2. Barry Emery Week 3: Semiotics
211MKT Buyer Behaviour
Barry Emery
Week 3: Semiotics

3. This week’s objectives
To explore communication as generation, negotiation and exchange of meaning
To understand the concept of the sign, paradigm and syntagm
To understand the use of semiotics in marketing communications
To review the contributions of Saussure and Peirce to understanding semiotics

4. Communication, meaning and signs
Linear / process
Message transmission
Steps and stages
Message direction
Receiver (passive)

5. A linear process of communication?
Source /
Sender
Encoding
Decoding
Receiver /
Audience
Channel
MESSAGE
Response Feedback Loop
Noise

6. Communication, meaning and signs
Linear / process
Message transmission
Steps and stages
Message direction
Receiver (passive)
Meaning generation
What makes marks on paper and sounds in the air a message?
Messages have significance as a result of the relationships between the elements involved
Reader of messages (active)

7. Semiotics
The study of signs ‘The study of the social production of meaning from sign systems’ O’Sullivan et al (1994) ‘a science that studies the life of signs within society’ Ferdinand de Saussure (1916)

8. Sign
‘an all-inclusive notion that comprises words, visualisations, tactile objects, olfactory sensations and anything else that is perceived by the senses and has the potential to communicate meaning…’ Shimp (2008)

9. Sign Has 3 essential characteristics: Physical form
Refer to something other than itself
Recognised and used as a sign - that is, it is an element in a shared cultural code or system

10. Sign A present for my wife… Cabbage Cactus Rose
White rose – surrender?
Red rose – passion?

11. Saussure (1916) sees a constant dynamic interaction between the two elements of the sign
SIGNIFIER S I G N
SIGNIFIED
See Cobley and Jansz (1997)

12. Sign
Saussure (1916) Sign has two constituent elements: Red rose - a flower = the signifier: its physical form as perceived by our senses - denotative meaning - objective Red rose - passionate love = the signified: the mental concept referred to by the sign - connotative meaning - subjective

13. Using signs…
The same sign can mean different things to different people at different times, in different contexts Red rose Partido Socialista Obrero Español A traditional gift given to women in Cataluña on 23rd April – El dia de San Jordi

14. Semiotics: 3 areas of study
The sign
The codes and systems into which signs are organised. Codes involve ‘choice and chain’ – ‘paradigm and syntagm’
The culture within which signs and codes operate. Meaning is dependent on shared structures of understanding, shared cultural codes.

15. (Connotative meaning)
Peirce
Sign
(Connotative meaning)
Object
(Denotative meaning)
Interpretant
See Jappy (2016)

16. Peirce
Double ended arrows emphasise that each term is understood in relation to the others
Interpretant = the effect of the sign in the mind of the reader
The interpretation of the object (as a sign) is dependent on and derives from the receiver’s experience of that sign
Sign
Interpretant
Object

17. Paradigm
Paradigm – a set of signs from which a particular sign is chosen. A paradigm is a set of signs that are interchangeable within a given context. The choice made from a particular set will be highly significant.

18. Semiotics: 3 areas of study
Paradigmatic analysis – what signs have been chosen at the expense of others?
Soldier
Guerrilla
Spy
Terrorist
Freedom fighter
Meaning is partly determined and understood in relation to other signs in the same code/system and determined by what it is not.

19. Paradigms: What signs have been chosen at the expense of others?
Units in a paradigm must have something in common … must share characteristics that determine their membership of that paradigm
What signs have been chosen at the expense of others?
(Paradigmatic analysis – meaning is distinguished from others)

20. Syntagm
Syntagm – a ‘chain’ of signs which are combined or organised in a meaningful order from a paradigmatic set of choices.
A sentence – a syntagm of words (signs)
A melody – a syntagm of notes (signs)

21. Syntagms
Menus are paradigmatic lists
Starter
Main course
Dessert
Diners choose individual dishes to produce their meal – the syntagm
The combination of chosen signs which produce a syntagm is rule-governed
(so no one chooses chocolate cake followed by roast lamb rounded off with herring pate)

22. Culture
Meaning is dependent on shared structures of understanding, shared cultural codes.
‘Semiotics gave the reader something to do’
Hartley (2002)
The reader plays an active role in the meaning-making process

23. References
Cobley, P and Jansz, L. (1997) Semiotics for Beginners London: Totem Books. Hartley, J. (2002) Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key Concepts, London: Routledge. Jappy, T (2016) Peirces Twenty-Eight Classes of Signs and the Philosophy of Representation (Bloomsbury Advances in Semiotics) London: Bloomsbury. O’Sullivan, T. et al. (1994) Key Concepts in Communication and Cultural Studies (Studies in Culture and Communication) London: Routledge. Shimp, T. A. (2008) Advertising Promotion, and Other Aspects of Integrated Marketing Communications New York: South-Western.