SEMIOTICS ITS PLACE IN INFORMATION SCIENCE

OVERVIEW

 Definitions  Meanings and Semiotics  Goals  The Role of Semiotics in IS  History  Modern Roots

DEFINITIONS

 Semiotics is the “science of produced meanings” (Danesi, 2007).

 Semiotics applies to how people represent things in a meaningful way.

 Social context establishes the meanings that signs convey.   The meaning a word conveys in one context may

differ from the meaning a word conveys in a different context i.e. “Seminole.”

MEANINGS AND SEMIOTICS

 Semiotics looks at how meaning is ascribed to texts (all kinds—musical scores, advertisements, narratives, paintings).

 Semiotics focuses on what information is and how it is interpreted.   This is directed related to the issue of the nature of

information.

 Anything in a culture can be a sign: text, image, building, design of a car, a hairstyle.   These signs are read and a meaning is imputed to

them.   Interpretation allows us to make sense of the

meanings we encounter.

GOALS OF SEMIOTICS

 Semiotics seeks to explain the “how and what of signs” (Danesi, 2007).

 What is the social function of signs?

 What role do signs play in communication and linguistics?

BRIEF HISTORY

 Hippocrates: Coined the term as a medical concept that referred to symptoms as warning ”signs” of a medical condition.

 Plato: Distinguished between physical and human made or conventional semeions.

 Aristotle disputed Plato’s notion that words reflect innate forms—he believed that words were simply a practical means of identifying things.

 Plato’s method is referred to as a “mentalist” perspective while Aristotle’s process of reasoning is empirical.

SEMIOTICS IN MEDIEVAL THOUGHT

 Roger Bacon: (13th c.) Developed the first typology or classification of signs.

 Poinsot: (17th c.) is noted as particularly important in the development of sign theory.   Poinsot believed that signs function as an intermediary between thoughts and things.

  John Locke: (18th c.) adopted Poinsot’s notion and proposed a formal study of signs in his famous work titled, “Essay on Human Understanding.”   Locke: Locke viewed signs as a method of inquiry in

philosophy, rather than a separate discipline or branch of philosophy.

THE MODERN ROOTS OF SEMIOTICS

 Saussure (19th c. Swiss linguist) Viewed as the father of modern semiotics.

 Saussure described signs within their social context.   Social context determined the meaning of signs.

  Signs are a product of human sensory and emotional experience of the world.

THE MODERN ROOTS OF SEMIOTICS

 Pierce (19th c. American linguist)

 Pierce viewed a sign as anything that could be taken as standing for something else.

 Pierce views signs as representations that are basically “containers” for an object.

 Pierce’s model is three-dimensional   Representation, interpretation, and object   The interaction among these dimensions produces

meanings.

SEMIOTICS THE MODERN PERIOD

  Morris (20th c.): Divided the study of signs into sign collections—he called these collections syntactics.   Syntactics—refers to the analysis of signs and their

relations. This analysis between signs and their relations, he termed, semantics. He termed the study of the relationship between signs and their users as pragmatics.

  Jakobson (20th c.): Known widely for his model of communication.   This model indicates that messages or “exchanges” are

rarely neutral; they are generally subjective and involve goal attainment.

  Barthes (20th c.): Known for his work in decoding hidden meanings in pop culture and films.

SEMIOTICS: THE MODERN PERIOD

 Eco (20th c.)   The universe of semiotics can be “postulated in the

format of a labyrinth.” (Eco, 1986).   In other words, signs are interpreted as one’s perception

and experience directs.   Such a view relates to the interaction of culture, worldview,

context, education, and perception.

 A sign is everything that can be taken as significantly substituting for something else.

THE SEMIOTIC FRAMEWORK

 Semiotics and “Meaning”

  The word meaning in English has more than 20 definitions –to avoid confusion, semiotics employs the terms reference, sense, and definition.

REFERENCE, SENSE, AND DEFINITION

 Reference (denotation)—points out or identifies something

 Definition—representation between mental signifier and referential object (Hockett)

 Sense (connotation)—refers to what something evokes psychologically, historically, and socially (context).   Connotive senses of the word “cool.”   How many uses or senses of the word “cool” can you

think of? Or, “Super,” “Great,” “Sorry,” etc.

SEMIOTICS AND INFORMATION SCIENCE

 Raber (2003) views semiotics and information science as concerned with “representation and the production of culture.”

  “…the relationship between representation and what is being represented, are at the heart of information science,” (Raber 2003 p. 225).

SEMIOTICS AND ISSUES IN IS

 Arbitrary nature of language and signs.

 Meanings are cooperatively generated.

 The concept of information, itself, conveys many meanings – depending upon its users, their purpose, and the context.

APPROACHES TO ISSUES

 Buckland – information-as-thing, information-as-knowledge, information-as-process

  Ingwersen – aboutness and interpretation or identification of authorial intent

 Raber – the indeterminable nature or ambiguity of signs or objects; context and user needs – user interpretation.