24,656
edits
Changes
Sign
,no edit summary
====Saussurean Sign====
[[Image:SAUSSUREANSIGN.gif|thumb|200px|right|[[Sign|The Saussurean Sign]]]]
[[Saussure]] represented the [[sign]] by means of a diagram.<ref>[[Saussure|Saussure, Ferdinand de]]. (1916) ''[[Saussure|Course in General Linguistics]]'', ed. Charles Bally and Albert Sechehaye, trans. Wade Baskin, Glasgow: Collins Fontana. p.114</ref>
For [[Lacan]], this [[algorithm]] defines "the [[topography]] of the [[unconscious]]."<ref>{{E}} p.163</ref>
=====Charles S. Peirce=====
According to [[Peirce]], the [[sign]] is something whcih represents an [[object]] to some interpretant (the term "object can mean, for [[Peirce]], a physical thing, an event, an idea, or another [[sign]]).
[[Peirce]] divides [[signs]] into three classes: "[[symbol]]s", "[[index|indices]]" and "[[icon]]s," which differ in the way they relate to the [[object]].
The [[symbol]] has no "natural" or necessary relationship to the [[object]] it refers to, but is related to the [[object]] by a purely conventional rule.
The [[index]] has an "existential relation" to the [[object]] it represents (i.e. the [[index]] is always spatially or temporally contiguous to the [[object]]).
The [[icon]] represents an [[object]] by exhibiting its form via similarity.
[[Peirce]]'s distinctions between [[icon]]s, [[index|indices]] and [[symbol]]s are analytical and not intended to be mutually exclusive.
Hence a [[sign]] will almost always function in a variety of modes; personal pronouns, for example, are [[sign]]s which function both symbolically and indexically.
=====Jacques Lacan=====
[[Lacan]] takes up [[Peirce]]'s concept of the [[index]] in order to distinguish between the [[psychoanalytic]] and medical concepts of the [[symptom]], and to distinguish between (animal) [[code]]s and (human) [[language]]s.
[[Lacan]] also develops the concept of the [[index]] along the lines set down by [[Roman Jakobson]] in the concept of the [[shifter]], to distinguish between the [[subject]] of the [[statement]] and the [[subject]] of the [[enunciation]].
==See Also==
* [[Index]]
* [[Language]]
* [[Metaphor]]
* [[Signified]]
* [[Signifying Chain]]
* [[Shifter]]
* [[Subject]]
* [[Symbol]]
== References ==
