orientations that

digital text making aff ords. For example, to visibly document the Pinoys’ social

uses of technology required adapting traditional ethnographies of languageand literacy research to also include ethnographies of media that emphasize a

shi from rooted-place orientations to more fluid configurations (Condry 2006;

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Dornfeld 1998). This ethnographic perspective is also combined with social and

semiotic theories, methods, and descriptions to account for the functions of texts

for the participants in this study (Bakhtin 1981; Kress 2010; Rampton 1995). It

makes evident how the design of multimodal ensembles and texts opens possi-bilities for navigating a mixed sense of belonging and diverse affiliations across

discourse communities.

.. Participants

The six urban youth featured in this study associate with one another as members

of a hip-hop group that includes affiliation with members across London and also

various parts of Europe, Asia, and North America. The group is drawn together

by their experiences as migrants to London and also given their affinity for their

Filipino heritage and interest in hip-hop culture. They referred to themselves as

the Pinoys and this article makes the same use of the term to demonstrate their

social affiliation and their cultural heritage.

The research focused on working with the six participants as they avidly used

digital technologies in their daily literacy activities. For example, the youth used

digitally enabled text-making platforms like Ulead, Photoshop, Cubase, and You-

Tube. While these platforms include a range of digital tools for graphic, video,and music editing, I refer to them as text-making platforms as engaging with them

oen resulted in a multimodal text. For this paper, I will focus on one of the main

participants, Aziatik, given his prolific engagement of text making using digital

technologies. During the three-year ethnography, Aziatik was among the main

participants who remained active in producing beats, lyrics, videos, and per-

forming his music. The consistency and frequency of my observations of his work

during this period enabled a more comprehensive understanding of his social

uses of technology to shape his languages and literacies into remixed cultural

artifacts. These oen materialized first as multimodal ensembles (e.g., music and

audio eff ects being edited in a digital workstation like Cubase, or graphic and

visual editing of modal resources in Ulead) and eventually as a coherent multi-

modal text (e.g., edited audio combined with an edited video that is uploaded

Just as my work moves away from a causal relationship between orality and writing, ethnog-

raphy of media moves away from causal eff ects of technology on the lives of people. Instead,

there is an emphasis on the social practice of media, which attends to understanding how people

manipulate technologies to attend to their own culture and ideology.

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Myrrh Domingo

on YouTube). A second participant, Lucky QBall, is also included as he provided

insight and feedback during my interview with Aziatik. Both participants empha-

sized the significance of hip-hop lyricism for preserving cultural ties to the Philip-

pines and strengthening their “skillz” for craing “culture songs.”

.. Data collection

Data are drawn from a three-year ethnography that traced the movement of six

urban youth, their ideas, and their texts across spaces (e.g., performance halls,

homes, social media platforms, among others). To arrive at salient patterns, this

ethnography drew upon observational fieldnotes, semi-structured interviews,

recorded videos, and literacy artifacts (Dyson and Genishi 2005). Interaction

with the Pinoys through their social networking sites (e.g., YouTube, MySpace,

Facebook) further enabled access into their social activities through their posted

photographs, digital updates, news feeds, and online communication. Further,

the proliferation of digital technologies as communicational and artistic tools in

the Pinoys’ daily lives alleviated intrusion of my own research tools into their

community. For example, digital video cameras and smart phones are regularly

stored in the participants’ bags to ensure that they could capture video footage or

still images should they encounter a setting that they consider appropriate for amusic video or their social networking sites.

.. Data analysis

For this paper, the following analyses are highlighted to track the Pinoys’ migrat-

ing literacies: (i) open-ended and thematic coding of fieldnotes and transcribed

video and audio interviews (Dyson and Genishi 2005); (ii) multimodal transcrip-

tion (Domingo 2011; Hull and Nelson 2005; Kress 2010); and (iii) comparative

framing across cases (Heath and Street 2008).

There are three types of videos that were collected for this ethnography: (i) youth-produced

videos, which are literacy artifacts created by the Pinoys (e.g., music videos of their songs);

(ii) community-circulated videos, which are videos of the Pinoys captured by the Filipino

community and publicly shared (e.g., YouTube); and (iii) researcher-recorded videos, which

document the literacies of the Pinoys as enacted in their daily lives (e.g., filmed observation of

music-video editing sessions or semi-structured interview videos from field visits).

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The data for this section draw from various renditions of Aziatik’s music titled

Pinoy Ako, including the lyrics for the song, beats for the music, video clips, andrelated images for the music video. There are also the recorded interviews that

were transcribed related to the Pinoys’ process of producing the overall multi-

modal text. The patterns that emerged from this data were also supported by

other data focused on other multimodal texts. Where necessary to illuminate the

findings with further examples, data were also drawn from other instances of text

making outside of Pinoy Ako. In combination, the data generated provide a view

of the Pinoys’ text making as collaborative and oen digitally enabled through

their social shaping of technology.

Pinoy Ako is a rap song lyrically composed by Aziatik in Tagalog, the native

language of the Philippines. He explained that the piece was composed in an

attempt to teach Filipino youth about their heritage. I opted to revisit this data

because it is a keen example of how migrating literacies is evident in digitally

enabled text making. Further, it demonstrates how using a range of modal re-

sources (e.g., sound, music, visuals, written words) to shape multimodal texts

can be used to navigate belonging across diff erent discourse communities.

. Migrating literacies and cultural remix of multimodal

ensembles

Aziatik describes himself as a “conscious lyricist” and studying his literacy prac-

tices shows how his participation in hip hop includes text making for educative

purposes. In examining Aziatik’s online and offline authorship, a prevalent pat-

tern in his text making is cultural remix for shaping multimodal ensembles that

link his affiliation across discourse communities. While notions of texts and text

making are increasingly linked with social interaction and ephemeral practices

such as writing in online environments (Domingo et al. forthcoming; Wade and

Moje 2001; Wheeler et al. 2008; Courtland and Paddington 2008), Aziatik’s texts

and text making diff ers from previous studies given the ways in which his prac-

tice integrated migrating literacies to achieve social and cultural purposes using

digitally enabled multimodal ensembles. For example, Aziatik and QBall con-

sider their design of music as creating “culture song.” In this way, text making for

For this article, I revisit my previous multimodal analysis (Domingo 2012) to now also include

other multimodal data relevant to the music video.

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Myrrh Domingo

the Pinoys is an educative endeavor that teaches the youth about their transna-

tional community affiliations, both in terms of cultural connections and linguis-

tic identities. As Aziatik states, “. . . we want something for them to yung maalala

nila yung culture nila” (‘remember their culture’). By examining the multimodalnarratives surrounding the production of Pinoy Ako, it is also evident that their

educative endeavors are grounded on the premise that the texts in schools do not

readily relate to the cultural histories of the youth as Filipinos and they are com-

pelled to compose music that makes the link more apparent.

While such practices have previously been described as a form of remixing

(Knobel and Lankshear 2008), their process varies to some extent given the ways

in which their cultural remixing also involved more purposeful modal configu-

rations of their affiliations using multimodal design. For example, the beat of

Tinikling as a traditional folk song was mindfully selected as a mode given its

historical ties to the Filipino culture. Using digitally enabled text making, Aziatik

and the Pinoys adeptly harnessed the semiotic resources of the digital platform

Cubase to edit the hip-hop beat for Pinoy Ako from a traditional Filipino folk song

called Tinikling . This involved manipulating a one-second clip from the introduc-

tion of the folk song using the digital beat-making tools to edit and layer it with

instruments such as harp, piano, and strings. In this way, the youth who may not

necessarily want to hear a folk song are more willing to listen given the fusion

of hip-hop rhythm and rhyme. Aziatik and Lucky QBall described how a songlike Pinoy Ako creates a lot of “hype” when performed live because of its catchy

beat and simple chorus; therefore, the youth not familiar with Tagalog can easily

learn the verses in Tagalog and comprehend its English translation with ease.

Such practices serve to encourage linguistic variety among youth members and

fans of their hip-hop group. Similarly, they describe the significance of making

music videos as another way to widen their audience base. They discussed up-

loading their music videos to a YouTube channel they created for their hip-hop

group which resulted in a larger download of mp3 music files in their Soundclick

profiles. Like Facebook and other social media, Soundclick is a social networking

music platform aimed at building community and interaction in online spaces.

Yet, what appears as multimodal texts on their YouTube and Soundclick plat-

forms makes use of diff erent modal configurations. As such, the notion of digi-

tally enabled text making varies in terms of the multimodal ensembles utilized

for distinctive social purposes.

Analysis of the videos on YouTube demonstrates that the ways in which affil-

iations are made discernible involves more visual and graphic displays of mem-

bership across discourse communities. A prime example would be the use of se-miotic resources to produce multimodal ensembles that express social relations.

Every music video that the youth produce and upload on YouTube includes diff er-

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ent renditions of logo animations that attribute the video source as belonging to

the Pinoys’ hip-hop production (cf. Figure 2). These logo animations that are col-

laboratively designed with other Pinoys in the group represent a new mixed sense

of their cultural affiliations materialized in the inextricable modal configurationsof images, written texts, colors, frames, and fonts. The Pinoys described how they

oen use the colors red, blue, yellow, and white because these colors comprise

the combination of the flags of the Philippines and the United Kingdom. The ma-

terialization of their social relations is further extended through digitally enabled

text making using digital graphic and video editing soware like Photoshop and

Ulead. For example, the central image names their hip-hop production group

(e.g., LSTV UK) and with video eff ects, the logo sometimes turns counter clock-

wise to shape a circle. Aziatik explained that it is supposed to represent the sun

in the Philippine flag. Similarly, the frames of the logo animations typically have

a blue and red line to connote the shape of a flag. As demonstrated by the data

analyzed, a predominant feature of their multimodal text making involves config-

uring modes to embody social and cultural significance. The various data for this

ethnography demonstrate a pattern of cultural remixing among the Pinoys’ text

making. This pattern, like those materialized in the logo animations across music

videos, resonates with their practice of migrating literacies. Specifically, it shows

how their digitally enabled text making functions as social, technological, and

Fig. 2: Cultural remix using multimodal ensembles. This screen shot of an animated logo

visually displays the range of modal resources (e.g., color, framing, written words) used by the

Pinoys to materialize belonging across diff erent discourse communities.

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Myrrh Domingo

semiotic resources for managing their language variety and cultural affiliation

across discourse communities.

The examples of the Pinoys’ texts and text making demonstrate instances

of linguistic identities materializing through multimodal meaning making.

Suchsocial relations have previously been theorized through the notion of language

loyalty (Rampton 1995). As Rampton (1995: 342) states, “. . . affiliation refers to

a connection between people and groups that are considered to be separate or

diff erent, whereas inheritance is concerned with the continuity between people

and groups who are felt to be closely linked.” This premise of language loyalty is

evidenced by the data for Pinoy Ako. Aziatik dely signaled his affiliation to the

discourse communities of Filipino, British, hip hop, and youth pop culture. It is

also an ideal example of language loyalty through inheritance given that it was

purposefully designed as an educative endeavor to teach about Filipino culture.

Migrating literacies as a framework for understanding social language de-

velopment of the youth in digitally enabled platforms is also made more discern-

ible through the notion of dialogics as shaping social language into one’s own

voice (Bakhtin 1981: 271). For example, Aziatik and the Pinoys are making mean-

ing through music and purposely selecting multimodal ensembles that integrate

their affiliations across discourse communities. They sometimes blend Tagalog

and English words and lyrics but also use other modal configurations previously

mentioned to articulate their belonging across communities like Filipino, British,hip hop, and youth pop culture. Amidst the social cadence of their cultural remix-

ing of sounds, voices, beats, rhythm, they also retain a new mixed sense of their

linguistic identities and transnational belonging. This concept of migrating liter-

acies is most notably visible in the second verse of Aziatik’s lyrics for Pinoy Ako

(lines 17–20). He metaphorically describes the orchestration of voices and sounds

that resonate with his Filipino affiliation while also calling forth the participation

of a new mixed sense of Filipino British youth.

()

Pang bansang tunog nadinig mo ng una.

The sound of my country will be heard first.

Aking y hahandog sa makabagong kultura.

I am off ering it to my new culture

upang di malimutan ang ating tradisyon

so I do not forget my tradition

Rampton (1995) argues that referencing speakers as merely being “native” or “non-native”

fails to recognize the dynamic social processes involved in negotiating their language loyalty in

multilingual settings.

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at ipapakilala sa bagong generation.

and I show it to the new generation.

During one of my field visits, Aziatik opened two boxes filled with lyrics; hun-dreds of loose pages containing rap verses he composed over the years. Analysis

of the writing demonstrates how Aziatik’s writing evolved through his partici-

pation in hip-hop lyricism and the digital text making associated with making

music. His earlier lyrics contained fewer internal rhyme patterns and oen lacked

the double metaphors his later writing integrated. In contrast to his earlier and

less developed lyrical compositions, Pinoy Ako moved beyond integration of

rhyme and metaphor to also include call and response mechanisms whereby the

rapper elicits the audience not only to listen but also to participate (Alim 2006:

79). For example, in the introduction and chorus Aziatik alternated the phrases,

“ Pinoy Ako y sigaw mo” ‘I am Filipino, shout it out’ and “Go, y sigaw mo” ‘Go,

shout it out’. The repetitive nature engages listeners to hear his cultural affiliation

but also calls upon the audience to respond by stating theirs. For Aziatik’s rap

song, the call and response mechanism served an educative purpose, teaching

listeners about Filipino cultural traditions; however, it also served a rhetorical

purpose in eliciting the Filipino youth to profess their linguistic inheritance and

cultural affiliation, when they are asked to shout back to Aziatik, “ Pinoy Ako” ‘I

am Filipino’.These examples make discernable how cultural remixing functions as a form

of migrating literacies for the Pinoys. Using technological and semiotic resources,

the youth were able to materialize their social relations in ways that more atten-

tively expressed their belonging across discourse spaces. In the following section,

migrating literacies is further discussed to examine changing principles of com-

position and authorship in relation to multimodal and digital text making.

. Migrating literacies and multimodal aff ordances of digital

text making

Current research describes digitally enabled text making as off ering authors in-

creased modal aff ordances for making meaning beyond the primary mode of writ-

ing (Bezemer and Kress 2008; Jewitt 2002). With this shi is a need to understand

how multimodal ensembles are made coherent using grammars particular to dig-

ital environments. Domingo, Jewitt, and Kress (forthcoming) name the increasing

practice of online writing as possessing design “modularity.” In contrast to print-based mediums like books, digital and online environments (e.g., videos, blogs)

are organized in less linear configurations (i.e., le to right and top to bottom). As

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such, text making includes more layout configuration for authors when making

meaning. The spatial design in these digital environments raises diff erent ques-

tions with regard to how multimodal ensembles are made coherent. For example,

what modes are used and are they the best suited to express the intended mean-ing? Whereas traditional print-based platforms make use of a linear reading path

for making meaning, digital environments such as those described in the Pinoys’

text making are more likely to make use of modular navigation to materialize

social relations in texts. Authorship in such spaces increasingly uses cohesive de-

vices such as framing, color scheme, font selection, among other modal resources

for making meaning (Domingo et al. forthcoming). In this way, the grammars of

digitally enabled text making are made apparent through the selected modal con-

figurations and not merely through the written words. Further, meaning making

is seen as socially shaped not only by the author but also by the readers of the text

given that the reading path is more flexibly designed for various entries.

Among the other media the Pinoys used for sharing their music and other

multimodal texts is a podcast. Aziatik created LS Radio, which at the time of con-

ducting this research included weekly downloadable shows. While the primary

digital environment is a podcast, the show could also be accessed on a website.

This website makes use of modular navigation as the overall multimodal text is

not restricted to a linear reading path. Similarly, other promotional websites that

the Pinoys created during the course of this research made use of frames, colors,images, videos, sounds, music, and written words as multimodal ensembles for

shaping social relations in digital environments. In terms of migrating litera-

cies, these patterns that appeared in other digital texts like their music videos

also became apparent in the design of the websites. For example, the choice of

color cohesively linked the range of multimodal texts embedded within the web-

site (e.g., digital videos and photographs). The same could be said of the use of

sounds and sound eff ects. Some of the sound eff ects in Pinoy Ako was also used

in the weekly podcasts and functioned much like the introductory logo animation

in the videos. In this way, the grammar of their text making extended beyond

the use of traditional linguistic features for cohesively shaping multimodal texts

across spaces.

Their digitally enabled text making also extended the ways in which they

blended traditional linguistic features of coherence with multimodal grammat-

ical features (Mills 2009; Pahl 2007). This is evident in a multimodal transcrip-

tion of Aziatik performing Pinoy Ako (cf. Figure 3). Multimodal transcription re-

vealed four predominant modes that Aziatik engaged: image, gesture, speech,

and music. These four modes made it possible for Aziatik to engage his languageaffiliation across discourse communities.

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While the discussion in this section primarily references literature that

focuses on the shi in coherence when viewing online and digital environments,

I draw from data that makes use of both online and offline practices to show the

confluence of traditional and digital grammars of migrating literacies. This de-

picts how the youth and their texts move across online and offline spaces in less

bounded and more fluid ways. Some of the data analyzed focuses on observations

of Aziatik before he had completed recording the entire song; therefore, he was

yet to memorize all of the lyrics. As such, his performance involved reading the

lyrics on the screen as he rapped to the remixed beat playing on the computer.

Aziatik began the performance by invoking hybrid sounds and voices that an-nounced his social and cultural affiliations. He played the hybridized Tinikling

beat, adjusted the computer volume, and called forth the lyrics on screen. Before

he began, he said to me, “Ito lyrics nya, te” (‘Here are the lyrics, sis’). As his pri-

mary audience, he awaited my acknowledgement before he started rapping. In

this regard, Aziatik was signaling the multimodal ensemble of a dialogic text by

beckoning a call and response (Alim 2006: 79).

The Pinoys did not always use my first name. They sometimes referred to me as ate ‘sister’ or

te ‘sis’. In the Philippine culture, elders – whether family or friends or even acquaintances – are

oen called sister or brother as a sign of respect.

Fig. 3: Grammar of digitally enabled text making. This partial transcription displays the four

modes that Aziatik engaged to achieve coherence in text making: image, gesture, speech, and

music. These modes extended his grammar through the inextricable configuration of

multimodal ensembles as textual features.

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Myrrh Domingo

As he rapped in Tagalog, his grammar extended linguistic features to also

include more visual grammar. For example, he used gesture as part of a multi-

modal ensemble to extend meaning making beyond use of words. Specifically, his

modal configuration of gestures is inextricably intertwined with his use of tonalsemantics and poetics, which consist of “talk-singing, repetition and alliterative

word play, intonational contouring and rhyme [. . .]” (Alim 2006: 84–86). Azia-

tik employed a multilayered internal and external rhyme scheme that included

linguistic and gestural couplings (Kress and Van Leeuwen 2001). In each line,

the word before the gesture and the last word of each line are linked linguistic

metaphors tied together by Aziatik’s gesturing (lines 13–16). While the English

translation does not vividly display the connection in the way that his Tagalog

lyrics richly make visible their inextricable interrelation, it is still useful to view

the translation as contextual background. For example, Aziatik states that his

birth language is reminiscent of a burning candle (lines 14 and 15). The word wika

has a double meaning in Tagalog. It could be translated to mean the wick of a

candle but it could also translate as ‘language’ or ‘dialect’. When studying the

multimodal ensemble of this coupling with the hip-hop beat, there is also his use

of gestures that is significant to his meaning making. Because wika ‘wick’ is most

oen associated with candila ‘candle’, it is not as commonly used by the Filipino

youth to refer to language or dialect. Given this distinction, Aziatik purposely

points to his mouth when he says “wika” and gestures aer “candila” with hisright hand, what appeared to be the flame of a candle rising up. He is demonstrat-

ing the double meaning he is making and also sharing an extended meaning of

the word wika to those who may not be familiar with its second definition.

() Wala man sa pinas ((raises right hand up)) tinataas ang bandila.

He carries the flag of his birth country even if not there.

Gamit ko ang wika ((points to mouth)) ang pinapalang dila

I use my birth language

parang candila ((gestures with right hand)) ako ay nagaapoy.

like a candle I burn bright.

Patulo sasabihin mabuhay ang Pinoy ((raises right hand up)).

As I burn I cry long live the Filipinos.

By coupling speech and gesture and using these modes as part of a larger multi-

modal text, Aziatik moves beyond traditional conventions of grammar to shape a

lyrical experience that more inclusively attends to the transcultural experiences

of the multilingual youth. Digitally enabled text making provided Aziatik and thePinoys modal aff ordances for designing multimodal texts that more fully repre-

sented their social relations across discourse communities.

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Conclusion

Text for the urban youth in this study functioned beyond making meaning using

written words. They shaped multimodal ensembles using digitally enabled textmaking to express their new mixed sense of belonging across discourse com-

munities. Their social relations were materialized through purposeful design

of modal configurations. Another feature of text and text making that demon-

strates the cultural significance of modal aff ordances is how such practices en-

abled migrating literacies across discourse communities. Rather than having

to shi their discourses to fit the specific linguistic and social communities in

which they participated, the Pinoys were able to shape texts that could attend to

their transnational notions of belonging. Aziatik’s Pinoy Ako is one among the

multimodal texts that off ers insight into the social and cultural significance of

migrating literacies. Examining cultural remix and grammatical features of the

Pinoys’ multimodal ensembles makes discernable the ways in which the youth

today, like Aziatik, are cultivating migrating literacies that more readily prepares

them to navigate across cultural and linguistic boundaries in an increasingly di-

verse world. Continued examination of text and text making has the potential to

contribute to evolved understandings of shiing notions of authorship and com-

position in digital environments, and how such practices foster new ways of ma-

terializing social relations and affiliations. Given the vast migration of people andtexts in our global and digital world, such insights are increasingly necessary to

expand our understanding of how the youth navigate belonging across discourse

communities.

By studying Aziatik’s text Pinoy Ako and the text making involved in the

multimodal renditions of this music, this article off ered a multimodal analytic ap-

proach for examining migrating literacies. The method also presented new ways

of accounting for the multimodal ensembles in text making that expands under-

standing of culture from rooted-space orientations to more fluid configurations

(Condry 2006; Dornfeld 1998). To this end, continued multimodal analysis of

texts and text making across digital and physical spaces is needed to more aptly

document the adaptive ways in which the urban youth are shaping languages,

literacies, and technologies for social and educative purposes.

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Myrrh Domingo

Appendix: Aziatik’s lyrics for Pinoy Ako

Pinoy Ako, y sigaw mo.

I am Filipino, shout it out. Pinoy Ako,

I am Filipino

Pinoy Ako, y sigaw mo.

I am Filipino, shout it out.

Pinoy Ako.

I am Filipino.

Go, y sigaw mo.

Go, shout it out.

Pinoy Ako.

I am Filipino.

Pinoy Ako, Pinoy Ako,

I am Filipino, I am Filipino,

Pinoy Ako.

I am Filipino.

Aziatik, batang lumaki sa balibago

Aziatik, the kid that grew up in Balibago

pag hawak na ang micropono dala ay lagging bago when he holds the microphone he carries something new

ng mga ka taga na hindi basta basta

words that are not simple

kahit barya ang dala ma porma paring kumasta

even with no money he still carries himself with dignity

Wala man sa pinas tinataas ang bandila.

He carries the flag of his birth country even if not there.

Gamit ko ang wika ang pinapalang dila

I use my birth language

parang candila ako ay nagaapoy.

like a candle I burn bright.

Patulo sasabihin mabuhay ang Pinoy.

As I burn I cry long live the Filipinos.

Pang bansang tunog nadinig mo ng una.

The sound of my country will be heard first.

Aking y hahandog sa makabagong kultura.

I am off ering it to my new culture upang di malimutan ang ating tradisyon

so I do not forget my tradition

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at ipapakilala sa bagong generation.

and I show it to the new generation.

Ingay ang bitaw parang tunog ng saraw

The sound is loud like that of the sun dance Dahandahan gumalaw parang sakay sa kalabao

Moving slowly like riding a carabao

Mula Luzon, Visayas, at Mindanao,

From Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao

Y taas ang kamay at iyong y sigaw,

Raise your hands and voices and say,

Now shake, shake this is the anthem,

Y galaw ang katawan, at sumama ka samin,

Move your body and join us,

Y sigaw mo Pilipino ako, y taas ang kamay at sumigaw sa bayo,

Shout I’m a Filipino, raise your hand and shout with the rhythm,

Now shake shake.

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Myrrh Domingo

Bionote

Myrrh Domingo is Lecturer in Contemporary Literacy at the Institute of Education,

University of London. Her recent projects and publications are focused on analy-sis of social media practices, online research, technology mediated teaching and

learning, and multimodal perspectives in literacy.

Domingo 2014 Migrating-literacies

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