Semiotics: Sign Structure in Peircean Semiotics

Hello and welcome dear colleagues and fellow researchers. 

Today, I will continue talking about Peircean semiotics. Today, we will discuss the Basic Sign Structure in Peircean Semiotics.

In one of his many definitions of a sign, Peirce writes:

"I define a sign as anything which is so determined by something else, called its Object, and so determines an effect upon a person, which effect I call its interpretant, that the later is thereby mediately determined by the former." (EP2, 478)

What we see here is Peirce’s basic claim that signs consist of three inter-related parts: a sign or representamen, an object, and an interpretant.

For the sake of simplicity, we can think of the sign or representamen as the signifier, for example, a written word, an utterance, smoke as a sign for fire, etc.

The object, on the other hand, is best thought of as whatever is signified, for example, the object to which the written or uttered word attaches, or the fire signified by the smoke.

The interpretant, the most innovative and distinctive feature of Peirce’s account, is best thought of as the understanding that we have of the sign-object relation.

The importance of the interpretant for Peirce is that signification is not a simple dyadic relationship between sign/representamen and object: a sign signifies only in being interpreted. This makes the interpretant central to the content of the sign, in that, the meaning of a sign is manifest in the interpretation that it generates in sign users.

That is all for today. Comment which concepts you want to know in more detail. Stay tuned.

Thank you. 

Source: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/peirce-semiotics/