Discourses and Models of Intermediality

Abstract

In his article "Discourses and Models of Intermediality" Jens Schröter discusses the question as to what relations do different discourses pose between different "media." Schröter identifies four models of discourse: 1) synthetic intermediality: A "fusion" of different media to supermedia, a model with roots in the Wagnerian concept of Gesamtkunstwerk with political connotations, 2) formal (or transmedial) intermediality: a concept based on formal structures not "specific" to one medium but found in different media, 3) transformational intermediality: a model centered around the representation of one medium through another medium. Model 3) leads to the postulate that transformational intermediality is not located in intermediality but in processes of representation and thus transformational intermediality is the flip side of model 4) ontological intermediality: a model suggesting that media always already exist in relation to other media. Thus, model 4) suggests that there are no single media but that intermedial relations take place ubiquitously. Schröter comes to the conclusion that one should not start with definitions of media and then discuss intermediality but the opposite: The intermedial field (including the intermedial processes on writing about intermediality) produces definitions of media. © Purdue University.