According to Roland Barthes, (1964) Semiology also known as Semiotics is the study of signs. The important question here is what are signs? Signs can be in a form of images, gestures, sound, and even objects that individual sees in everyday life. For example it could be public toilet signs, sign boards on roads, and even the different color of the traffic light are signs. Why is it important to learn semiotics in visual communication? According to Thomas Sebeok, (1991) semiotics is all about the learning the meaning and understanding the verbal language of the signs. This is needed in analyzing visual communication because it is to understand how and why images are perceived differently by individuals in society.
Semiotic uses two important factors to identify a sign: it is the signifiers and signified. Barthes, (1964) believed that the idea of semiotics was founded by Ferdinand de Saussure (1916) who defined signifiers also known as signification to be seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting. This is basically the five physical senses where individuals use to perceive the image or object and turn it into verbal language. For example: Having a word that sounds the same however has different meanings.
The word "Write" and "Right" have the same tone and sound therefore, hearing these words maybe depend on their perception of what comes first in their mind.
This verbal language is known as the signified, according to the definition used in Griffin (2009) it is "the meaning we associate with sign". In other words, a sign is formed when both signifiers and signified are combined together. This is an example where it is a warning sign, the signifier is to "see" that zombies cross in this area and the signified is to be "warned" and stay away.
However, how a sign is interpreted is by the denotation and connotation. According to Sebeok (2001) denotation is defined as the "initial, or intensional, meaning captured by a form or sign." In other words, denotation is the literal meaning of the sign, for example: a picture of a kitten playing with a ball of wool will only be understood as the what the image shows.
However, connotation is the opposite, it is defined as "the extended meaning of a form or sign." (Sebeok, 2001, p.152) For example: a picture of a rose will have the connotation for beauty, love, passion, and desire, yet these words are not written in actual picture itself. It is the based on the individual's own perception whether the picture of the rose does convey those perception or not.
"Tutorial Question: Provide examples of Signifiers, Signified and Connotation."
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| To Write |
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| To the Right |
The word "Write" and "Right" have the same tone and sound therefore, hearing these words maybe depend on their perception of what comes first in their mind.
This verbal language is known as the signified, according to the definition used in Griffin (2009) it is "the meaning we associate with sign". In other words, a sign is formed when both signifiers and signified are combined together. This is an example where it is a warning sign, the signifier is to "see" that zombies cross in this area and the signified is to be "warned" and stay away.
However, how a sign is interpreted is by the denotation and connotation. According to Sebeok (2001) denotation is defined as the "initial, or intensional, meaning captured by a form or sign." In other words, denotation is the literal meaning of the sign, for example: a picture of a kitten playing with a ball of wool will only be understood as the what the image shows.
However, connotation is the opposite, it is defined as "the extended meaning of a form or sign." (Sebeok, 2001, p.152) For example: a picture of a rose will have the connotation for beauty, love, passion, and desire, yet these words are not written in actual picture itself. It is the based on the individual's own perception whether the picture of the rose does convey those perception or not.
In conclusion, semiotics is the process of learning the signs. It is important to understand because it is useful in analyzing visual communication. Understanding the signifiers, signified and denotation and connotation is important for analyzing the visual ideology and perception of individuals in different society
References:
Barthes, R. (1964) Elements of Semiology. Hill and Wang
Griffin, E. (2009) A First Look at Communication Theory (7th Ed.) Glecoe, IL: McGraw Hill.
Saussure, F. (1916) Course in General Linguistics. (trans. Wade Baskin) London: Fontana/Collins.
Sebeok, T. A. (1991) A Sign is Just a Sign. Bloomingtom: Indiana University Press.
Sebeok, T. A. (2001) Signs: An Introduction to Semiotics. (2nd Ed.) University of Toronto Press Incorporated.
You must use one of the questions that I have outlined in the study guide. At the moment, while you do have a good grasp of the terms and exemplified correctly, there is no purpose or argument in this blog entry. The question, what is a sign, that you wrote in the first paragraph, is not a strong enough question for an analytical blog.
ReplyDeleteAlso, avoid misusing references in the blog. Just mentioning an author without further explanation of why they are important or what is the central thesis of the author's point of view is not acceptable. You must engage with something that they wrote, said or thought about.
Nevertheless, a good effort made. Make these corrections in future entries and you would write much better entries.