Types of signs Indexical A mode defined by

Types of signs Indexical • A mode defined by relationship of necessity (especially cause and effect). Prototypically, think fever. Iconic • A mode defined by relationship of resemblance. Prototypically, think picture. Symbolic • A mode defined by relationship of arbitrariness, convention, and learning. Prototypically, think word. English 306 A; Harris

Bow-wow-pooh-yo-he-ho theories Index-to-icon-to-symbol migration theories English 306 A; Harris

Dimensions of signs Indexicality An onomasiological tendency defined by relationship of necessity (esp. cause and effect). Iconicity An onomasiological tendency defined by relationship of resemblance. Symbolicity An onomasiological tendency defined by relationship of arbitrariness, convention, and learning. English 306 A; Harris

Metaphor and metonymy Indirect representation Something (called the vehicle) carries the primary signification for something else (tenor) that ordinarily holds that signification. Metaphor is iconic The vehicle/tenor relationship is an asserted resemblance: the tenor is said to be like the vehicle in some way. Metonymy is indexical The vehicle/tenor relationship is (not exactly necessary but) drawn from the same habitat: the tenor is related to the vehicle in some way. English 306 A; Harris

Metonymy— The principle of set membership One element of a set or a relationship (the vehicle) singled out to represent other element(s) (the tenor) • • • Hollywood loves westerns. Toronto collapses! Calgary wins in OT! All hands on deck. Thirty head of cattle. English 306 A; Harris

Metaphor— The principle of comparison One element (the vehicle) represents another element (the tenor), to which it is unrelated. • • • My love is red, red rose. Homer is a pig. Toronto is toast. The table leg is broken. The orthopedic wing is closed. Fire kills thousands every year. (Personification) English 306 A; Harris

Metonym Attributes are picked out (taken as indexical) to represent something associated with those attributes. Like a mascot. Dancin’ Homer English 306 A; Harris

Metaphor Attributes are invoked, by way of resemblance (iconic). • Homer is a pig. • Eats a lot • Noisy • Not very clean. • English 306 A; Harris

English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” Metaphor • Tenor = vagina • Vehicle = cat • Attributes • Warm • Furry • English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” Metonymy • Tenor = woman • Vehicle = vagina/pussy The ultimate devaluing of a (category of a) person: to a small anatomical component. English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” Metaphor • Tenor = the insult target • Vehicle = woman (not vagina) • Attributes = • Weak • Soft • Quitter • Means ‘Opposite of a man’, but in a wholly evaluative way. English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” Metaphor Metonymy Metaphor Indexicality, Iconicity • a relatively mundane example of ordinary language • not a fancy literary or rhetorical device • these processes, and figuration generally, are pervasive English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” English 306 A; Harris

“Pussy” Metaphor • Tenor = the insult target • Vehicle = a particular type of woman (still not vagina) • Attributes = • Weak • Soft • Quitter • Means ‘the sort of woman that gives all of us a bad name for being weak, soft, quitters’ (? ); in a wholly evaluative way. English 306 A; Harris

We now return you to regular programming F English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality Deixis Pointing words Egocentricity Speaker-oriented Anthropocentrism Human-oriented Inherent orientation Human-body orientation projected to objects English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality Deictics Gk. deiktos ≈ “to show” • Pointing words Pronouns • Picks out attributes (speaker, hearer, masculine, feminine, …) Proximals • Speaking location • Speaking time • Relative location to speaker English 306 A; Harris

Indexical orientation — Deictic centre Egocentricity The speaker (or, in a rhetorical extention, the hearer) as the (default) reference point for everything else. • “The squirrel is behind the tree. ” • “Mount Pinotubo is on the left” (compare “your left”) English 306 A; Harris

Indexical orientation — Deictic centre Egocentricity Pronouns • First person (I, me, we, us, …) • Second person (you, your) • Third person (he, she, it, they, …) Proximals • Speaking location (here and there) • Speaking time (now and then) • Relative location to speaker (this and that) English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality— Inherent orientation Anthropocentricity Gk. anthropos ≈ “man” (hu)man-centred Human-first (agent-centred) syntax • I feel bad • *Bad is felt by me. • She knows math. • *Math is known by her. English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality Anthropocentricity Gk. anthropos ≈ “man” (hu)man-centred Other objects oriented like humans • front, back • left, right • before, behind English 306 A; Harris

Deictic (egocentric) vs. Inherent (anthropocentric) Orientation English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality Anthropocentricity Gk. anthropos ≈ “man” (hu)man-centred Personification • Metaphor sub-type (i. e. , iconic) • X is a person • My car just doesn’t want to go. • Unemployment has moved into Canada. • Tuition ate up my wages. English 306 A; Harris

Indexicality Anthropocentricity Gk. anthropos ≈ “man” (hu)man-centred Personification • Metaphor sub-type (i. e. , iconic) • X is a person • My car just doesn’t want to go. • Unemployment has moved into Canada. • Tuition ate up my wages. English 306 A; Harris ‘Sentification’ ‘organismification’

Indexicality Anthropocentricity Gk. anthropos ≈ “man” (hu)man-centred Daniel Dennett’s “Intentional stance” English 306 A; Harris

“It works with people almost all the time. … Our use of the intentional strategy is so habitual and effortless that the role it plays in shaping our expectations about people is easily overlooked. The strategy also works on most other mammals most of the time. For instance, you can use it to design better traps to catch those mammals, by reasoning about what the creature knows or believes about various things, what it prefers, what it wants to avoid. The strategy works on birds, and on fish, and on reptiles, and on insects and spiders, and even on such lowly and unenterprising creatures as clams (once a clam believes there is danger about, it will not relax its grip on its closed shell until it is convinced that the danger has passed). It also works on some artifacts: the chess-playing computer will not take your knight because it knows that there is a line of ensuing play that would lead to losing its rook, and it does not want that to happen. More modestly, thermostat will turn off the boiler as soon as it comes to believe the room has reached the desired temperature. The strategy even works for plants. In a locale with late spring storms, you should plant apple varieties that are particularly cautious about concluding that it is spring-which is when they want to blossom, of course. It even works for such inanimate and apparently undesigned phenomena as lightning. An electrician once explained to me how he worked out how to protect my underground water pump from lightning damage: lightning, he said, always wants to find the best way to ground, but sometimes it gets tricked into taking the second-best paths. You can protect the pump by making another, better path more obvious to the lightning. ” (Dennett, 1997, English 306 A; Harris 65)

Iconicity Sequential order “Don’t drink and drive” Distance Immediacy of action Quantity Reduplication English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity Principle of sequential order Unless marked, the order of words (by default) mirrors the order of events. • He kicked sand in my face and I got mad. • I got mad and he kicked sand in my face. English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity Principle of distance Linguistic distance (proximity) tends to mirror conceptual distance. • She squeezed me. • She gave me a squeeze. • She gave a squeeze to me. English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity Principle of quantity Length of utterance correlates with (speaker’s perception of) quantity of concept. • Dinosaurs lived a l o o o n g time ago. • Dinosaurs lived a long, … time ago. • Lawyerese. • Political speeches. English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Reduplication Japanese hito 'person' hitobito ’group of people' kami 'god' kamigami ’group of gods' Mandarin xiao 'small' xiao 'very small' gaoxing 'happy' gaogaoxing 'very happy' English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Reduplication /ora¯/ = man / ora¯/ = all sorts of men /anak/ = child /anak/ = all sorts of children /ma¯a/ = mango / ma¯a / = all sorts of mangoes English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Reduplication Download the= all. SIL / ora¯/ sorts of men to =see /anak/ = child. IPA fonts /anak/ all sorts of children these /ma¯a/ = mango / ma¯a / = all sorts of mangoes transcriptions in PPS files /ora¯/ = man English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Conceptual Reduplication Trinidad and Tobago [j. Eswij] • emphatic confirmation, agreement; interjective intensifier Children at Play, Romeo Downer http: //caribbeanartist. com/ English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Conceptual Reduplication Trinidad and Tobago [j. Eswij] • emphatic confirmation, agreement; interjective intensifier • yes-we? Children at Play, Romeo Downer http: //caribbeanartist. com/ English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Conceptual Reduplication Trinidad and Tobago [j. Eswij] • emphatic confirmation, agreement; interjective intensifier • yes-we? • yes-whee? Children at Play, Romeo Downer http: //caribbeanartist. com/ English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Principle of quantity Conceptual Reduplication Trinidad and Tobago [j. Eswij] • emphatic confirmation, agreement; interjective intensifier • yes-we? • yes-whee? • yes-oui! Children at Play, Romeo Downer http: //caribbeanartist. com/ English 306 A; Harris

Iconicity — Quantity or distance? Politeness/Face preservation No smoking. Please, don’t smoke. Would you mind not smoking? I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t smoke. Customers are requested to refrain from smoking if they can. It would be appreciated deeply by all of us here at Rapperswill Clothiers if you observe our no-smoking policy. English 306 A; Harris

Any questions? Indexicality Necessary linkage; metonymical; linguistic pointing. Iconicity Representational linkage; metaphorical; linguistic and conceptual linkages. (Symbolicity “Arbitrary”, conventional linkages; motivations atrophied. ) English 306 A; Harris