Semiotics is the theory of the production and interpretation of meaning. It's basic principle is that meaning is made by the deployment of acts and objects which function as "signs" in relation to other signs. Systems of signs are constituted by the complex meaning-relations that can exist between one sign and another, primarily relations of contrast and super ordination/subordination (e.g. class/member, whole/part). Signs are deployed in space and time to produce "texts", whose meanings are construed by the mutually contextualizing relations among their signs.
There are two major traditions in European semiotics: F. de Saussure, semiology; and C.S. Peirce, semiotics. Saussure's approach was a generalization of formal, structuralist linguistics; Peirce's was an extension of reasoning and logic in the natural sciences.
No comments:
Post a Comment