MediaSpace Wiki

Intercultural Spr2006 Sess15

Index Card Assignment due today

Select one of the signs we identified in this scene. Describe three different meanings that might be associated with this sign.

Language and Semiotics

• Language and Meaning
  • The search for universals in language and meaning
    • Comparative Languages
  • Language affects how we see the world
  • Semantic Dimensions of Language
    • Evaluation
    • Potency
    • Activity
• Language and Perception
  • The Nominalist Position: Language as a tool of perception
  • The relativist Position: Language as a shaper of perception
  • The qualified relativist position: Language as a tool of perception that shapes perception.
  • Research generally suggests that perception is uniform and that language has only minor effects on perception
• Cultural Variation
  • Language has power
    • Which some languages express with different levels of formality
  • Communication Style
    • Tonal coloring
    • Metamessages
    • High-context versus low-context
    • Dimensions
      • Direct versus Indirect
      • Elaborate versus Understated
  • Contextual Rules
• Language and Power
  • Co-Cultural
    • Dominant groups set the baseline for social meaning
    • Nondominant groups must adapt
      • Common Strategies
        • Nonassertive: e.g. covering
        • Assertive
        • Aggressive
  • Semiotics
    • Semiosis
    • Signs
      • Signifier and Signified
        • Barthes: layers of meaning and "myths"
  • Discourse and Social Structure

• the signified that we associate with a signifier depends on the context
  • other signifiers, including anchors and frames
  • in radio and, especially, television, multiple meanings are presented together using different languages