Multimodality : An EFL textbook comparison using multimodal discourse analysis

Abstract: This essay aims to compare two EFL (English as a Foreign Language) textbooks by using a multimodal discourse analysis in order to find out how EFL textbooks have changed in design and visually. In this essay the textual content is treated as one of several pillars making up design, this essay is interested in the visual changes. This analysis is done using two EFL textbooks with twenty years in between them, both are used in the same school by different teachers. A study like this is going to be published later this year but that study includes three subjects (English being one of them) and starts with textbooks from the 1930s up until now. In this essay, two chapters of each textbook will be looked at  in a closer analysis to represent each textbook; every page is analyzed without first reading the text. The conclusion of this essay is that the written communication still seem to be the most credible of the different communicative methods of making meaning, however, it is no longer the only credible way of making meaning.