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Saussure (1857-1913)
semiology

• A sign is a whole
consisting of a
“Material
singnifier” and an
“Immaterial
signified”

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 • The cat is running after the mouse

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 Denotation and
Connotation

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 The pragmatic dimension
of semiology

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 Language as a system of
differences

• The signified of a
verbal sign is
determined by its
opposition to, or
its difference from,
other verbal signs

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 Peirce’s model of
Triangular Relation
The idea of
unlimited semiosis: it
is impossible to
determine the final
and absolute
meaning of sings

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 Symbol/symbolic

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 Icon/iconic

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 Index/indexical

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 Media are coded with
sings

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 It is the context in which the sign
appears that determines what
connotations are relevant

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 Media (and signs in general) are polysemic
("poly-" [many] "semic" [of or related to
meaning]): open to many interpretations

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 Genres as codes

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 Syntagms and Paradigms

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 Semiotics and
interpretation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROn_9302UHg

martedì 26 ottobre 2010

 Types of Readings
• Preferred or Dominant: a reading which may not have been the
result of any conscious intention on the part of the author(s)) - in
such a stance the code seems 'natural' and 'transparent';

• Oppositonal: the readers’ social situation places them in a

directly oppositional relation to the preferred or dominant
reading because they do not share it

• Negotiated: the reader only partly shares the text's connotative

meaning and sometimes modifies it to reflect their own position
and experiences
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 The reader as
constitutive in text’s

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 Authorship: a historical
invention

• 'I don't have the feeling that I write my books,

I have the feeling that my books get written
through me... I never had, and still do not
have, the perception of feeling my personal
identity. I appear to myself as the place where
something is going on, but there is no "I", no
"me"' (cited in Wiseman & Groves 2000, 173).

martedì 26 ottobre 2010

 'the death of the author' and
'the birth of the reader'

martedì 26 ottobre 2010

 Intertextuality prepares us for the text, and
prepares the text for us, so that any resulting
meaning, power, or effects that the text may be
seen to possess are in part a function of the
already read (Gray 2006)

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 Paratext

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 About intertextuality:
Reading deeper into Alice

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 The Mad Hatter and The
Cheshire Cat

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 How might a post-
structuralist respond to
the claim that something
might be lost in the
Burton’s version of Alice?

martedì 26 ottobre 2010

 Post modernism
Nothing is absolute.
There is no great 'Truth'.
Everything is a 'text' to be deconstructed.
There are no 'Grand Narratives' of how to explain
society. All research findings must be open to change.

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 Representations

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 Media Representations
An anthropological definition of
culture: "whole and distinctive
way of life" (Barker, 40) …

"art is not a copy of the world but

a specific socially constructed
representation" (Barker, 48).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIn8mPy5_jA

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 Key Questions about Specific Representations
• What is being represented?

• How is it represented? Using what codes? Within what genre?

• How is the representation made to seem 'true', 'commonsense' or 'natural'?

• What is foregrounded and what is backgrounded? Are there any notable absences?

• Whose representation is it? Whose interests does it reflect? How do you know?

• At whom is this representation targeted? How do you know?

• What does the representation mean to you? What does the representation mean to others?
How do you account for the differences?

• How do people make sense of it? According to what codes?

• With what alternative representations could it be compared? How does it differ?

• A reflexive consideration - Why is the concept of representation problematic?

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 Gap of Representation

True meaning media representations

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 Stereotypes
A stereotype is a standardized, usually oversimplified,
mental picture or attitude that is held in common by
members of a group. From Mediation by Steve Baker

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 Eowyn

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QgcV_U8cwI&feature=player_embedded

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 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YI7Q0ZGvIc

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 Do the right thing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwjHoSM6lhY

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