LINGUIST List 12.2780

Wed Nov 7 2001

Books: Semiotics

Editor for this issue: Richard John Harvey <richardlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Sean Hanrahan, Semiotics: Semiotics; The Basics

Daniel Chandler, University of Wales, Aberystwyth,

SEMIOTICS: The Basics

"This is the best introduction to semiotics I have read.
Comprehensive, accessible and interesting, it is an invaluable
resource for both beginners and more advanced students." -Guy Cook,
University of Reading

Following the successful Basics format, this is the book for anyone
coming to semiotics for the first time. Using jargon- free language
and lively, up-to-date examples, Semiotics: The Basics demystifies
this highly interdisciplinary subject. Along the way, the reader will
find out what a sign and a text are, what codes we take for granted,
how semiotics can be used in textual analysis and who Saussure,
Pierce, Barthes and Jakobson are and why they are important. Features
include a glossary of key terms and realistic suggestions for further
reading. This book also has a highly-developed and long-established
online version of the book at:
www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B. Part of the Basics series.

February 2002: 288 pp: 28 illus
HB: 0415265932: $65.00 �30.00
PB: 0415265940: $15.95 �9.99

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Definitions
Traditions
Methodologies
Relation to Linguistics
Language and Parole
Why Study Semiotics?
1. Models of the Sign
Two Sides of a Page * The Relational System * Arbitrariness
The Peircean Model * Relativity * Symbolic Mode * Iconic Mode
Indexical Mode * Modes Not Types * Changing Relations *
Digital and Analogue * Types and Tokens
Rematerializing the Sign * Hjelmslev's Framework
2. Signs and Things
Naming Things * Referentiality * Modality
The Word Is Not the Thing * Empty Signifiers
3. Analyzing Structures
Horizontal and Vertical Axes *The Syntagmatic Dimension
Conceptual Relations * Spatial Relations * Sequential Relations
Structural Relations * The Paradigmatic Dimension
The Commutation Test * Oppositions *
The Language of Opposition * Us and Them * Alignment
Markedness * Valorizing Term B * The Semiotic Square
4. Challenging the Literal
Rhetorical Tropes * Metaphor * Metonymy * Synecdoche * Irony
Master Tropes * Denotation and Connotation * Myth
5. Codes
Types of Codes * Perceptual Codes * Social Codes
Textual Codes * Codes of Realism * Invisible Editing
Broadcast and Narrowcast Codes * Interaction of Textual Codes
Codification
6. Textual Interactions
Modes of Communication * The Positioning of the Subject
Adopting a Perspective * Modes of Address * Reading Positions
Intertextuality * Problematizing Authorship
Reading as Rewriting * No Text Is an Island * Intratextuality
Bricolage * Types and Degress of Intertextuality
7. Limitations and Strengths
Imperialism * Form and Function * Inescapable Frames
Post-structuralist Semiotics * Strengths of Semiotic Analysis
Mediation * The Construction of Meanings and Subjects
Semiotic Modes
Glossary
References
Index