Ch. 2 Fundamental Concepts in Semiotics -  Part Two

1. Ch. 2 Fundamental Concepts in Semiotics -Part Two Review 2.1 Semiology and semiotics Saussure Peirce 2.2 Signs, semiosis, and abduction The sign of a house with lights on means…. abductive reasoning

2. 2.3 Sign Classifications, their origin, and their Use Classifications: Icons Indices Symbols Categories: Firstness Secondness Thirdness • Substance • Quantity • Quality • Relation • Place • Time • Position • Possession • Activity • passivity Peircean Aristotle (1980) 10 categories:

3. Epistemology • Study • “what is to be known” • “how knowledge originates” • “how knowledge expands” • “how knowledge collapses”

4. Peirce Classification • Firstness – undifferentiated qualitative experience • Secondness – “thing” to the knower • Thirdness – mediated relations involving three things or more Tell a joke!

5. 2.4 Pragmatics, speech acts, and culture The five basic classes of speech acts proposed by Searle are: • Assertives (speech acts that commit the speaker to the truth of what is being said) ; • Directives (speech acts that aim at causing the hearer to do something); • Declaratives (speech acts that change the status of the world by virtue of what is said, by whom and to whom);

6. 2.4 Pragmatics, speech acts, and culture (cont..) • Commissives (speech acts that commit the speaker to taking some particular course of action in the future); and • Expressive (speech acts that aim at drawing the hearer’s attention to the speaker’s psychological state or attitude).

7. 2.4 Cooperative Principle The cooperative principle is defined by four maxims, freely paraphrased as • The Maxim of Quantity participants in a conversation should make their contribution as informative as necessary; not more, not less. • The Maxim of Quality participants in a conversation should only say what they honestly believe to be the case; they should acknowledge their doubts about what they don’t know for a fact, and never tell a lie.

8. 2.4 Cooperative Principle (cont..) • The Maxim of Relation participants in a conversation should only talk about what is relevant for the ongoing conversation. • The Maxim of Manner participants in a conversation should express their contribution clearly and unambiguously.

9. Six Maxims that constitute Leech’s Politeness principle: 1. The Tact Maxim (Applicable to Directive and Commissive Speech Acts) when using language to give orders or make promises, it is polite to minimize the cost to interlocutors (or to maximize interlocutors benefit). 2. The Generosity Maxim (applicable to Directive and Commissive Speech Acts) when using language to give orders or make promises, it is polite to minimize the speaker’s benefit (or to maximize the speaker's cost).

10. Six Maxims that constitute Leech’s Politeness principle: (cont..) 3. The Approbation Maxim (applicable to Expressive and Assertive Speech Arts) When using language to express or state something that affects interlocutors, it is polite to minimize dispraise of things having to do with them ( or to maximize praise of such things). 4. The Modesty Maxim (applicable to Assertive Speech Arts) when using language to express or state something that affects interlocutors, it is polite to minimize praise of things having to do with us ( or to maximize dispraise of such things).

11. Six Maxims that constitute Leech’s Politeness principle: (cont..) 5. The Agreement Maxim (applicable to Expressive and Assertive Speech Acts) when using language to make a statement about something that affects interlocutors, it is polite to minimize disagreement (or to maximize agreement). 6. The Sympathy Maxim (applicable to Expressive and Assertive Speech Acts) when using language to make a statement, it is polite to minimize antipathy toward interlocutors (or to maximize sympathy toward them).

12. 2.5 Sign Production, Communication and Discursive competence • What do they investigate? • What are the theories? Communication Semiotics

13. Shannon & Weaver’s Model of Communication (1949) • Communicative processes  probabilistic properties of information sources codes and message transmissions • Eco interpretation of Shannon & Weaver’s: • Structural theory of the statistical properties of an information source • Structural theory of the generative properties of a source code • Study of how nonsignificant signals are transmitted through a channel • Study of how significant pieces of information are transmitted for purposes of communication.

14. Jakobson (1960) • Communicative functions: • Channels, • messages, • senders, • receivers, and • codes. • A sender transmits a message to a receiver through a channel. The message is expressed in a code and refers to a context.

15. http://www.cyberartsweb.org/cpace/theory/luco/Hypersign/Jakobson.htmlhttp://www.cyberartsweb.org/cpace/theory/luco/Hypersign/Jakobson.html Figure 2.9 Jakobson’s model of the Communication Space

16. Jakobson’s 6 functions of language in communication • Expressive function focuses communication on the sender of the message • Conative  on its receiver • Referential function  on its context • Phatic function  on the channel • Metalinguistic function  on the message’s code • Poetic function  on the message itself (what & how)

17. Expressive function focuses communication on the sender of the message • Page 67 –Figure 2.10a – When the speaker says….

18. Conative  on its receiver • Page 67 –Figure 2.10b – When the speaker says “Anyone home?,” he is checking to see if his listener is present and alert

19. Referential function  on its context • Page 68 –Figure 2.10c

20. Phatic function  on the channel (see 2.10.d) • Metalinguistic function  on the message’s code (see 2.10.e) • Poetic function  on the message itself (what & how) (see 2.10.f)

21. Eco (1976) • Semiotics is the method that enables him to talk about all of it at the same time: seeing it all as aspects of one and the same world of significations and interpretations.

22. 2.6 Metaphors and Metonymies • Desktop metaphor • Xerox Star • Lakoff & Johnson’s (1981) Cognitive semantics • Spectrum of metaphors • They correspond to primitive notions • Example • Airplane’s nose, wing, tail (shape & location)

23. Metonymies • Associated with metaphors • Metaphors is semantic short circuit between two concepts– metonymies represent a concept by means of another that is semantically continuous to it. • Rhetorical purposes. • Examples • Europe supported a decision made by the US • Effect of highlighting the unity and homogeneity of action to the detriment of the diversity of opinions.

24. Metaphors and metonymies • Parole • Not langue (not grammar)

25. Encoding - Decoding

26. Decoding • In the context of semiotics, 'decoding' involves not simply basic recognition and comprehension of what a text 'says' but also the interpretation and evaluation of its meaning with reference to relevant codes.