The Basics

Question 1

Arbitrariness/Motivation

Answer 1

Relationship between signifier and signified is not necessary, intrinsic or natural.

Question 2

Binary Opposition

Answer 2

Pairs of mutually exclusive signifiers in a paradigm set representing categories which are logically opposed ex. alive/ not alive

Question 3

Channel

Answer 3

A sensory mode utilized by a medium. Available channels are dictated by the technical features of the medium in which text appears.

Question 4

Codes

Answer 4

Semiotic codes are procedural systems of related conventions for correlating signifiers and signifies in certain domains. They provide framework within which signs make sense.

Question 5

Deconstruction

Answer 5

A poststructuralist strategy for textual analysis, which was developed by Jacques Derrida. Practitioners seek to dismantle the rhetorical structures within a text to demonstrate how key concepts within it depeond on their unstated oppositional relation to absent signifiers.

Question 6

Diachronic/Synchronic

Answer 6

Analysis of codes over time. Analysis of codes as if frozen in time.

Question 7

Discourse

Answer 7

A system of representation consisting of a set of representational codes for constructing and maintaining particular forms of reality within the ontological domain defined as relevant to its concerns

Question 8

Double Articulation

Answer 8

A semiotic code which has two abstract structural levels. 1st containing small meaning full units such as words. 2nd containing minimal units that lack meaning in themselves such as speech

Question 9

Indexical

Answer 9

A mode in which the signifier is not purely arbitrary but is directly connected in some way to the signified,

Question 10

Iconic

Answer 10

A mode in which the signifier is perceived as resembling or imitating the signified. Being similar in possessing some of its qualities.

Question 11

Langue/Parole

Answer 11

Langue being the system and language. Parole being a particular item of the whole.

Question 12

Markedness

Answer 12

Paired signifiers consist of an unmarked form and a marked form distinguished by some special semiotic feature. Applies to both signfiers and their signifieds

Question 13

Metaphor

Answer 13

involves one signified acting as a signifier referring to a rather different signified. Symbolic and Iconic

Question 14

Metonymy

Answer 14

Figure of speech that invovles using one signified to stand for another signified which is directly related to it or closely associated.

Question 15

Modality

Answer 15

Reality status accorded to or claimed by a sign, text or genre.

Question 16

Myth

Answer 16

Strauss- Systems of binary alignments mediating between nature and culture. Barthes- dominant discourses of contemporary culture. metalanguage operating through codes and serving the ideological function of naturalization.

Question 17

Dominant Code and Reading

Answer 17

Ideological code in which the decoder fully shares the text’s codes and accepts and reproduces the preferred reading.

Question 18

Negotiated Code and Reading

Answer 18

Idelogical code in which the reader partly shares the text;s code and broadly accepts the preferred reading, but sometimes resists and modifies it in a way which reflects their own social position, experiences and interests.

Question 19

Oppositional Code and Reading

Answer 19

Ideological code in which the the reader, whose social situation places them in a directly oppositional relation to the dominant code, understands the preferred reading but does not share the texts code and rejects this reading, bringing to bear an alternative ideological code.

Question 20

Paradigmatic

Answer 20

Structuralist technique which seeks to identify the various paradigms which underlie the surface structure of a text.

Question 21

Paradigm

Answer 21

Set of associated signifiers which are all members of some defining category, but in which each signifier is significantly different. For instance, Verbs and Nouns as a part of natural language.

Question 22

Syntagmatic

Answer 22

Structuralist technique which seeks to establish the surface structure of a text and the relationship between its parts

Question 23

Syntagm

Answer 23

Orderly combination of interacting signifiers which forms a meaningful whole. Sequential or Spatial.

Question 24

Shifter

Answer 24

Term for indexical symbols in language-grammatical units with an indexical characer- such as personal pronouns.

Question 25

Simulacrum

Answer 25

A sign that has no reference in the real world. Denny’s Hobbit meal.