Event Construal through Spatial Relations in Science Documentaries: Language and Image

Information construal in cinematic discourse employs different semiotic modes; meanwhile, their variance is yet to be explored. The study is aimed at exploring spatial event construal in the language and image modes of science documentaries. We hypothesise that three major event types - environmental events, human-environment interaction events and interpersonal interaction events - employ different spatial construal patterns in language and image, which results from mode allowances and constraints. To verify the hypothesis, we use spatial image schema topology while identifying the image schemas in the lexical and grammatical structure of language and in the layout of the objects, the manner of their movement and interaction in image. The research data include 353 events in single clauses and in shots extracted from two English-language science documentaries. The results show the prevalence of the source-path-goal schema in both semiotic modes, which consequently prevents it from differentiating between event types both within and across the modes. The schemas scale, straight, and near-far display a tendency to differentiate between events; however, no significant distinctions were observed, presumably due to the ontological nature of events as well as the semiotic characteristics of the modes. Additionally, the study reveals that spatial construal of events can follow parallel alignment, commonly with the schemas source-path-goal, contact, near-far, and complementary alignment with the schemas centre-periphery, scale, up-down, front-back, straight, left-right, which reflects a complex nature of inter-semiotic relations in cinematic discourse. The findings of the article contribute to the understanding of event construal in the multimodal discourse of science documentaries.