Semiotics: what it is and how it relates to communication

Semiotics, also known as semiology or sign theory, is the study of how we use signs to create and transmit meanings and meanings while we communicate.

It is a theory that has had important repercussions in the human and social sciences because it has helped us to understand in a way deep our communication, the interactions we establish as well as some elements of the contexts where we develop.

Below we review in a general way what semiotics is, what are some of its antecedents and the effects it has had on the social and human sciences.

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What is semiotics?

Semiotics is the scientific discipline that is responsible for studying the signs and the ways in which meaning is constructed and transmitted during communication. It is part of the theories of language, where the sign is defined as the minimum unit of a sentence; an element (object, phenomenon, signal) that is used to represent or replace another that is not present; with which, the sign is an element loaded with meanings.

To study this, semiotics is divided into three main branches: semantics, pragmatics, and syntactics. Among its antecedents is Saussure's theory of signs, which is also known as semiology.

In fact, the term semiology comes from the Greek "semeion" which means sign. The antecedents of him can be found in the field of atomistic philosophy, and also in the seventeenth century, when John Locke spoke of semiotiké as a science or a set of principles to explain signs.

In the same century, the German philosopher Johann Lambert wrote a treatise where he addressed the same topic, already under the concept of semiotics. However, the most recognized antecedent of this discipline comes from the 20th century and from the studies of Ferdinand de Saussure and Charles Sanders Peirce.

Like any other discipline, semiotics has gone through different stages and It has been transformed according to different philosophical and scientific currents. Zecchetto (2002), speaks of three generations of semiotics: the first of them arose approximately in 1950 and is characterized by structuralist thought; the second, in 1970, has an approach that moves towards poststructuralism; and in the third, about 1980, the question arises about the interaction between the text and the interlocutor, which is why it is an interactionist paradigm.

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Semiotics or semiology? Differences

Although the answer largely depends on which author you ask, in general they are terms that are used interchangeably.

However, there are those who defend that semiology is the theoretical description of symbolic systems in general; and semiotics refers to the study of particular systems, for example, images, fashions, cinema, advertising, among others.

At a formal level, and especially since 1969 when the International Association for Semiotic Studies (IASS) was institutionalized, only one term is recognized: semiotics; to cover the two types of study we have mentioned.

Beyond the text: semiotics of the image

We humans communicate through almost all (if not all) of the things we do: what we say and what we don't; through our movements, gestures or postures, and even through more complex tools that involve our senses, such as advertising, movies, music, etc.

Therefore, semiotics is a science that has more than one method: it can investigate the meaning that is constructed and transmitted not only through oral language or language written, but can analyze, for example, an advertising poster and its elements (how its language is structured and used, images or aesthetic forms), and thus way understand what the meaning is, the meaning and even the effect or the relationship that one seeks to establish with the receivers.

Its importance in the social sciences

Semiotics has had an important impact on both the studies of language and communication human, as in the understanding of the psychological and social phenomena that are generated through this communication.

That is why semiotics is importantly related to the problem of knowledge, and with the way in which the signs allow us to reach it. In other words, semiotics, the study of signs, offers us a point of view on reality, and on the way in which things acquire and convey meaning, which has been especially helpful in extending the reach of science human.

Some of his criticisms revolve around the fact that semiotics is a discipline that tries to cover too many things, thus whose methods become diffuse and sometimes difficult to justify through scientific methods traditional.

Bibliographic references:

• Bobes, M. (1973). Semiotics as linguistic theory. Madrid: Editorial Gredos.
• International Association of Semiotic Studies (IASS). (S / A). Short Story. Retrieved April 10, 2018. Available in http://iass-ais.org/presentation-2/short-history/.
• Zecchetto, V. (2002). The dance of the signs. Notions of general semiotics. Ecuador: ABYA-YALA Editions.