Semiotics

The study of symbols and signs

Written by:
Magdalena Piszczek
Monika Kusber
Introduction

As one may say, semiotics as a scientific term may be described as the theory and to
be more precise also study of symbols and signs. The study refers especially to signs as
elements of language or other systems of communication. The method of semiotics or
semiotic analysis exploits the perspective of semiotic theory to enrich our understanding of
particular signs.
Ask one for a definition of ‘semiotics’ and what you get is basically a blank look.
Indeed, it is extremely hard to offer simple definition which is of much use. Semiotics could
be anywhere and the shortest definition is that it is the study of signs. But to be honest, that
doesn't leave us- enquirers much wiser.
Semiotics is not widely institutionalized as an academic discipline. It is a field of study
involving many different theoretical stances and methodological tools. A general semiotic
theory will be considered powerful according to its capacity for offering an appropriate formal
definition for every sort of sign function, whether it has already been described and coded or
not.1 Semiotics is usually divided into three branches, which include: - Semantics: studies the
relation between signs and the things to which they refer, so their meaning; - Syntactics:
conducts research on relations among signs, particularly in formal structures; - and
Pragmatics: which studies the relation between signs and the effects they have on their users.
Well, as it turns out it is possible, indeed, to conceive of a science which actually
studies the role of signs as part of social life. However, it does not yet exist, there is a place
ready for it in advance. It would form part of social psychology, and hence of general
psychology and it would investigate the nature of signs and the laws governing them.2
Although an idea of 'sign' itself has been intensively discussed and explored in western
philosophy at least since Plato and the Stoics, a special area of activities or interests which
would be devoted to the general study of signs did not emerge until the beginning of the
twentieth century. The one that appeared became variously known as 'semeiotic', 'semiotic',
'significs' (Peirce, 1977), 'semiology', 'signology' (Saussure, 1916) and 'semiotics' (Sebeok,
1976).3 All these terms have in common its origin, as they are derived from the ancient Greek
word for 'sign': semeion and also its Latin equivalent signum.

1
Umberto Eco, A theory of semiotics (First Midland Book Edition, 1979) , p. 5.
2
Chandler Daniel. “Semiotics for beginners” 2007. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/ (25 Feb
2011).
3
Bouissac Paul. "Saussure’s legacy in semiotics." The Cambridge Companion to Saussure. Ed. Carol Sanders.
Cambridge University Press, 2004. Cambridge Collections Online. Cambridge University Press. (18 February
2011).

2
 Semiotics began to become a major approach to cultural studies in the late 1960s,
partly as a result of the work of Roland Barthes. What contributed to a great increase of
scholarly awareness of this approach was the translation into English of his popular essays in
a collection entitled Mythologies, which was followed then (in the 1970s and 1980s) by many
of his other writings. In one of his writings from 1964, Barthes declared that 'semiology aims
to take in any system of signs, whatever their substance and limits; images, gestures, musical
sounds, objects, and the complex associations of all of these, which form the content of ritual,
convention or public entertainment: these constitute, if not languages, at least systems of
signification' (Barthes 1967, 9). The adoption of semiotics in Britain was influenced by its
prominence in the work of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) at the
University of Birmingham whilst the centre was under the direction of the neo-Marxist
sociologist Stuart Hall.
Gradually, during the second half of the twentieth century, 'semiotics' was increasingly
associated with its reference to the branch of knowledge concerned with research (both formal
and empirical) on signs, signification, meaning and communication. Although semiotics may
be less central now within cultural and media studies (at least in its earlier, more structuralist
form), it remains essential for anyone in the field to understand it. Undoubtly, what individual
scientists have to assess, of course, is whether and how semiotics may be useful in any aspect
of their concerns.
What is worth mentioning, is that Saussure's term, 'semiology' is sometimes used to
refer to the his tradition, whilst 'semiotics' sometimes refers to the Peircean tradition.
Nowadays however, the term 'semiotics' is more likely to be used as an umbrella term to
embrace the whole field.4 What we mean is that both terms: 'semiology' and ‘semiotics’ are
used with more or less the same broad value, unless specified otherwise. Peirce and Saussure
are considered as the two initiators of the modern 'science of signs' for which they
independently sketched tentative definitions and research blueprints. Thanks to that, there is
one evident characteristic that allows to distinguish between ‘semiotics’ and ‘semiology’.
While the first one has an apparent tendency to extract and quote the writings of American
philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914), the other one would sometimes exclusively
refer to the traditions derived from the teaching of Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure
(1857-1913), principally in the Gallic context.

4
Chandler Daniel. “Semiotics for beginners” 2007. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/ (25 Feb
2011).

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 To start any study of laws, rules or limits of semiotics, there is an important issue to
consider. One should determine whether the term ‘semiotics’ refers to a specific discipline,
with its particular object and own methods, or, perhaps, a field of studies, not entirely unified
yet. Whatever the conclusion is, we should- as Umberto Eco puts it- keep I mind the semiotic
field as it appears today, in all its many and varied forms and in all its disorder.5
When talking about semiotics we cannot forget about the input of its founding fathers
i.e. the Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure and Umberto Eco. The first mentioned is
responsible for the concept of the sign (in other words signifier or referent) forms which is
perceived as the core of the field. In the next two chapters we will aim at describing their
achievements in the fields of semiotics.
Other than Saussure, Barthes and Eco, key figures in the development of semiotics
were f.e. the previously mentioned American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce and Charles
William Morris, who developed a behaviourist semiotics.

Ferdinand de Saussure on Semiotics

Saussure, widely known for the foundation of structuralism, defines language as a

system of signs which can be studied in an abstract way. But at this point, we are forced to
define the single ‘sign’. Saussure gives it as the collation of a word with a concept. When a
sign is employed in speech it has a two-fold effect: the signifier and the signified. In the
signifier, there is the physical sound pattern generated by vocalization and received by the
mind. The signified is the concept or idea that the sign stands for. Both the signifier and the
signified are “deposited” in the mind as effects of one and the same speech event.6 So
basically they are inseparably linked, like the two sides of a coin.
Undoubtly, Saussure left precious legacy in semiotics, along with another philosopher-
Peirce. Even though the two scientists seemed to be working in the same field, they used
different approach to the topic. Whilst for Saussure, as a linguist, 'semiology' was 'a science
which studies the role of signs as part of social life', for the philosopher Charles Peirce
'semiotic' was the 'formal doctrine of signs' which was closely related to Logic. What they do
have in common is that as every semiotician they study signs not in isolation but as part of
semiotic sign systems. They studied how meanings were made.
5
Umberto Eco, A theory of semiotics (First Midland Book Edition, 1979) , p.7.
6
“Ferdinand de Saussure on Structuralism, Linguistics and Semiotics” Tel Asiado. 2010.
http://www.suite101.com/content/ferdinand-de-saussure-on-structuralism-linguistics-and-semiotics-
a248131 (3 March 2011).

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 What is more when it comes to the comparison of the two semioticians, while Peirce
was a prolific writer who produced many versions of his theoretical vision, Saussure did not
publish any work on this topic in his lifetime and he communicated his ideas exclusively
through his teaching and correspondence. These ideas were summarised and edited by two of
his colleagues posthumously.

Umberto Eco’s input

As we learn from Daniel Chandler, there was a significant influence outside

linguistics, when the Saussure's principles and theories were expansively interpretated) and
then implemented by scholars and literary thinkers, such as Roland Barthes itself, Jacques
Lacan, and Claude Lévi-Strauss.7 But, it was Umberto Eco who is responsible for one of the
broadest definitions, who states that 'semiotics is concerned with everything that can be taken
as a sign'.
What we learn from his book, a design for a general semiotics should consider: a
theory of codes and a theory of sign production- the latter taking into account a large range of
phenomena such as the common use of languages, the evolution of codes, aesthetic
communication, different types of interactional communicative behavior, the use of sign in
order to mention things or states of the world and so on.8
This man is widely known for making a wider audience aware of semiotics by his
various publications, most notably A Theory of Semiotics and his novel, which, perhaps, most
of us know well, namely- The Name of the Rose, which itself includes applied semiotic
operations. His most important contributions to the field include encyclopaedia and
interpretation. But what is more and, perhaps, more important from the point of view of
semiotics, he also criticized in several works (i.e. A theory of semiotics, La struttura assente,
Le signe, La production de signes) the "iconism" or "iconic signs" (which were taken from
Peirce's most famous triadic relation) to which he purposes four modes of sign production:
recognition, ostension, replica, and invention.

Strengths of Semiotic Analysis

Undoubtly, for many scientists semiotics, as a discipline, seems to be very exciting.

But what may affect us personally, semiotics can help to make us aware of what we take for
7
Chandler Daniel. “Semiotics for beginners” 2007. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/ (25 Feb
2011).
8
Umberto Eco. „A theory of semiotics” (First Midland Book Edition, 1979) , p.3.

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granted while representing the world. Sign systems help to name, describe reality of 'the way
things are'. What we mean is that it is semiotics that reminds us that we are always dealing
with signs, in every aspect of our everyday life and also that sign systems are involved in the
construction of meaning.
In Chandler’s ‘Semiotic for beginners’ we learn what famous Robert Hodge and
Gunther Kress point out about semiotics. They argue that unlike many academic disciplines,
'semiotics offers study of communications phenomena as a whole, not just instances of it'. 9
And last but not least, semiotics makes us aware of the very fact that the culture, all
the cultural values we follow and with which we basically make sense of the world, have been
handed down from generation to generation by the members of the culture of which we are
currently a part of and that they form the conventions. It is a kind of a reminder left for us that
there is nothing 'natural' about our values. But also that they differ radically from culture to
culture.

Criticism of Semiotic Analysis

Well, as it often happens with scientists and philosophers, unfortunately, there is

relatively little agreement when it comes to the scope and methodology of semiotics. Even
though Saussure had hopefully looked forward to the day when semiotics would truly become
part of the social sciences, semiotics remains a loosely defined critical practice rather than a
unified, analytical method or theory. Going further, 'semiotic analysis' is nowadays considered
as just a form of literary criticism which is based only on subjective interpretation and grand
assertions.

9
Chandler Daniel. “Semiotics for beginners” 2007. http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/ (3 March
2011).