The paper aims to make a contribution to semiotic research on the future by bringing together var... more The paper aims to make a contribution to semiotic research on the future by bringing together various approaches that deal with the relationship humans have with the future. More specifically, the paper concentrates on anticipation viewed as an activity that is based on modelling the (un)desired future as suggested by Nikolai Bernstein. The model-based approach to anticipation allows drawing connections between the psychophysiological and semiotically mediated forms of anticipation on the one hand, and between individual and collective forms of anticipation on the other hand. With these aims in mind, the paper offers a sketch of a semiotic approach to the future that is based on the framework of semiotic modelling systems, i.e. views the future in terms of models of it and the semiotic resources and processes involved in the model-building. As the semiotically mediated models of the future circulating in a culture can become collectively shared means of cognizing and anticipating so...
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Culture Theory, 2020
The growing plurality of approaches within human sciences calls for comparative and integrative p... more The growing plurality of approaches within human sciences calls for comparative and integrative perspectives that can map the similarities, complementarities and possible incompatibilities of approaches, bring to the fore their common episte-mological assumptions as well as points of divergence, and establish informed relations between the variety of theoretical and methodological means available in the human sciences. The comparative and integrative approaches have important roles in helping to avoid the traps of disciplinary self-absorption, disintegration of knowledge or multiplication of superficially novel insights. They are also a springboard for advancing new insights. [..] Next to the epistemology of manifold self- enclosed (disciplinary) universes, the disciplines juxtaposed in the article also offer an alternative trajectory – as highlighted by Ivana Marková (2000) – in the form of dialogical epistemology. Indeed, perhaps dialogue and translation will provide the next step beyond understanding the formation of human/cultural umwelts towards understanding the mechanisms that make it possible to rise above the self-enclosed human or cultural umwelt towards a more open world.
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Culture Theory. (Approaches to Culture Theory 8), 2020
The aim of this article is to study the internal and external boundaries of cultures of the past.... more The aim of this article is to study the internal and external boundaries of cultures of the past. Boundaries here include spatial and temporal, as well as functional boundaries. The exemplary cases analysed here include the archaeological cultures of tarand cemetery and long barrows. We will discuss the concept of archaeological culture and describe the features and boundaries that have frequently been used to distinguish the cultures of tarand cemetery and long barrows. In order to move closer to the lived culture that existed in the past along with its external and internal borders , we supplement the notion of archaeological culture with the semiotic model of culture and its notion of boundary. We test the applicability of semiotic theories to archaeological empirical material and develop a micro-, meso-, and macro-level system of description. The proposed theoretical and methodological scheme should highlight the cultural boundaries expressed within an individual grave, between graves, and between larger areas and eras. Having a sufficient amount of empirical material together with the system of description would enable tentative reconstruction of the self-model of cultural entities on different levels. Burial places are one of the possible semiotic systems that can be analysed in this manner. In this article, we did a micro-level description of a single burial in a tarand cemetery and in a barrow cemetery and mapped the analysed cases on the meso-and macro-levels. In the macro-level analysis, distinct boundaries can be observed in the burial rites and grave goods, but the greatest internal boundary is probably the one between the elite and the common people: the former buried their dead in monumental structures, while the majority of the people treated their dead in manners that have not left any archaeological traces. The macro-level analysis of graves also displays intentional transgressions of boundaries, such as mixing bones or the re-use of older burial sites, which appear to be features shared widely among the discussed cultures.
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the problematics of methodology in semiotics concerns the m... more Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the problematics of methodology in semiotics concerns the more fundamental question of the disciplinary nature of semiotics – whether se-miotics is, or should be, a theoretical discipline or an empirical discipline – or both – and the particular modes of inquiry deemed proper for each perspective. Although debating over the disciplinary nature, or, to put it more simply, over how to practice semiotics, in those terms might seem a thing of the past, the problematics reveals its acuteness each time the relationship between theories, methods and practices/applications, as well as their scope and meaning in semiotics is discussed. Yet what remains also latent in these discussions is a more fundamental question of the particular 'brand' of 'science' and 'scientificity' that semiotics is expected (or not) to align with. One of the results of leaving these issues implicit and unar-ticulated is the divide often seen between theory and method, or theoretical and empirical semiotics.This article attempts to demonstrate how modelling functions as a bridge between theory and method. Yet the value of this bridging depends exactly on acknowledging the more fundamental layers of semiotic inquiry. The main aim of the paper is to propose and develop the concept of metaphorical modelling as a particular methodological tool in se-miotic inquiry as well as the humanities more broadly. The role of metaphors in science is a known issue, however, there are few approaches that deal with it explicitly in the humanities, and as a methodological issue. The use of theories and concepts viewed as method brings to the fore the role of language in methodology. Thereby an awareness of the metaphorical functioning and processing of language becomes necessary for understanding how theoretical language is used in research.The article attempts to show that the traditional distinction between theoretical concepts as precise, literal and analytical, and metaphor as imprecise figure of speech is not adequate for understanding how theoretical constructs are used in the humanities in general and semiotics in particular. From this perspective, one can notice that the metaphorical use of theories, constructs and models has been central in the humanities and semiotics for a while. Thus better understanding of metaphor and of the metaphorical use of theoretical constructs could provide a basis for more explicit, precise and systematic use of metaphorical modelling as one speci c and valuable mode of inquiry among others. A er explicating the connections between method, theory, modelling and metaphor, the ar- ticle examines these issues in the context of semiotics, more particularly as pertaining to the cross-domain use of a model of the sign and cross-disciplinary use of models of language.
Title. The place of semiotics among modelling systems: notes towards the creative and play-type m... more Title. The place of semiotics among modelling systems: notes towards the creative and play-type modelling in human sciences
Abstract. The issue of modelling has been extensively studied in the context of natural sciences yet considerably less so in human sciences. The current article presents an attempt to do so with the help of the Tartu–Moscow School’s modelling systems theory. One of the motivations behind the article was an observation made while reading Lotman’s article „The place of art among other modeling systems” that there is certain similarity between his conception of artistic modelling and certain practices and ways of thinking in contemporary human sciences. To make some preliminary observations about the type of modelling in the human sciences, I study Lotman’s grounds for differentiating between scientific, play-type and artistic modelling. For that aim, I give first an overview of Lotman’s and the Tartu–Moscow School’s view on modelling systems, to bring forth features I consider to be central: understanding modelling systems in a cognitive and activity theoretical framework, the agency of modelling systems, the pragmatics of modelling activity, modelling as translation, attitude toward the con- ditionality of modelling as well as the multi-layeredness of modelling. Approaching modelling as translation opens up a perspective to elaborate on the nature of the creative modelling central to art. The attitude towards the conditionality of modelling, in turn, differentiates between scientific and play-type modelling. If we analyse Lotman’s distinction between two layers of semiotics – cultural and metasemiotics – from that perspective, his views on the role of scientific modelling in semiotics (and the human sciences more generally) can be inferred, more specifically the acknowledged need for another type of modelling besides scientific. On these grounds, I build the hypothesis that the modelling specific to the human sciences is a unique combination of scientific, creative and play-type modelling. While the issues of scientific modelling and creative modelling in the sciences have already found some attention, Lotman’s approach offers perspective for the study of play-type modelling in the human sciences.
Keywords: modelling systems, Lotman, semiotics, human sciences, cognition, creativity, conditionality
The founder of semiotics of cinema, Christian Metz set as the aim of his project to go to the bot... more The founder of semiotics of cinema, Christian Metz set as the aim of his project to go to the bottom of the metaphor of language that had been used widely for describing cinema in film theory, yet without taking into account the knowledge about language that had accumulated in linguistics. Thus the goal of early semiotics of cinema was to go beyond figural analogy and bring together the two domains of knowledge: knowledge about cinema and knowledge about language. However in the beginning there were difficulties with overcoming essentialist approach characteristic to classical film theory and using methodological approach that would model the language of cinema on the basis of the model of language proposed by the theory of language they use. The development of metaphor of language of cinema into semiotic model of language of cinema sheds light to semiotic modelling as methodological tool. Firstly the metaphor of language of cinema itself – either pre-theoretical or theoretical - can be seen as an attempt to make sense of novel phenomena through analogy or approximation with something already familiar. This stage resulted in ontological theories of language of cinema. Refining this rough analogy into the object of study required not only linguistic methods, but ultimately revision of epistemological underpinnings of the project. This meant acknowledging the difference between cinema as experienced and cinema as object of knowledge, arriving thereby at methodological theories of cinema that use semiotic modelling as a means for constructing the object of study.
Keywords: semiotic modelling, methodology, language of cinema, semiotics of cinema, metaphor
In order to estimate the current situation of teaching materials available in the field of semiot... more In order to estimate the current situation of teaching materials available in the field of semiotics, we are providing a comparative overview and a worldwide bibliography of introductions and textbooks on general semiotics published within last 50 years, i.e. since the beginning of institutionalization of semiotics. In this category, we have found over 130 original books in 22 languages. Together with the translations of more than 20 of these titles, our bibliography includes publications in 32 languages. Comparing the authors, their theoretical backgrounds and the general frames of the discipline of semiotics in different decades since the 1960s makes it possible to describe a number of predominant tendencies. In the extensive bibliography thus compiled we also include separate lists for existing lexicons and readers of semiotics as additional material not covered in the main discussion. The publication frequency of new titles is growing, with a certain depression having occurred in the 1980s. A leading role of French, Russian and Italian works is demonstrated.
The paper aims to make a contribution to semiotic research on the future by bringing together var... more The paper aims to make a contribution to semiotic research on the future by bringing together various approaches that deal with the relationship humans have with the future. More specifically, the paper concentrates on anticipation viewed as an activity that is based on modelling the (un)desired future as suggested by Nikolai Bernstein. The model-based approach to anticipation allows drawing connections between the psychophysiological and semiotically mediated forms of anticipation on the one hand, and between individual and collective forms of anticipation on the other hand. With these aims in mind, the paper offers a sketch of a semiotic approach to the future that is based on the framework of semiotic modelling systems, i.e. views the future in terms of models of it and the semiotic resources and processes involved in the model-building. As the semiotically mediated models of the future circulating in a culture can become collectively shared means of cognizing and anticipating so...
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Culture Theory, 2020
The growing plurality of approaches within human sciences calls for comparative and integrative p... more The growing plurality of approaches within human sciences calls for comparative and integrative perspectives that can map the similarities, complementarities and possible incompatibilities of approaches, bring to the fore their common episte-mological assumptions as well as points of divergence, and establish informed relations between the variety of theoretical and methodological means available in the human sciences. The comparative and integrative approaches have important roles in helping to avoid the traps of disciplinary self-absorption, disintegration of knowledge or multiplication of superficially novel insights. They are also a springboard for advancing new insights. [..] Next to the epistemology of manifold self- enclosed (disciplinary) universes, the disciplines juxtaposed in the article also offer an alternative trajectory – as highlighted by Ivana Marková (2000) – in the form of dialogical epistemology. Indeed, perhaps dialogue and translation will provide the next step beyond understanding the formation of human/cultural umwelts towards understanding the mechanisms that make it possible to rise above the self-enclosed human or cultural umwelt towards a more open world.
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Culture Theory. (Approaches to Culture Theory 8), 2020
The aim of this article is to study the internal and external boundaries of cultures of the past.... more The aim of this article is to study the internal and external boundaries of cultures of the past. Boundaries here include spatial and temporal, as well as functional boundaries. The exemplary cases analysed here include the archaeological cultures of tarand cemetery and long barrows. We will discuss the concept of archaeological culture and describe the features and boundaries that have frequently been used to distinguish the cultures of tarand cemetery and long barrows. In order to move closer to the lived culture that existed in the past along with its external and internal borders , we supplement the notion of archaeological culture with the semiotic model of culture and its notion of boundary. We test the applicability of semiotic theories to archaeological empirical material and develop a micro-, meso-, and macro-level system of description. The proposed theoretical and methodological scheme should highlight the cultural boundaries expressed within an individual grave, between graves, and between larger areas and eras. Having a sufficient amount of empirical material together with the system of description would enable tentative reconstruction of the self-model of cultural entities on different levels. Burial places are one of the possible semiotic systems that can be analysed in this manner. In this article, we did a micro-level description of a single burial in a tarand cemetery and in a barrow cemetery and mapped the analysed cases on the meso-and macro-levels. In the macro-level analysis, distinct boundaries can be observed in the burial rites and grave goods, but the greatest internal boundary is probably the one between the elite and the common people: the former buried their dead in monumental structures, while the majority of the people treated their dead in manners that have not left any archaeological traces. The macro-level analysis of graves also displays intentional transgressions of boundaries, such as mixing bones or the re-use of older burial sites, which appear to be features shared widely among the discussed cultures.
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the problematics of methodology in semiotics concerns the m... more Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the problematics of methodology in semiotics concerns the more fundamental question of the disciplinary nature of semiotics – whether se-miotics is, or should be, a theoretical discipline or an empirical discipline – or both – and the particular modes of inquiry deemed proper for each perspective. Although debating over the disciplinary nature, or, to put it more simply, over how to practice semiotics, in those terms might seem a thing of the past, the problematics reveals its acuteness each time the relationship between theories, methods and practices/applications, as well as their scope and meaning in semiotics is discussed. Yet what remains also latent in these discussions is a more fundamental question of the particular 'brand' of 'science' and 'scientificity' that semiotics is expected (or not) to align with. One of the results of leaving these issues implicit and unar-ticulated is the divide often seen between theory and method, or theoretical and empirical semiotics.This article attempts to demonstrate how modelling functions as a bridge between theory and method. Yet the value of this bridging depends exactly on acknowledging the more fundamental layers of semiotic inquiry. The main aim of the paper is to propose and develop the concept of metaphorical modelling as a particular methodological tool in se-miotic inquiry as well as the humanities more broadly. The role of metaphors in science is a known issue, however, there are few approaches that deal with it explicitly in the humanities, and as a methodological issue. The use of theories and concepts viewed as method brings to the fore the role of language in methodology. Thereby an awareness of the metaphorical functioning and processing of language becomes necessary for understanding how theoretical language is used in research.The article attempts to show that the traditional distinction between theoretical concepts as precise, literal and analytical, and metaphor as imprecise figure of speech is not adequate for understanding how theoretical constructs are used in the humanities in general and semiotics in particular. From this perspective, one can notice that the metaphorical use of theories, constructs and models has been central in the humanities and semiotics for a while. Thus better understanding of metaphor and of the metaphorical use of theoretical constructs could provide a basis for more explicit, precise and systematic use of metaphorical modelling as one speci c and valuable mode of inquiry among others. A er explicating the connections between method, theory, modelling and metaphor, the ar- ticle examines these issues in the context of semiotics, more particularly as pertaining to the cross-domain use of a model of the sign and cross-disciplinary use of models of language.
Title. The place of semiotics among modelling systems: notes towards the creative and play-type m... more Title. The place of semiotics among modelling systems: notes towards the creative and play-type modelling in human sciences
Abstract. The issue of modelling has been extensively studied in the context of natural sciences yet considerably less so in human sciences. The current article presents an attempt to do so with the help of the Tartu–Moscow School’s modelling systems theory. One of the motivations behind the article was an observation made while reading Lotman’s article „The place of art among other modeling systems” that there is certain similarity between his conception of artistic modelling and certain practices and ways of thinking in contemporary human sciences. To make some preliminary observations about the type of modelling in the human sciences, I study Lotman’s grounds for differentiating between scientific, play-type and artistic modelling. For that aim, I give first an overview of Lotman’s and the Tartu–Moscow School’s view on modelling systems, to bring forth features I consider to be central: understanding modelling systems in a cognitive and activity theoretical framework, the agency of modelling systems, the pragmatics of modelling activity, modelling as translation, attitude toward the con- ditionality of modelling as well as the multi-layeredness of modelling. Approaching modelling as translation opens up a perspective to elaborate on the nature of the creative modelling central to art. The attitude towards the conditionality of modelling, in turn, differentiates between scientific and play-type modelling. If we analyse Lotman’s distinction between two layers of semiotics – cultural and metasemiotics – from that perspective, his views on the role of scientific modelling in semiotics (and the human sciences more generally) can be inferred, more specifically the acknowledged need for another type of modelling besides scientific. On these grounds, I build the hypothesis that the modelling specific to the human sciences is a unique combination of scientific, creative and play-type modelling. While the issues of scientific modelling and creative modelling in the sciences have already found some attention, Lotman’s approach offers perspective for the study of play-type modelling in the human sciences.
Keywords: modelling systems, Lotman, semiotics, human sciences, cognition, creativity, conditionality
The founder of semiotics of cinema, Christian Metz set as the aim of his project to go to the bot... more The founder of semiotics of cinema, Christian Metz set as the aim of his project to go to the bottom of the metaphor of language that had been used widely for describing cinema in film theory, yet without taking into account the knowledge about language that had accumulated in linguistics. Thus the goal of early semiotics of cinema was to go beyond figural analogy and bring together the two domains of knowledge: knowledge about cinema and knowledge about language. However in the beginning there were difficulties with overcoming essentialist approach characteristic to classical film theory and using methodological approach that would model the language of cinema on the basis of the model of language proposed by the theory of language they use. The development of metaphor of language of cinema into semiotic model of language of cinema sheds light to semiotic modelling as methodological tool. Firstly the metaphor of language of cinema itself – either pre-theoretical or theoretical - can be seen as an attempt to make sense of novel phenomena through analogy or approximation with something already familiar. This stage resulted in ontological theories of language of cinema. Refining this rough analogy into the object of study required not only linguistic methods, but ultimately revision of epistemological underpinnings of the project. This meant acknowledging the difference between cinema as experienced and cinema as object of knowledge, arriving thereby at methodological theories of cinema that use semiotic modelling as a means for constructing the object of study.
Keywords: semiotic modelling, methodology, language of cinema, semiotics of cinema, metaphor
In order to estimate the current situation of teaching materials available in the field of semiot... more In order to estimate the current situation of teaching materials available in the field of semiotics, we are providing a comparative overview and a worldwide bibliography of introductions and textbooks on general semiotics published within last 50 years, i.e. since the beginning of institutionalization of semiotics. In this category, we have found over 130 original books in 22 languages. Together with the translations of more than 20 of these titles, our bibliography includes publications in 32 languages. Comparing the authors, their theoretical backgrounds and the general frames of the discipline of semiotics in different decades since the 1960s makes it possible to describe a number of predominant tendencies. In the extensive bibliography thus compiled we also include separate lists for existing lexicons and readers of semiotics as additional material not covered in the main discussion. The publication frequency of new titles is growing, with a certain depression having occurred in the 1980s. A leading role of French, Russian and Italian works is demonstrated.
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Abstract. The issue of modelling has been extensively studied in the context of natural sciences yet considerably less so in human sciences. The current article presents an attempt to do so with the help of the Tartu–Moscow School’s modelling systems theory. One of the motivations behind the article was an observation made while reading Lotman’s article „The place of art among other modeling systems” that there is certain similarity between his conception of artistic modelling and certain practices and ways of thinking in contemporary human sciences.
To make some preliminary observations about the type of modelling in the human sciences, I study Lotman’s grounds for differentiating between scientific, play-type and artistic modelling. For that aim, I give first an overview of Lotman’s and the Tartu–Moscow School’s view on modelling systems, to bring forth features I consider to be central: understanding modelling systems in a cognitive and activity theoretical framework, the agency of modelling systems, the pragmatics of modelling activity, modelling as translation, attitude toward the con- ditionality of modelling as well as the multi-layeredness of modelling.
Approaching modelling as translation opens up a perspective to elaborate on the nature of the creative modelling central to art. The attitude towards the conditionality of modelling, in turn, differentiates between scientific and play-type modelling. If we analyse Lotman’s distinction between two layers of semiotics – cultural and metasemiotics – from that perspective, his views on the role of scientific modelling in semiotics (and the human sciences more generally) can be inferred, more specifically the acknowledged need for another type of modelling besides scientific.
On these grounds, I build the hypothesis that the modelling specific to the human sciences is a unique combination of scientific, creative and play-type modelling. While the issues of scientific modelling and creative modelling in the sciences have already found some attention, Lotman’s approach offers perspective for the study of play-type modelling in the human sciences.
Keywords: modelling systems, Lotman, semiotics, human sciences, cognition, creativity, conditionality
The development of metaphor of language of cinema into semiotic model of language of cinema sheds light to semiotic modelling as methodological tool. Firstly the metaphor of language of cinema itself – either pre-theoretical or theoretical - can be seen as an attempt to make sense of novel phenomena through analogy or approximation with something already familiar. This stage resulted in ontological theories of language of cinema. Refining this rough analogy into the object of study required not only linguistic methods, but ultimately revision of epistemological underpinnings of the project. This meant acknowledging the difference between cinema as experienced and cinema as object of knowledge, arriving thereby at methodological theories of cinema that use semiotic modelling as a means for constructing the object of study.
Keywords: semiotic modelling, methodology, language of cinema, semiotics of cinema, metaphor
Abstract. The issue of modelling has been extensively studied in the context of natural sciences yet considerably less so in human sciences. The current article presents an attempt to do so with the help of the Tartu–Moscow School’s modelling systems theory. One of the motivations behind the article was an observation made while reading Lotman’s article „The place of art among other modeling systems” that there is certain similarity between his conception of artistic modelling and certain practices and ways of thinking in contemporary human sciences.
To make some preliminary observations about the type of modelling in the human sciences, I study Lotman’s grounds for differentiating between scientific, play-type and artistic modelling. For that aim, I give first an overview of Lotman’s and the Tartu–Moscow School’s view on modelling systems, to bring forth features I consider to be central: understanding modelling systems in a cognitive and activity theoretical framework, the agency of modelling systems, the pragmatics of modelling activity, modelling as translation, attitude toward the con- ditionality of modelling as well as the multi-layeredness of modelling.
Approaching modelling as translation opens up a perspective to elaborate on the nature of the creative modelling central to art. The attitude towards the conditionality of modelling, in turn, differentiates between scientific and play-type modelling. If we analyse Lotman’s distinction between two layers of semiotics – cultural and metasemiotics – from that perspective, his views on the role of scientific modelling in semiotics (and the human sciences more generally) can be inferred, more specifically the acknowledged need for another type of modelling besides scientific.
On these grounds, I build the hypothesis that the modelling specific to the human sciences is a unique combination of scientific, creative and play-type modelling. While the issues of scientific modelling and creative modelling in the sciences have already found some attention, Lotman’s approach offers perspective for the study of play-type modelling in the human sciences.
Keywords: modelling systems, Lotman, semiotics, human sciences, cognition, creativity, conditionality
The development of metaphor of language of cinema into semiotic model of language of cinema sheds light to semiotic modelling as methodological tool. Firstly the metaphor of language of cinema itself – either pre-theoretical or theoretical - can be seen as an attempt to make sense of novel phenomena through analogy or approximation with something already familiar. This stage resulted in ontological theories of language of cinema. Refining this rough analogy into the object of study required not only linguistic methods, but ultimately revision of epistemological underpinnings of the project. This meant acknowledging the difference between cinema as experienced and cinema as object of knowledge, arriving thereby at methodological theories of cinema that use semiotic modelling as a means for constructing the object of study.
Keywords: semiotic modelling, methodology, language of cinema, semiotics of cinema, metaphor