The multimodal dimension of claims in food packaging

Despite the proliferation of regulations governing health and content claims on food packages, customers continue to be confused and sometimes deceived. One reason for this is that most regulations adopt a rather restricted, language-centric view of what a claim is, a view that focuses on how claims represent reality as opposed to what claims “do”, the kinds of actions and human relationships they make possible. This paper introduces a perspective on package claims that takes account of their performative and multimodal dimensions. The pragmatic force of a food package, it argues, always depends on multiple conditions such as the identities of manufactures, retailers and customers, the conditions under which packages are encountered, and the way multiple semiotic modes such as language, graphics, colors, fonts, the shape of packages, and even the shape and texture of the food itself interact. The multimodal dimension of claims is not limited to the intratextual links among different modes and different materialities on the package, but also the intertextual links among the elements on the package and other modes and materialities in the environments in which customers make purchasing decisions. A multimodal view of package claims attempts to understand how claims are situated within specific material contexts, specific social actions, and specific social practices, and how they function to index social identities for manufacturers, retailers, customers, and even government officials who make and enforce regulations governing their use.