Already a subscriber? - Login here
Not yet a subscriber? - Subscribe here

Browse by:



Displaying: 1-20 of 44 documents


1. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Kalevi Kull, Kati Lindström, Mihhail Lotman, Timo Maran, Silvi Salupere

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

ecosemiotics

2. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Kati Lindström, Kalevi Kull, Hannes Palang

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The article provides an overview of different approaches to the semiotic study of landscapes both in the field of semiotics proper and in landscape studiesin general. The article describes different approaches to the semiotic processes in landscapes from the semiological tradition where landscape has been seen as analogous to a text with its language, to more naturalized and phenomenological approaches, as well as ecosemiotic view of landscapes that goes beyond anthropocentric definitions. Special attention is paid to the potential of cultural semiotics of Tartu–Moscow school for the analysis of landscapes and the possibilities held by a dynamic, dialogic and holistic landscape definition for the development of ecosemiotics.
3. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Kati Lindström, Kalevi Kull, Hannes Palang

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
4. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Kati Lindström, Kalevi Kull, Hannes Palang

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
5. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Riin Magnus

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The term “time-plan” is introduced in the article to sum up the diversity of temporal processes described by Jakob von Uexküll (1864–1944) in the frameworkof the general Planmässigkeit of nature. Although Uexküll hardly had any connections with his contemporary philosophies of time, the theme of the subjectivetimes and timing of the organisms forms an essential part of his umwelt theory. As an alternative to the dominance of evolutionary time in biological discussions, Uexküll took perceptual and developmental times of organisms as his natural scientific priorities. While discussing the characteristics of the latter, Uexküll departs from an epigenetic position. Discussion about perceptual time entails detecting the primary units of time (moments) as well as how the succession of moments results in the perception of movement. The last part of the article will explicate the significance of the “time plan” concept for biophilosophical discussions. It is suggested that the bioethical question rising from Uexküll’s works may take the following form: do other biological subjects besides humans have a right to their own timing?
6. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Riin Magnus

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
7. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Riin Magnus

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

sociosemiotics

8. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Andreas Ventsel

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
This paper attempts to integrate discourse theories, mainly the theory of hegemony by Essex School, and Tartu–Moscow School’s cultural semiotics, andsets for itself the modest task to point to the applicability of semiotic approach in political analysis. The so-called post-foundationalist view, that is common for discourse theories, is primarily characterized by the rejection of essentialist notions of ground for the social, and the inauguration of cultural and discursive characteristics (such as asymmetry and entropy; explosion; antagonism; insurmountable tension between organization and disorganization, regularity and irregularity, etc.) into the wider social scientific paradigm. Customarily, those characteristics have been attributed to contingent or peripheral events and phenomena that by nature do not belong to the social structure proper. Grounds for such ‘groundless’ contingencies are found in philosophy (Marchart), or for instance from the psychoanalytic notion of affect (Laclau). Many discourse theorists proceed here from Derrida’s position that in the process of signification there is an overabundance of meaning which renders final closure impossible (Howarth; Glynos). However, it seems that despite placing communication at the heart of their conceptions of discourse, the communicative character of constructing power relations remains undertheorized in those conceptions. This article attempts to approach the above mentioned problem by way of the concepts of communication and autocommunication (Lotman). The outcomes stemming from the latter are unavoidable, since the result of any possible research (text) itself belongs to culture or a larger discourse and opera tes as the organizing function of the latter. Hence, research practice and its results always need to be looked at as mutually affecting each other.
9. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Andreas Ventsel

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
10. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Andreas Ventsel

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
11. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Anti Randviir

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
Contemporary sociosemiotics is a way to transcend borderlines between trends inside semiotics, and also other disciplines. Whereas semiotics has been considered as an interdisciplinary field of research par excellence, sociosemiotics can point directions at transdisciplinary research. The present article will try toconjoin the structural and the processual views on culture and society, binding them together with the notion of signification. The signification of space willillustrate the dynamic between both cultures and metacultures, and cultural mainstreams and subcultures. This paper pays attention to the practice of sociocultural semiotisation of space and territorialisation by diverse examples and different sociocultural levels that imply semiotic cooperation between several members of groups that can be characterised as socii. We analyse territorialisation by graffiti, by furnishing spatial environment through artistic manners, by shaping the semiotic essence of cities through naming, renaming and translating street names, by pinning and structuring territories with monuments, by landmarking and mapping cultural space through individualisation of cities. We will see how principles of semiotisation of space are valid on different levels (individual and social, formal and informal, democratic and hegemonic, cultural and subcultural) and how these principles form a transdisciplinary object of study as ‘semiotisation of space’, and how space can be regarded as a genuinely transdisciplinary research object. Individual, culture, and society are connected in such an object both as constituents and as a background of study.
12. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Anti Randviir

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
13. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Anti Randviir

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
14. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Tiit Remm

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The city is a complex sociocultural phenomenon where space and time are simultaneously parts of itself and parts of its conceptualisation. In the paper I draw out three general perspectives where the city is characterised by different spatialities and temporalities. The urban space can thus be a space of rhythms and practices, an objectified dimension of the settlement, and a symbolic form in interpretations and creations of cities. The city can be understood as a semioticwhole by considering varying semiotic natures of the urban space.
15. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Tiit Remm

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
16. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Tiit Remm

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
17. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Vadim Verenich

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The issue of reciprocal relationships between the logic of law, positivistic theory of the logic of law, and legal semiotics is among the most important questionsof the modern theoretical jurisprudence. This paper has not attempted to provide any comprehensive account of the modern jurisprudence (and legal logic).Instead, the emphasis has been laid on those aspects of positivist legal theories, logical studies of law and legal semiotics that allow tracing the common pointsor the differences between these paradigms of legal research. One of the theses of the present work is that, at the comparative methodological level, the limits oflegal semiotics and its object of inquiry could only be defined in relation to legal positivism and logical studies of law. This paper also argues for a proper positionfor legal semiotics in between legal positivism and legal logic. The differences between legal positivism, legal logic and legal semiotics are best captured in theissue of referent.
18. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Vadim Verenich

view |  rights & permissions | cited by
19. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Vadim Verenich

view |  rights & permissions | cited by

semiotics of naming

20. Sign Systems Studies: Volume > 39 > Issue: 2/4
Ülle Pärli

abstract | view |  rights & permissions | cited by
The present article is divided into two parts. Its theoretical introductory part takes under scrutiny how proper name has been previously dealt with in linguistics, philosophy and semiotics. The purpose of this short overview is to synthesise different approaches that could be productive in the semiotic analysis of naming practices. Author proposes that proper names should not be seen as a linguistic element or a type of (indexical) signs, but rather as a function that can be carried by different linguistic units. This approach allows us to develop a transdisciplinary basis for a wider understanding of naming as a sociocultural practice. The empirical part of the article uses one certain village in Estonia in Laane-Virumaa district as an example to demonstrate how toponyms structure the social space, how they carry the memory and how naming practice highlights such changes in the semiotic behaviour of the social life that otherwise could have remained hidden.