Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler

This chapter on codes is essentially an analysis of how we analyze. To understand how we make sense of our environment is the on going search for the finite in the infinite. The codes used to translate the ‘everyday world’ vary between cultures and have changed over time. These conventions of interpretation take root from the time we are born. “With familiar codes we are rarely conscious of our acts of interpretation.” The classification of codes is an attempt to understand the internal structure of this unconscious system. The concept of 'figure' and 'ground' in Gestalt psychology shows that consistent interpretations are favored over those that are irregular. “Once we know the code, decoding it is almost automatic and the code retreats to invisibility.” Analyzing the reasons behind what is understood as fundamental can reveal parts of the stucture that frames our existence.

Modern Hieroglyphs / Language of Dreams By Ellen Lupton and Abbott Miller

Otto Neurath’s theory of ‘logical positivism’ reminded me of the “rational observation’ scientists use to investigate a hypothesis. Unlike the scientific method, an international system of uniform typography is culturally specific and must be learned. The reduction and consistency of an image results in generic silhouettes that can be interpreted both literally and conceptually. Pictograms try to clarify the relationship between the parts of a whole and demonstrate how something works. Isotype may transcend some limitations of letters, however, these neutral silhouettes are limited by their own simplicity.

I have never been successful in deciphering my dreams… until now. I’ve used the Freudian dream decoder and I understand why I was dangling fifty feet in the air from a novelty balloon last night. By exchanging the direct, literal meaning of these images for indirect substitutions I’ve concluded that my dreams are weird. There are so many possible associations in memory, sound, and physical structure that eventually meaning is whatever you want it to be. How Freud interprets the dream world is not so different than how we interpret reality. Before reading this article I never realized how sophisticated the Japanese language was. 40,000 signs that have separate symbols for words and parts of words that might sound the same but have different meanings and look differently. Imagine all the possible interpretations of a Japanese dream!

Constructing the Swastika, by Jennifer Hadden

In third grade my friend showed me a drawing that he made on his desk. I was fascinated by its symmetry and tried to copy it… we were both sent to the principal’s office. Neither of us knew that it was a swastika. My friend’s grandfather grew up in Nazi Germany and the symbol was passed down to him without context. The principal explained that it was a very bad symbol. As a teenager I saw the symbol studying Buddhism and was surprised to learn that it had a completely opposite meaning. A Manji, “a symbol that can mean good luck or represent a Buddhist temple,” is now “irreversibly marked by Nazism, and thus a reviled form that cannot be ‘emptied’ of its meaning.” The origin of this symbol may have been derived independently in many cultures around the globe. It is interesting that M. Schliemann and Hitler used the ancient swastika as a tool to unite Germany under a mythical Aryan-German Identity. Political symbols can produce their own meaning by controlling how they are experienced. “The Swastika may ‘mean’ the Nazis, but it is the Nazis that give the symbol its meaning.” The history of powerful symbols; and the set of assumptions, values, and practices that allow them to exist; can offer a new perspective on how we represent reality.

What is a sign?

I found C.S. Pierce’s ‘Grand Logic’ over-generalizing and too matter of fact. I suppose that’s what happens when you try to divide the entire conscious experience into three universal categories. Three states of mind, interest, signs, and likenesses defining our existence. I feel confined when reading the absolute rules of how I am to understand something. Even though I see applications for categorizing logical thought, C.S. Pierce doesn’t leave room for any exceptions with statements like, ‘…pictures alone, —pure likenesses, —can never convey the slightest information’. I disagree with this. People derive simple information and the deepest meaning from everyday likenesses. A random example: Wow that grease stain looks like the Virgin Mary, therefore, this McDonalds bag must be holy. Another point of confusion was the difference between feeling and Feeling. ‘As the most rudimentary sense of Reaction involves two states of Feeling, so it will be found that the most rudimentary Thought involves three states of Feeling.’ If I’m paraphrasing this correctly: people are not able to think about one feeling without that feeling reacting with another. There are many examples of people focusing their thoughts on one feeling. Singular thoughts develop knowledge founded in ignorance, which is a common way to form a bias. I think it is necessary to challenge generalizations to understand why they exist and how our human consciousness can fit so neatly into groups of three.