The present paper examines patterns of relatedness in exchanges built by the video responses to one of YouTube “Most Responded” videos. The analysis shows the presence of a diversified range of patterns, as a result of the interactants’ creative use of the video response option, which affords text-production through copy-and-paste. The results trace a continuum from fully cohesive and coherent exchanges to exchanges presenting no clues of relatedness, with a great variation in-between the two poles. Videos often respond incoherently, disregarding the meaning, diverting from the topic or foregrounding a background element of the video they respond to. In other cases, responses are created through the reuse of previously made texts, so that their recontextualization reconfigures or scatters cohesive ties, producing a marked implicitness in the exchange. Interactants accept (and at times praise) incoherent and non-cohesive semiotic chains thus acknowledging and reinforcing emerging conventions in video-interaction. Interaction through videos seems driven by the participants’ interested reinter- pretation, transformation, and recontextualization of texts, thus shaping distinc- tively the requirements for successful communication in the semiotic space.
What I can (re)make out of it: Incoherence, non-cohesion, and re-interpretation in YouTube video responses
ADAMI, Elisabetta
2015-01-01
Abstract
The present paper examines patterns of relatedness in exchanges built by the video responses to one of YouTube “Most Responded” videos. The analysis shows the presence of a diversified range of patterns, as a result of the interactants’ creative use of the video response option, which affords text-production through copy-and-paste. The results trace a continuum from fully cohesive and coherent exchanges to exchanges presenting no clues of relatedness, with a great variation in-between the two poles. Videos often respond incoherently, disregarding the meaning, diverting from the topic or foregrounding a background element of the video they respond to. In other cases, responses are created through the reuse of previously made texts, so that their recontextualization reconfigures or scatters cohesive ties, producing a marked implicitness in the exchange. Interactants accept (and at times praise) incoherent and non-cohesive semiotic chains thus acknowledging and reinforcing emerging conventions in video-interaction. Interaction through videos seems driven by the participants’ interested reinter- pretation, transformation, and recontextualization of texts, thus shaping distinc- tively the requirements for successful communication in the semiotic space.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
