Semiotics resume

Eva Nur Mazidah 120710209

Type and Tokens

Eco divides sign vehicles into types and tokens. Tokens are the example of type or the total number of words used. Type means different words used. Type and tokens influence how a text is interpreted. According to Eco, there are 3 kinds of sign vehicles namely signs consisting of several tokens of the same type, sign whose tokens having a peculiar quality of uniqueness, and signs whose token and type being identical.

Rematerializing the Sign

There are debates whether or nor the signifier and the signified are material. Saussure argued that they are non material ’psychological’ forms. They also deal with the type-token distinction. Therefore language signifiers are not physical. Other argument came from Pierce who proposed the materializing of the sign (signifier). He said that the materiality does not affect its representative function. Voloshinov also strengthened Pierce’s argument that a sign was a phenomenon of the external world and sign was particular, material things. For Freudian, the sound of signifier can guide to its possible signified. The Freudian also added concepts of condensation and displacement which described the chain relation between signified and signifier in dreams. Some thoughts are condensed into symbol while unconscious desire is displaced into a real trivial symbol. Another point of view, Derrida put forward his idea about this case. He said that words and texts were things (material).
According to Barthes, writing was dealing with the signifiers and letting the symbol take care of themselves. Thus, material objects function as signs (signifiers) not only in status symbols but also in their sense of personal and social identity. After sometimes, Bolter came up with his idea that there was no sign without medium. Sign may not be a material entity but it has a material dimension that brought its own principles of structure. Here the medium is not ‘neutral‘ because it has its own affordances and constraints (changed with cultural signification). Therefore, changing the medium will influence the signifieds.

Hjelmslev’s Framework

Hjelmslev proposed his idea about ‘planes’ of expression and content (signifier and signified). He had 4 categories in his framework namely substance of expression, form of expression, substance of content, and form of content. He allowed us to analyze text based on various dimensions to know the potential for signification.