Language Visual Essay

Pierce - Semiotics
 Roland Barthe - Semiotics

Firske and Hartley - Semiotics and Representation

What is Media Language ?
Every medium has its own ‘language’ ( or combination of languages). These are used to communicate meaning which the audience and for them to understand them, as they are familiar with the codes and conventions used. Understanding the grammar, syntax and metaphor system of media language increases our appreciation and enjoyment of media experiences as well as helping us to be less susceptible to manipulation.

Media Language can be shown in a variety of ways, for example TV shows elements of verbal, written language, moving images and sound. Language and sound can be used to reach into the emotional core of humans. For Example the John Lewis Christmas Advert 2014 shows this:

Charles Sanders Peirce (1931) - Semiotics

 

 

Peirce said we only think only in signs, "Nothing is a sign unless it is interpreted as a sign". These signs take the form of words, images, sounds, odours, flavours, acts or objects, but such things have no intrinsic meaning. Therefore these signs only become signs when we invert them with meaning. Different cultures and personal experiences determine how we create a meaning for these signs. 

Anything can be a sign as long as someone interprets it as 'signifying' something - referring to or standing for something other than itself. We interpret things as signs largely unconsciously by relating them to familiar systems of conventions. It is this meaningful use of signs which is at the heart of the concerns of semiotics.

 

 

Peirce 3 Types Of Signs

 

1. Icon/iconic: A mode in which the signifier is perceived as resembling or imitating the signified (recognizably looking, sounding, feeling, tasting or smelling like it) - being similar in possessing some of its qualities: e.g. 'realistic' sounds in 'programme music', sound effects in radio drama, a dubbed film soundtrack.

 

2.Index/indexical: A mode in which the signifier is not arbitrary but is directly connected in some way (physically or causally) to the signified - this link can be observed or inferred: e.g. 'natural signs' (smoke, thunder, footprints, echoes ) or medical symptoms (pain, a rash, pulse-rate) or measuring instruments (weathercock, thermometer, clock, spirit-level) These link symbols to meaning e.g Clock = Time

 

3.Symbol/symbolic: A mode in which the signifier does not resemble the signified but which is fundamentally arbitrary or purely conventional - so that the relationship must be learnt: e.g. language in general (plus specific languages, alphabetical letters, punctuation marks, words, phrases and sentences), numbers, morse code, traffic lights, national flags.

Roland Barthes (1967) - Semiotics

In semiotics, denotation and connotation are terms describing the relationship between the signifier and its signified, and an analytic distinction is made between two types of signifieds: a denotative signified and a connotative signified. Meaning includes both denotation and connotation.

Barthes argued that in photography a connotation can be (analytically) distinguished from the denotation. What we see and how be interpret something is different. 

Saussure's model of the sign focused on denotation at the expense of connotation and it was left to subsequent theorists (notably Barthes himself) to offer an account of this important dimension of meaning .

We all share these ideas f
Myths
Related to connotation is what refers to as myth. For Barthes myths were the dominant ideologies of our time. Ideology is reflective to beliefs and and ideologies.

Firske and Hartley (1982) - Semiotics and Representation

T    The 1st and 2nd orders of signification called denotation and connotation combine to produce ideology - which has been described as a third order of signification.

Paradigms and Syntagms

Roman Jakobson (1956)

Jakobson and later Claude Levi-Strauss, emphasized that meaning arises from the differences between signifiers. 

These differences are of two kinds: syntagmatic (concerning positioning, high angle, tilt. The audience becomes positioned in a certain way ) and paradigmatic (concerning substitution, choice such a props, narrative events such as Horror vs Sci-fi). 

Genres are paradigms (models) which can have different meaning determined by structure. In film and television, paradigms include ways of changing shot (such as cut, fade, dissolve and wipe). The medium or genre are also paradigms, and particular media texts derive meaning from the ways in which the medium and genre used differs from the alternatives. Such as Alien , which is Horror and Sci-fi ...... .....

   

This therefore requires us to use semiotic terminology to explain our encoding of elements and codes and conventions within our texts. For example a low angle is used to create a certain meaning , such as showing a dominant character looking down on a weaker character.

Other Language Theorists

Linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (1974)

 - Working 1910s but work wasn't published until 1974.
- Offered a 'dyadic' or two-part model of the sign.
- He defined a sign as being composed of two elements:
  ---The 'signifier’ (Denotation) - the form which the sign takes
  ---The 'signified’ (Connotation) - the concept it represents

     

 

How is media language represented in Sam Smith-Lay Me Down ?

Between 0:00 and 0:25 , the introduction of this music video, there is silence. This has been done to demonstrate the typical start of a funeral. Funerals are places of morning and remembrance for the death of a loved one. As the camera pans around Smith it is evident that he is a time of morning. Through the use of mise-en-scene, the camera pans across burnt out candles which according to Pierce is a sign which can be identified into three types , Icon, Index and Symbol.

Insert candles

Peirce 3 types of signs:

1. Icon/iconic: A mode in which the signifier is perceived as resembling or imitating the signified (recognizably looking, sounding, feeling, tasting or smelling like it) - being similar in possessing some of its qualities: e.g. 'realistic' sounds in 'programme music', sound effects in radio drama, a dubbed film soundtrack.
2. Index/indexical: A mode in which the signifier is not arbitrary but is directly connected in some way (physically or causally) to the signified - this link can be observed or inferred: e.g. 'natural signs' (smoke, thunder, footprints, echoes ) or medical symptoms (pain, a rash, pulse-rate) or measuring instruments (weathercock, thermometer, clock, spirit-level) These link symbols to meaning e.g Clock = Time
3. Symbol/symbolic: A mode in which the signifier does not resemble the signified but which is fundamentally arbitrary or purely conventional - so that the relationship must be learnt: e.g. language in general (plus specific languages, alphabetical letters, punctuation marks, words, phrases and sentences), numbers, morse code, traffic lights, national flags