CMN 2173 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Canadian English, Semiotics, Binary Opposition
17 Feb 2017
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Structuralism approach: people understand the world in binary opposition (high vs. low, me vs. Semioticians disagree, say human agency is not controlled but is its own structure in itself (leads to structuration) Structure and agency: structures determine how society operates, and these put pressure on agency (the will of a person to make their own decisions, autonomy) Structuration: the relationship between structure and agency (push and pull, how they interact) In structuration, the subject (the agency) becomes another structure that acts upon other structures, with agency we question meaning. Structuralism focus on the big general rules of language, semiotics studies speech and how according to agency different speech is produced (meaning changes because the subject changes too) Signifier: the material element, sound, or marks on paper (the element that expresses meaning, eg. the word cat) The signified: the concept with which the signifier is associated (eg. an idea of a cat) The referent: the concrete thing (an actual specific cat)
