Semiotics and Semiology

Semiotics - Is the study of how meaning is constructed through language or codes
(Semiotics is Greek for sign)

Signs usually have no fixed meaning, it's influenced by cultural background. We have developed over time a socially recognised sign or language.

Semiotics anaylisis allows you to deconstruct meanings from media texts.

• Structuralism - identifying underlying structures. There are innate abilities to be able to talk. 

There is aways a:

• Signifier - text (sound, print, still or moving image)
• Signified - idea or meaning

There is no reason we call a tree 'tree' it has been built/developed culturally over time. The letters T-R-E-E has come to signify a tree.

Signs

• Arbitary - No obvious connection between the sign and the object. e.g. the word cat has no obvious links to a furry animal usually domesticated as a pet. It only works because the letters when put together has meaning. The meaning of words is the result of a mutal agreement amongst society.

• Iconic -Iconic signs means 'picture graphic'; resembles what it's trying to show. Universally recognisable signs e.g. male and female toliets signs are universally recognised symbol.

• Indexical - Indexical signs have some kind of connection with what is being signified, for example tears rolling down a face is the indexical sign for sorrow. The play button is an indexical sign because it shows the arrow going the way the film will play; and becuase we read from left to right.

Crossroads sign is an example of a sign that intergrates all 3 sign classifications.

Anchorage - The fixing or limiting of a particular set of meanings to an image.
Denotation - What an image actually shows and what is immediately apparent.
Connotation - The meaning of a sign that has arrived through the cultural experiences behind it.