SEMIOLOGY
INTRODUCTION
Interest in signs and the way they communicate has a long history (medieval philosophers, John Locke and others have shown interest), modern semiotic analysis can be said to have begin with two men- Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) and American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914). Peirce called his system Semiotic, and that has become the dominant term used for the science of signs. Saussure’s Semiology differs from Peirce’s Semiotics in some respects but they both are concerned with signs. 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 these, which form the content of ritual convention or public entertainment: this constitutes, if not language, at least systems of signification. There is no doubt that the development of mass communications confers particular relevance today upon the vast field of signifying media, just when the success of disciplines such as linguistics, information theory, formal logic and structural anthropology provide semantic analysis with new instruments. It is true that objects, images and patterns of behavior can signify, and so on a large scale, but never autonomously; every semiological system has it linguistic admixture.
Where there is a visual substance for example, the meaning is confirmed by being duplicated in a linguistic message (which happens in the case of the cinema, advertising, comic strips, press photography etc). It is more difficult to conceive a system of images and objects whose usage or reason can exist independently of language: to perceive what a substance signifies is inevitably to fall back on the individuation of language: there is no meaning which is not designated, and the world of usage is none other than that of language. The concept of the sign is taken from Saussure (Course in General Linguistics, 1916). It is seen as a combination of signifier (the material element, sound, or marks on paper) and signified (the concept with which the signifier is associated). The two are bound together like the two sides of a piece of paper. Saussure emphasized the conventional nature of signs. There is no necessary relationship between the sign and its referent; rather, the relationship is socially agreed. We could call our hands ‘daffodils’, and flowers ‘hands’, and nothing would change in the world: it is just that we commonly agree that the daffodil is a flower and the things at the end of our arms are hands. The meaning of any particular sign is defined by its relationship to other signs in the system. For example, we understand the meaning of ‘up’ in relation to the meaning of ‘down’, and cannot conceive of one without the other. Saussure's distinction between speech and language is also important: speech refers to individual speech-acts; language to the structure of signs out of which the speech-acts are formed.
DEFINITION OF SEMIOLOGY
Etymologically, semiology is gotten from the Greek word ‘Semeion’ which means ‘sign’. Semiology is the study that deals with signs or sign language. It’s the study of signs, symbols and signals. Semiology owes much to the structural linguistics of Saussure and developed as part of the upsurge of structuralism during the 1970s. It proved especially attractive to sociologists interested in the analysis of ideology-particularly those with a Marxist or feminist background
ELEMENTS OF SEMIOLOGY
Element of semiology can be grouped under four main headings which are as follows:
1. Language and Speech
2. Signifier and Signified
3. Syntagm and System
4. Denotation and Connotation
Language and Speech
The language (Langue)-A language, so to speak, language minus speech: it is at the same time a social institution and a system of values. As a social institution, it is by no means an act, it is not subject to any premeditation. It is the social part of language, the individual cannot by himself either create or modify it; it is essentially a collective contract which one must accept in its entirety if one wishes to communicate. Moreover, this social product is autonomous, like a game with its own rules, for it can be handled only after a period of learning. As a system of values, a language is made of a certain number of elements, each one of which is at the same time the equivalent of a given quantity of things and a term of a large function, in which are found, in a differential order, other correlative values: from the point of view of the language, the sign is like a coin which has the value of a certain amount of goods which it allows one to buy, but also has value in relation to other coins, in a greater or lesser degree. The institutional and the systematic aspect are of course connected: it is because a language is a system of contractual values (in part arbitrary or more exactly unmotivated) that it resists the modifications coming from a single individual and is consequently a social institution.
Speech-In contrast to the language, which is both institution and system, speech is essentially an individual act of selection and actualization; it is made in the first place of the 'combination thanks to which the speaking subject can use the code of the language with a view to expressing his personal thought' (this extended speech could be called discourse) and secondly by the 'psycho-physical mechanisms which allow him to exteriorize these combinations.' It is certain that phonation, for instance, cannot be confused with the language; neither the institution nor the system is altered if the individual who resorts to them speaks loudly or softly, with slow or rapid delivery, etc. The combinative aspect of speech is of course of capital importance, for it implies that speech is constituted by the recurrence of identical signs: it is because signs are repeated in successive discourses and within one and the same discourse (although they are combined in accordance with the infinite diversity of various people's speech) that each sign becomes an element of the language; and it is because speech is essentially a combinative activity that it corresponds to an individual act and not to a pure creation.
The dialectics of language and speech-Language and speech: each of these two terms of course achieves its full definition only in the dialectical process which unites one to the other: there is no language without speech, and no speech outside language: it is in this exchange that the real linguistic praxis is situated, as Merleau-Ponty has pointed out. And V. Brondal writes, 'A language is a purely abstract entity, a norm which stands above individuals, a set of essential types, which speech actualizes in an infinite variety of ways."' Language and speech are therefore in a relation of reciprocal comprehensiveness. On the one hand, the language is 'the treasure deposited by the practice of speech, in the subjects belonging to the same community' and, since it is a collective summa of individual imprints, it must remain incomplete at the level of each isolated individual: a language does not exist perfectly except in the 'speaking mass'; one cannot handle speech except by drawing on the language. But conversely, a language is possible only starting from speech: historically, speech phenomena always precede language phenomena (it is speech which makes language evolve), and genetically, a language is constituted in the individual through his learning from the environmental speech (one does not teach grammar and vocabulary which are, broadly speaking, the language, to babies).
To sum, a language is at the same time the product and the instrument of speech: their relationship is therefore a genuinely dialectical one. It will be noticed that there could not possibly be (at least according to Saussure) linguistics of speech, since any speech, as soon as it is grasped as a process of communication, is already part of the language: the latter only can be the object of a science. This disposes of two questions at the outset: it is useless to wonder whether speech must be studied before the language: the opposite is impossible: one can only study speech straight away in as much as it reflects the language (inasmuch as it is 'glottic'). It is just as useless to wonder at the outset how to separate the language from speech: this is no preliminary operation, but on the contrary the very essence of linguistic and later semiological investigation: to separate the language from speech means ipso facto constituting the problematic of the meaning.
Signifier and Signified
The classification of signs: The signified and the signifier, in Saussurean terminology, are the components of the sign. Now this term, sign, which is found in very different vocabularies (from that of theology to that of medicine), and whose history is very rich (running from the Gospels"' to cybernetics), is for these very reasons very ambiguous. According to the arbitrary choice of various authors, the sign is placed in a series of terms which have affinities and dissimilarities with it: signal, index, icon, symbol, allegory, are the chief rivals of sign. The element which is common to all these terms are: they all necessarily refer us to a relation between two relata. This feature cannot therefore be used to distinguish any of the terms in the series; to find a variation in meaning, we shall have to resort to other features, which will be expressed here in the form of an alternative (presences absence): i) the relation implies, or does not imply, the mental representation of one of the relata; ii) the relation implies, or does not imply, an analogy between the relata; iii) the link between the two relata (the stimulus and its response) is immediate or is not; iv) the relata exactly coincide or, on the contrary, one overruns the other; v) the relation implies, or does not imply, an existential connection with the user. Whether these features are positive or negative (marked or unmarked), each term in the field is differentiated from its neighbours.
The linguistic sign: In linguistics, the notion of sign does not give rise to any competition between neighbouring terms. When he sought to designate the signifying relationship, Saussure immediately eliminated symbol (because the term implied the idea of motivation) in favour of sign which he defined as the union of a signifier and a signified (in the fashion of the recto and verso of a sheet of paper), or else of an acoustic image and a concept. Until he found the words signifier and signified, however, sign remained ambiguous, for it tended to become identified with the signifier only, which Saussure wanted at all costs to avoid; after having hesitated between sôme and same, form and idea, image and concept, Saussure settled upon signifier and signified, the union of which forms the sign. This is a paramount proposition, which one must always bear in mind, for there is a tendency to interpret sign as signifier, whereas this is a two-sided Janus-like entity. The (important) consequence is that, for Saussure, Hjelmslev and Frei at least, since the signifieds are signs among others, semantics must be a part of structural linguistics, whereas for the American mechanists the signifieds are substances which must be expelled from linguistics and left to psychology. Since Saussure, the theory of the linguistic sign has been enriched by the double articulation principle, the importance of which has been shown by Martinet, to the extent that he made it the criterion which defines language. For among linguistic signs, we must distinguish between the significant units, each one of which is endowed with one meaning (the 'words', or to be exact, the monemes') and which form the first articulation, and the distinctive units, which are part of the form but do not have a direct meaning ('the sounds', or rather the phonemes), and which constitute the second articulation. A sign is a compound of signifier and signified. The signifier means nomenclature or expression while the signified means usage or content.
The semiological sign: This perhaps allows us to foresee the nature of the semiological sign in relation to the linguistic sign. The semiological sign is also, like its model, compounded of a signifier and a signified (the colour of a light, for instance, is an order to move on, in the Highway Code), but it differs from it at the level of its substances. Many semiological systems (objects, gestures, pictorial images) have a substance of expression whose essence is not to signify; often, they are objects of everyday use, used by society in a derivative way, to signify something: clothes are used for protection and food for nourishment even if they are also used as signs. We propose to call these semiological signs, whose origin is utilitarian and functional, sign-functions. The sign-function bears witness to a double movement, which must be taken apart. In a first stage (this analysis is purely operative and does not imply real temporality) the function becomes pervaded with meaning.
This semantisation is inevitable: as soon as there is a society, every usage is converted into a sign of itself; the use of a raincoat is to give protection from the rain, but this use cannot be dissociated from the very signs of an atmospheric situation. Since our society produces only standardized, normalized objects, these objects are unavoidably realizations of a model, the speech of a language, the substances of a significant form. To rediscover a non-signifying object, one would have to imagine a utensil absolutely improvised and with no similarity to an existing model (Lévi-Strauss has shown to what extent tinkering about is itself the search for a meaning): a hypothesis which is virtually impossible to verify in any society. This universal semantisation of the usages is crucial: it expresses the fact that there is no reality except when it is intelligible, and should eventually lead to the merging of sociology with sociological But once the sign is constituted, society can very well refunctionalise it, and speak about it as if it were an object made for use: a fur-coat will be described as if it served only to protect from the cold. This recurrent functionalization, which needs, in order to exist, a second-order language, is by no means the same as the first (and indeed purely ideal) functionalization: for the function which is re-presented does in fact correspond to a second (disguised) semantic institutionalization, which is of the order of connotation. The sign-function therefore has (probably) an anthropological value, since it is the very unit where the relations of the technical and the significant are woven together.
Syntagm and System
A syntagm is the horizontal chain into which units are linked, according to agreed rules and conventions, to make a meaningful whole. The syntagm is the statement into which the chosen signs are combined. A road sign is a syntagm, a combination of the chosen shape with the chosen symbol.
Paradigms and syntagms are fundamental to the way that any system of signs is organized. In written language, the letters of the alphabet are the basic vertical paradigms. These may be combined into syntagms called words. These words can be formed into syntagms called phrases or sentences, i.e., according to the rules of grammar.
Syntagms-like sentences-exist in time: we can think of them as a chain. But syntagms of visual signs can exist simultaneously in space. Thus, a sign of two children leaving school, in black silhouette, can be syntagmatically combined with a red triangle or a road sign to mean: SCHOOL: BEWARE OF CHILDREN.
The system constitutes the second axis of the language. Saussure has seen it in the shape of a field of associative field; some determined by an affinity of sound (education, saturation) some by affinity in meaning (education, upbringing)
Denotation and Connotation
Denotation we mean the common sense, obvious meaning of the sign. A photograph of a street scene denotes the street that was photographed. This is the mechanical reproduction (on film) of the object the camera points at. For example, I can use color film, pick a day of pale sunshine, and use a soft focus lens to make the street appear warm and happy, a safe community for children. I can use black and white film, hard focus, and strong contrast, to make the street appear cold, inhospitable. The denotative meanings would be the same.
Connotation we mean the interaction that occurs when the sign and the feelings of the viewer meet. At this point, meanings move toward the subjective interpretation of the sign (as illustrated by the above examples). If denotation is what is photographed, connotation is how it is photographed.
METHODS OF SEMIOLOGY
Method of semiology involves the following:
1. commutation test
2. Paradigmatic Analysis
3. Syntagmatic Analysis
Commutation Test
The commutation test is used to analyze a signifying system. the test identifies signifiers as well as their signifieds, value and significance.
This test is a metalingual subjective system for analyzing textual or other material. It has evolved from a limited method for investigating the structure of individual signs (per Roman Jakobson). Its primary uses are to:
identify distinctive signifiers,
define their significance, and
divide material into paradigmatic classes and identify the codes to which the signifiers belong (Roland Barthes).
The initial assumption is that the communication to be analyzed represents both a cognitive use of the sign system and a statement that refers to the values of the addresser. The purpose of the test is therefore to illuminate the addresser's intention in using the code in this particular way. It works through a process of substitution, assessing the extent to which a change in the signifier leads to a change in the signified. The first step, therefore, is to exclude one signifier from the material to be analyzed. This is a test of redundancy: to identify what meaning is lost (if any) by omitting that sign. It will be relatively unusual to find that one sign is completely superfluous, but more common to find that the contribution of the one sign to the whole meaning is relatively weak. The weakness or strength of its contribution can be calibrated more exactly by placing alternate (synonymous and antonymous) signs in the context. This will enable the analyst to make a judgment on the distinctiveness of the particular signifier chosen by the author/artist and of its value to the meaning, i.e. as more or less necessary for maintaining the meaning and/or rule structure in different occurrences. By changing the collocation between two of the existing signifiers, and so changing their original relationship, the relative significance of each signifier can be considered. Further, by also placing the original sign into different contexts, it can be seen whether the sign becomes more or less distinctive.
Paradigmatic Analysis
Paradigmatic analysis is the analysis of paradigms embedded in the text rather than of the surface structure (syntax) of the text which is termed syntagmatic analysis. Paradigmatic analysis often uses commutation tests, i.e. analysis by substituting words of the same type or class to calibrate shifts in connotation. The sign is the fundamental building block out of which all meaning is constructed and transmitted. Meaning is encoded by the sender of the message and decoded by the receiver recalling past experience and placing the message in its appropriate cultural context. Individual signs can be collected together to form more complex signs, i.e. building up from linguistics, groups of sounds (and the letters to represent them) form words, groups of words form sentences, sentences form narratives, etc. The constructed signs are called syntagms (see syntagmatic structure) and each collection may be a paradigm. Thus, in the English language, the alphabet is the paradigm from which the syntagms of English words are formed. The set of English words collected together in a lexicon become the paradigm from which sentences are formed, etc. Hence, paradigmatic analysis is a method for exploring a syntagm by identifying its constituent paradigm, studying the individual paradigmatic elements, and then reconstructing the process by which the syntagm takes on meaning.
Syntagmatic Analysis
Syntagmatic analysis is analysis of syntax or surface structure (syntagmatic structure) as opposed to paradigms (paradigmatic analysis). This is often achieved using commutation tests. Syntagmatic means one element selects the other element either to precede it or to follow it. For example, the definitive article "the" selects a noun and not a verb. Of particular use in semiotic study, a syntagm is a chain which leads, through syntagmatic analysis, to understanding of how a sequence of events forms a narrative. Alternatively, syntagmatic analysis can describe the spatial relationship of a visual text such as posters, photographs or a particular setting of a filmed scene.
Roland Barthes was able to use metaphor in the form of the various garments in order to display how the syntagm/paradigm relationship worked together to at once create and change meaning. Expanding on this form of explanation by Barthes, both David Lodge (author) and Susan Spiggle have further developed the metaphor, using specific wearable items. Shirt, shorts and sandals for example, are freely interchangeable along the plane of tops, bottoms and footwear, the paradigmatic plane, assuming they follow the rules of wearable items, the syntagmatic plane. While you can change the sandals for high heels, it would be breaking the rules to wear them as a top. Turning to the grammatically correct sentence, it prevents the text from reading like it was written by Yoda.
References
Barthes, Roland. Elements of Semiology (trans. Annette lavers & Colin Smith). London: Jonathan cape. (1967).
GORDON MARSHALL. “Semiology”. A Dictionary of Sociology. 1998. Retrieved December 11, 2015 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1088-semiology.htm/
Chandler Daniel. 2001/2007. Semiotics: The Basics. London: Routledge.