Semiotics lecture

semiotic theory 

• semiotic is the 'science' of studying signs 
• code - a system of symbols or signs
• sign - signifier + signified, the relation between them is arbitrary signs are organised into code
• signifier - uttered by the sender
• signified - what the signifier creates in the head of the receiver
• arbitrary
• denotation - literal meaning
• connotation - cultural associations
• myth
• how the process of persuasion and affect works
• nothing innate about language, socially conditioned
• red signifies stop in a British traffic light system it doesn't innately make us stop
• 1917 Ferdinand de saussure - how does language as a system work, trying to understand the rules of language 
• now what things mean (symbolism) but how things obtain the meaning that they do
• structuralism - everything in the world has at its core underlying logic or order 
• post modernism obliterated structuralism
• bathes - signs signify in two different levels, the conscious level - the obvious meaning of something and the unconscious - the layers of meaning you forget about 
• we can unravel meaning in language by understanding the written and spoken material
• we can unravel meaning in cultural practises if we understand culture as operating like
• our whole existence is about socialising us into codes, they are found in all forms of ccultural prctice
• it has to operate on a pre conscious level or our brains would explode 
• signs are organised into codes in two ways paradigms and syntagms
• paradigm - a set of signs from which one is to be chose
• syntagm - the message into which the chosen signs are to be combined
• a code is an overarching cultural system
• a classic paradigm is the alphabet, we select leters to create words which only have meaning in our shared culture 
• examples of paradigm
  - changing shot in TV
  - typefaces
  - colour of front door
• where there is choice there is meaning and the meaning of what was chosen is determined by the meaning of what was not
• syntagmatic analysis - seeks to establish the 'surface structure' of a text an the relationship between its parts, reveals the rules underlying the production and interpretation of texts
• when we percieve all of these messages we can choose to accept them (dominant reading) reject them (negotiated reading) or draw our own meaning from them