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Sign (semiotics)
In semiotics, a sign is anything that communicates a meaning that is not the sign itself to the interpreter of the sign. The meaning can be intentional, as when a word is uttered with a specific meaning, or unintentional, as when a symptom is taken as a sign of a particular medical condition. Signs can communicate through any of the senses, visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, or taste.
Two major theories describe the way signs acquire the ability to transfer information. Both theories understand the defining property of the sign as a relation between a number of elements. In semiology, the tradition of semiotics developed by Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), the sign relation is dyadic, consisting only of a form of the sign (the signifier) and its meaning (the signified). Saussure saw this relation as being essentially arbitrary (the principle of semiotic arbitrariness), motivated only by social convention. Saussure's theory has been particularly influential in the study of linguistic signs. The other major semiotic theory, developed by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), defines the sign as a triadic relation as "something which stands to somebody for something in some respect or capacity.” This means that a sign is a relation between the sign vehicle (the specific physical form of the sign), a sign object (the aspect of the world that the sign carries meaning about) and an interpretant (the meaning of the sign as understood by an interpreter). According to Peirce, signs can be divided by the type of relation that holds the sign relation together as either icons, indices or symbols. Icons are those signs that signify by means of similarity between sign vehicle and sign object (e.g. a portrait or map), indices are those that signify by means of a direct relation of contiguity or causality between sign vehicle and sign object (e.g. a symptom), and symbols are those that signify through a law or arbitrary social convention.
According to Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), a sign is composed of the signifier (signifiant), and the signified (signifié). These cannot be conceptualized as separate entities but rather as a mapping from significant differences in sound to potential (correct) differential denotation. The Saussurean sign exists only at the level of the synchronic system, in which signs are defined by their relative and hierarchical privileges of co-occurrence. It is thus a common misreading of Saussure to take signifiers to be anything one could speak, and signifieds as things in the world. In fact, the relationship of language to parole (or speech-in-context) is and always has been a theoretical problem for linguistics (cf. Roman Jakobson's famous essay "Closing Statement: Linguistics and Poetics" et al.).
A famous thesis by Saussure states that the relationship between a sign and the real-world thing it denotes is an arbitrary one. There is not a natural relationship between a word and the object it refers to, nor is there a causal relationship between the inherent properties of the object and the nature of the sign used to denote it. For example, there is nothing about the physical quality of paper that requires denotation by the phonological sequence 'paper'. There is, however, what Saussure called 'relative motivation': the possibilities of signification of a signifier are constrained by the compositionality of elements in the linguistic system (cf. Émile Benveniste's paper on the arbitrariness of the sign in the first volume of his papers on general linguistics). In other words, a word is only available to acquire a new meaning if it is identifiably different from all the other words in the language and it has no existing meaning. Structuralism was later based on this idea that it is only within a given system that one can define the distinction between the levels of system and use, or the semantic "value" of a sign.
Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) proposed a different theory. Unlike Saussure who approached the conceptual question from a study of linguistics and phonology, Peirce, considered the father of Pragmaticism, extended the concept of sign to embrace many other forms. He considered "word" to be only one particular kind of sign, and characterized sign as any mediational means to understanding. He covered not only artificial, linguistic and symbolic signs, but also all semblances (such as kindred sensible qualities), and all indicators (such as mechanical reactions). He counted as symbols all terms, propositions and arguments whose interpretation is based upon convention or habit, even apart from their expression in particular languages. He held that "all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs". The setting of Peirce's study of signs is philosophical logic, which he defined as formal semiotic, and characterized as a normative field following esthetics and ethics, as more basic than metaphysics, and as the art of devising methods of research. He argued that, since all thought takes time, all thought is in signs, that all thought has the form of inference (even when not conscious and deliberate), and that, as inference, "logic is rooted in the social principle", since inference depends on a standpoint that, in a sense, is unlimited. The result is a theory not of language in particular, but rather of the production of meaning, and it rejects the idea of a static relationship between a sign and what it represents: its object. Peirce believed that signs are meaningful through recursive relationships that arise in sets of three.
Even when a sign represents by a resemblance or factual connection independent of interpretation, the sign is a sign only insofar as it is at least potentially interpretable by a mind and insofar as the sign is a determination of a mind or at least a quasi-mind, that functions as if it were a mind, for example in crystals and the work of bees—the focus here is on sign action in general, not on psychology, linguistics, or social studies (fields Peirce also pursued).
A sign depends on an object in a way that enables (and, in a sense, determines) an interpretation, an interpretant, to depend on the object as the sign depends on the object. The interpretant, then, is a further sign of the object, and thus enables and determines still further interpretations, further interpretant signs. The process, called semiosis, is irreducibly triadic, Peirce held, and is logically structured to perpetuate itself. It is what defines sign, object and interpretant in general. As Jean-Jacques Nattiez put it, "the process of referring effected by the sign is infinite." (Peirce used the word "determine" in the sense not of strict determinism, but of effectiveness that can vary like an influence.)
Peirce further characterized the three semiotic elements as follows:
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Sign (semiotics)
In semiotics, a sign is anything that communicates a meaning that is not the sign itself to the interpreter of the sign. The meaning can be intentional, as when a word is uttered with a specific meaning, or unintentional, as when a symptom is taken as a sign of a particular medical condition. Signs can communicate through any of the senses, visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, or taste.
Two major theories describe the way signs acquire the ability to transfer information. Both theories understand the defining property of the sign as a relation between a number of elements. In semiology, the tradition of semiotics developed by Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), the sign relation is dyadic, consisting only of a form of the sign (the signifier) and its meaning (the signified). Saussure saw this relation as being essentially arbitrary (the principle of semiotic arbitrariness), motivated only by social convention. Saussure's theory has been particularly influential in the study of linguistic signs. The other major semiotic theory, developed by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), defines the sign as a triadic relation as "something which stands to somebody for something in some respect or capacity.” This means that a sign is a relation between the sign vehicle (the specific physical form of the sign), a sign object (the aspect of the world that the sign carries meaning about) and an interpretant (the meaning of the sign as understood by an interpreter). According to Peirce, signs can be divided by the type of relation that holds the sign relation together as either icons, indices or symbols. Icons are those signs that signify by means of similarity between sign vehicle and sign object (e.g. a portrait or map), indices are those that signify by means of a direct relation of contiguity or causality between sign vehicle and sign object (e.g. a symptom), and symbols are those that signify through a law or arbitrary social convention.
According to Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), a sign is composed of the signifier (signifiant), and the signified (signifié). These cannot be conceptualized as separate entities but rather as a mapping from significant differences in sound to potential (correct) differential denotation. The Saussurean sign exists only at the level of the synchronic system, in which signs are defined by their relative and hierarchical privileges of co-occurrence. It is thus a common misreading of Saussure to take signifiers to be anything one could speak, and signifieds as things in the world. In fact, the relationship of language to parole (or speech-in-context) is and always has been a theoretical problem for linguistics (cf. Roman Jakobson's famous essay "Closing Statement: Linguistics and Poetics" et al.).
A famous thesis by Saussure states that the relationship between a sign and the real-world thing it denotes is an arbitrary one. There is not a natural relationship between a word and the object it refers to, nor is there a causal relationship between the inherent properties of the object and the nature of the sign used to denote it. For example, there is nothing about the physical quality of paper that requires denotation by the phonological sequence 'paper'. There is, however, what Saussure called 'relative motivation': the possibilities of signification of a signifier are constrained by the compositionality of elements in the linguistic system (cf. Émile Benveniste's paper on the arbitrariness of the sign in the first volume of his papers on general linguistics). In other words, a word is only available to acquire a new meaning if it is identifiably different from all the other words in the language and it has no existing meaning. Structuralism was later based on this idea that it is only within a given system that one can define the distinction between the levels of system and use, or the semantic "value" of a sign.
Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) proposed a different theory. Unlike Saussure who approached the conceptual question from a study of linguistics and phonology, Peirce, considered the father of Pragmaticism, extended the concept of sign to embrace many other forms. He considered "word" to be only one particular kind of sign, and characterized sign as any mediational means to understanding. He covered not only artificial, linguistic and symbolic signs, but also all semblances (such as kindred sensible qualities), and all indicators (such as mechanical reactions). He counted as symbols all terms, propositions and arguments whose interpretation is based upon convention or habit, even apart from their expression in particular languages. He held that "all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs". The setting of Peirce's study of signs is philosophical logic, which he defined as formal semiotic, and characterized as a normative field following esthetics and ethics, as more basic than metaphysics, and as the art of devising methods of research. He argued that, since all thought takes time, all thought is in signs, that all thought has the form of inference (even when not conscious and deliberate), and that, as inference, "logic is rooted in the social principle", since inference depends on a standpoint that, in a sense, is unlimited. The result is a theory not of language in particular, but rather of the production of meaning, and it rejects the idea of a static relationship between a sign and what it represents: its object. Peirce believed that signs are meaningful through recursive relationships that arise in sets of three.
Even when a sign represents by a resemblance or factual connection independent of interpretation, the sign is a sign only insofar as it is at least potentially interpretable by a mind and insofar as the sign is a determination of a mind or at least a quasi-mind, that functions as if it were a mind, for example in crystals and the work of bees—the focus here is on sign action in general, not on psychology, linguistics, or social studies (fields Peirce also pursued).
A sign depends on an object in a way that enables (and, in a sense, determines) an interpretation, an interpretant, to depend on the object as the sign depends on the object. The interpretant, then, is a further sign of the object, and thus enables and determines still further interpretations, further interpretant signs. The process, called semiosis, is irreducibly triadic, Peirce held, and is logically structured to perpetuate itself. It is what defines sign, object and interpretant in general. As Jean-Jacques Nattiez put it, "the process of referring effected by the sign is infinite." (Peirce used the word "determine" in the sense not of strict determinism, but of effectiveness that can vary like an influence.)
Peirce further characterized the three semiotic elements as follows: