Semiotics

Readings: Theory Text Ch. 5, 3:5, 3:6

 Semiotics on-line
Semiotics as the study of signs (very basic definition)
Other useful terminology
semantics: relationship of signs to what they stand for;
syntactics (or syntax): formal or structural relations between signs;
pragmatics: relation of signs to interpreters
Resources:
Daniel Chandler Semiotics for Beginners
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/semiotic.html
See also: Course website links on WebDav
 Language (F. de Saussure)

not just a naming-

process linking
words & things
 Linguistic Signs
Words and language link a signifier to concepts and sound-images
sound-images have two parts : Signified, signifier
Simplified Semiotic Model

Semiotic Domains and Non-Textual Technologies

From Design
by Barrie Carter and Duncan Knight (2008).
Peirces Model
Complex Model
 Sign (C.S. Peirce)
Sign is something
which stands to
somebody for
something
(representamen)
Creates another
sign (mental image)
or interpretant that
has like content
NOT like this
picture
 Semiotic & Analysis of Visual Images
Zhang Os series Daddy & Me
signifiers? (shown, not shown)
What is signified
 Types of Signs (Peirce)
Icon
Index
Symbol
 Icon
only is a sign if the object exists
Icon: has meaning
even if the object
doesnt exist

From M. McArthur
Reading Buddhist Art

Yamandejia or Yamantaka (Terminator of

Death--Victory over evil) (From M.
McArthur Reading Buddhist Art)
 Yamantaka
Thangka
Textile
Tibet/Xizang
C. 1644-1911(?)
The John C. and Susan L. Huntington
Archive of Buddhist and Related Art, The
Ohio State University
Court Scene: Picton Trial
 Index
Connects both with the
object and with the person
for whom it serves as a sign
Three characteristics
No significant resemblance to
object
Refer to singularities
Direct attention by
compulsion
Does not depend on
association by resemblance or
intellectual activities
Video clip (Cai Guo-Qiang
discussing Gunpowder
Paintings & Reading a
Painting--from Art:21, Art in
the Twenty-first Century,
Season Three)
 Symbol
Associated with objects (or
ideas) by habit or
convention without regard
for original selection
Pride Flag
Che Guevara--revolution
Uncropped photo
Nike Che
 Levels of Meaning (Roland Barthes)
Informational
(communication of
message)

Symbolic (semiologies of
various kinds, common
lexicon of meanings, closed
sense, obvious meaning(s))

Signifying/Obtuse (extends
beyond culture, signifier
without signified, outside
language, disturbs,
indifferent to the story,
against nature, free of
narrative, subversive,
DIFFERENT, point where
another language begins)
Ivan the Terrible Screen Shot
Ordinary fascism image
screen shot
 Signs,
Meanings
& events
(Make Bal)

Rethinking
encounters with
signs and
meanings
Narrativity vs.
scenes from
everyday life
with no
iconographic
expectations
(maybe)
Nailhole
NailHole
 How do we know what viewers will respond to?

Differences
between
verbal and
visual texts
Fundamental
differences
between
verbal and
visual reality
(or ways of
seeing)
Work-reader
interaction
 A picture is worth a thousand
words
New skepticism about
photography and truth
BUT.persistence of
belief in visual images
Video of tasar use by police
and death of R. Robert
Dziekanski at Vancouver
International Airport:
http://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=_3Ggpme5nUA
Larry Berg, CEO of the Vancouver Airport Authority, points to a
map showing the customs area controlled by the Canada Border
Services Agency.
(CBC)
Facts, Truth and Design (Kress and Van Leeuwen)
 Theories and Images
(Paul Gilroy)

Denotations
reading visual
representations &
text
Critical discourse
analysis
August Sander--Men in Suits
(John Berger)
P. Diddy (200-2008)
Hipster
 Beautiful Women

Ad and Illustration for article about White Trash aesthetics by M. Talbot, Getting Credit for being White New York Times
Magazine. Vol. 147 (Nov. 30 1997)
Jeong Mee Joon: Girl & Boy babies and
their things
 Notions of semiotics useful for analyzing
visual challenges to conventions

Marcel Duchamp. Fountain, original (left) and recreations of lost 1917 Original
Manet Olympia
Yasamasu Morimura
 Communication & Semiotics (Signs &
Codes)
Sign: something that stands for
something else in a system of
signification (language, images,
etc.) (M. Levine 2005)
Code: the relational system that
allows a sign to have meaning, the
social organization of meanings into
binary oppositions, hierarchies, and
differential systems.