Andrew Salway a'salwaysurrey'ac'uk

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Semiotics Some Points of Reference for the
Workshop

• Andrew Salway (a.salway_at_surrey.ac.uk)
• Dept. of Computing, University of Surrey
• 29 June 2000
• Workshop on Computational Semiotics for New Media

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Outline

• Semiotics, Semioticians Subject Matter
• Sign Typologies
• Semiosis
• Paradigms and Syntagms
• Aesthetic Frameworks
• Multimedia Communication

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Semiotics

• Science of signs
• Signification systematic, structural aspects of
  signs meaning-bearing potential
• Communication transactional aspects of signs
  cf. Jakobsons codes and messages, source and
  destination, channel and context

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Semioticians

• Saussure ? Hjelmslev ? Greimas, Metz and Eco
  structuralism content-expression
  (signified-signifier) linguistic bias paradigms
  and syntagms
• Peirce ? Morris rich typologies of signs
  emphasis on process of semiosis (syntactic,
  semantic, pragmatic dimensions) semiotic
  typology of discourse
• Eco toward a logic of culture a theory of
  codes and a theory of sign production
• Sebeok how the body interacts with the mind to
  produce signs, messages, thought and ultimately
  cultural behaviour

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Subject Matter of Semiotics ENC

• it can deal with any object of knowledge
• (Eco anything that can be used to lie)
• NB. exchange of information through machines
  conceived by humans, such as computers,
  necessarily involves signs and semiotic processes

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Areas of research belonging to semiotics E

• Zoosemiotics, olfactory signs, tactile
  communication, coding of tastes, paralinguistics,
  medical semiotics, kinesis and proxemics, musical
  codes, formalized languages, written languages,
  natural languages, visual communication??,
  systems of objects, plot structure, text theory,
  cultural codes, aesthetic texts, mass
  communication, rhetoric

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Headings in Handbook of Semiotics N

• Language and Language-Based Codes verbal
  communication, sign language, paralanguage
• Text semiotics literature, poetry, theatre and
  drama, narrative, myth, ideology, theology
• Nonverbal communication gesture, body language,
  kinesics, facial signals, gaze, tactile
  communication, proxemics, chronemics
• Aesthetics and visual communication aesthetics,
  music, architecture, objects, image, painting,
  photography, film, comics, advertising

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The Sign N

• Saussure signifier-signified arbitrary and
  conventional signs (mentalistic)
• Peirce
• Representatum (perceptible object) stands to
  somebody, for something
• Object in some respect
• To create an interpretant itself a sign
• Categories of Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness

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Sign Typologies N

• 27 possible combinations
• Of the representatum qualisign, sinsign,
  legisign,
• Of relation to object icon, index, symbol,
• Of relation to interpretant rheme, dicent,
  argument
• Ten principal classes of sign, e.g.
• Rhematic Iconic Qualisign a feeling of red
• Rhematic Iconic Sinsign an individual
  diagram
• Dicent Indexical Sinsign a weathercock
• Rhematic Symbolic Legisign a common noun
• Argument Symbolic Legisign a syllogism

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Semiosis

• Process in which the sign has a cognitive effect
  on the interpreter N42
• Communication and signification two classes of
  semiosis? N168
• Infinite Semiosis How can one represent this
  type of semantic universe? E ?
• Ross Quillians computational model of semantic
  memory.

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Paradigms and Syntagms C

• Semiotics as an approach to structural analysis
  of texts
• Saussurean semiotics signs are organised into
  codes by
• Paradigms (selection of signs)
• Syntagms (combination of signs)

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Aesthetic Frameworks

• Fine Art (Panofsky) pre-iconographic
  iconographic iconological
• Film (Metz) physical diegetic cinematic
  connotative sub-textual
• Dance (Adshead-Lansdale) description
  discernment of form interpretation evaluation

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Multimedia Communication ENC

• a special type of communication characterised
  by its media structure, though not explained by
  merely adding the descriptive results of a
  separate analysis of each medium
• multichanneled and polysensual system of signs,
  signals or codes
• it is not, clearly, a single-levelled and
  homogenous series of signs or signals that
  emerges, but rather a weave of radically
  differentiated modes of expression cf. Theatre
  Semiotics (Elam) 29 sets of codes.
• differences in semiotic status of different
  strands
• temporal and spatial fracture of the channels
• relationships between co-occurring media
• translatability between sign systems

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Multimedia Communication ENC

• Transmission Channels light-waves sound-waves
  biochemical thermodynamic electromagnetic
• Senses acoustic olfactory gustatory
  hapticaloptical
• Modes icons symbols indices (symptoms
  impulses)
• Codes verbal paraverbal non-verbal
  socio-perceptive psycho-physical
• Signal Processing ?? Social/cultural systems
• Physical ?? Conceptual
• Perception ?? Cognition

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Summary Five Notions of Semiotics ENC

• The syntactic, semantic and pragmatic properties
  of the sign
• A theory or discipline studying these properties
• Theories about how to study these properties
• Methods method of formalization method of
  language analysis method of interpretation
• Application use semiotics to analyze some
  fragment of reality, e.g. arts, architecture,
  film fashion, folk customs, etc.

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Summary ENC

• Semiotics, depending on whether it is defined as
  a type of research or as a doctrine, as a theory
  or as a set of methods, can use the tools of
  several sciences or doctrines, from logic and
  metamathematics to linguistics, aesthetics, and
  all the social sciences.
• But, it must refer constantly and consistently
  to any of its possible objects through sign and
  sign functioning, using methods implying a theory
  of signs and sign function

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Direction of Semiotics?

• ?? Tendency towards discussions of aesthetics,
  literary /cultural theory, psychoanalysis
• ?? To the neglect of explicating information
  processing / cognitive aspects

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Short Bibliography

• E Eco, Umberto (1976). A Theory of Semiotics.
  Indiana Uni Press.
• ENC Sebeok, Thomas A. (ed. 1994). An
  Encyclopedic Dictionary of Semiotics. Mouton de
  Gruyter.
• S Sebeok, Thomas A. (1994). Signs an
  introduction to semiotics. Uni of Toronto Press
• N Nöth, Winfried (ed. 1990). Handbook of
  Semiotics. Indiana Uni Press.
• For reference
• C Semiotics for Beginners, Daniel Chandler.
  http//www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/
• Semiotics. University of Colorado at Denver
• http//www.cudenver.edu/mryder/itc_data/semiotic
  s.html