SEMIOTICS AND STRUCTURALISM Serhiy Kvit Semiotics Science of

SEMIOTICS AND STRUCTURALISM © Serhiy Kvit

Semiotics Science of sign systems. The object of semiotic research is all areas of cultural activity, which can be considered as a system of signs, organized in accordance with cultural codes and the process of meaningmaking.

Ferdinand de Saussure (1857 - 1913) the double nature of the sign

Ferdinand de Saussure Ø the basis of language is not elements of language, but the relationship between them Ø the sign has a dual essence (form and content) Ø the connection between form and content is conditional Ø signifying (form) is constructed linearly

Charles Pierce (1839 -1914) semiotics

Charles Pierce • syntactic level of the text considers internal relations between signs; • semantic - between signs and what they mean; • pragmatic - between signs and those who perceive them.

Structuralism The field of knowledge, which is based on system-structural analysis. Ø sign Ø text Ø discourse

Text In a broad sense, it is a structure consisting of elements of meaning, a unity of these elements and the expression of this unity. In the narrow sense, - the unity of language signs, organized according to the norms of this language and are carriers of information.

Discourse The totality of expressions related to a particular issue is considered in mutual relations with this issue, and also in common relations between them. The units of discourse are specific statements that function in real historical, social and cultural conditions, reflect the time aspect in their content and structure, the interactions between the partners that create this type of discourse, as well as the space in which it occurs, the meanings that it creates, uses, reproduces or transforms.

Vladimir Propp (1895 -1970) the morphology of the fairy tale

Vladimir Propp • The Beginning of Structuralism: "The morphology of the fairy tale" (1928). • There is a certain number of plots from which different fairy tales are modeled.

Claude Levy-Strauss (1908 -2009) radical structure

Claude Levy-Strauss The structure is a certain system, which consists of such elements, that the change of one of them entails the change of all others. Secondly, any model belongs to a sequence of transformations, each of which corresponds to models of the same type, so that a certain number of these transformations creates a group of models. Third, the above properties allow predicting how the model will react to change one of the elements that make it up. Finally, the model should be designed in such a way that its application encompasses all the phenomena under study.

Jean Piaget (1896 -1980) three conditions for the structure

Jean Piaget The structure can be defined as a model adopted in linguistics, mathematics, logic, physics, biology, etc. if it meets the following three conditions: a) integrity - the subordination of the elements to the whole and the independence of the latter; b) self-regulation - the internal functioning of rules within the given system; c) transformation - an orderly transition from one substructure to another.

Roland Barthes (1915 -1980) non-radical structure

Roland Barthes A structural person takes reality and dissociates it, and then reunites the dismembered; at first glance, this seems to be irrelevant. However, from another point of view it turns out that this trivia is decisive because, in the gap between these two objects, or two phases of structuralistic activity, something new is born (. . . ). The model is an intelligence added to the subject, and this application has anthropological significance in the sense that it manifests itself as a person, his/her history, situation, freedom, and even the contradiction in his/her mind.

Yuri Lotman (1922 -1993) semiotics of culture

Yuri Lotman Ø culture is a collection of texts or a complex text Ø primary (native language) and secondary (culture and art) modeling systems Ø culture is the generator of the structurinity (structures)

Umberto Eco (1932 -2016) over-interpretation

Umberto Eco Ø open work (from the age of Baroque): "by plan" and "internally open" Ø ideal reader Ø textual cooperation Ø over-interpretation Ø threats of hyperreality

Umberto Eco Ø involvement of the reader in the generating of a textual meaning Ø the denial of his right to "paranoid interpretation"