Discourse

"Written or spoken communication or debate;

A formal discussion of a topic in speech or writing;

A connected series of utterances; a text or conversation." (OED)

Academic Discourse

-rival texts, interpretations and evaluations and theories

Communication

All discourse is built on communication

-language: exchange of sings, symbols, and symbolic meanings

Signs and Symbols

Sign: "an object, quality, or event whose presence or occurrence indicates the probable presence or occurrence of something else" (OED)

Symbol: "a thing that represents or stands for something else, especially a material object representing something abstract" (OED)

Our Common System : ALPHABET

Semiotics/Semiology

The study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation

Foundational thinkers:

-Charles Sanders Peirce and Ferdinand de Saussure

-An object or concept is the signified

-The sign or symbol created to represent that object is the signifier

Connections are arbitrary, contextually dependent

Arbitrariness

Arbitrary ="based on random choice... rather than ant reason or system"(OED)

The Importance of Context

-same source material, radically different use and meaning

Implications ("So What?")

1. only within the terms of the sign system.

-creating meaning through representation

-Status = Wealth = Power

-Inclusion = Respect = Safe Space

-Biohazard = Danger = Avoid

-Authority = Power = Control

Meaning are neither stable nor universal

2. There is no "transcendental signifier"

-meaning depends on understanding one sign in relation to all the other signs within the relevant system

Meaning through Absence

-Sign-sets: signifiers of related, but not identical, signified objects (plants)

3. All sign systems are imbued with ideologies and therefore carry issues of power and representation

Example: Newspeak/Doublespeak

-language intended to obscure the actual events it is describing

A sign = A representation  AND  A representation = A sign

-authority

Representations through presence

We know something is "a " because it is not "b"

-if a person is not a man, then she is a women

Transcendental signifier (does not exist)

-A singular, quintessential signifier that gives meaning to all related signs

-We cannot use particular sign to define and to give meaning to the entire signifier-signified system