Du sens II n'est pas une simple suite du sens I. A.J. Greimas y étend, par un geste décisif, les acquis de la sémiotique à des domaines qui excèdent très largement celui où elle se reconnaît d'emblée. Le texte dit théorique apparaît ainsi comme gouverné par un programme narratif: l'auteur, étudiant une préface de Georges Dumézil, montre comment elle s'organise comme une quête de la vérité, rencontrant des obstacles - c'est-à-dire en des termes analysables par l'étude structurale du récit. D'autres (...) textes, à première vue surprenants, eux aussi, peuvent relever de cette description : est examiné, en particulier, le programme narratif d'une... recette de cuisine. Mais surtout, A.J. Greimas aborde des questions encore plus primordiales que celles qu'il avait jusqu'ici traitées : c'est de la construction de l'objet par le discours ou du sujet dans le discours qu'il donne une description formelle, en décrivant notamment les constellations sémantiques de l'univers du croire et de l'univers du savoir ; en amorçant une étude sémiotique des passions (de la colère par exemple). Le sémio-narratif apparaît ainsi comme une forme bien plus large que le récit littéraire auquel on le ramène en général : il est la trame même non seulement de la communication et de la vie sociale mais aussi de la vie émotionnelle et affective. -- Back cover. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2017 Heft: 214 Seiten: 51-66.

This essay adopts a semiotic perspective focused on practices of communication, movement, and translation to examine the global impact of A. J. Greimas and his oeuvre. The linguist and semiotician’s lecture trips abroad, the number and provenance of international students in his Paris seminar, and the chronology and linguistic geography of translations of his work help describe, gauge, and explain the dissemination and development of his ideas throughout the world. His project has engendered distinctive appropriations and at times productive institutional (...) structures in a number of cultural and linguistic contexts, notably Romance, Anglo-American, Germanic, Russian, Lithuanian, and Chinese. The broader historical relations between France and other lands, and the extent of each society’s use of the French language have conditioned, fostered, or impeded responses to his proposals. The conclusion’s discussion of the relative importance of personal contacts, socio-historical context, and the sociolinguistic and pedagogical status of French for his international reception aims to contribute to general methodological debates in the history of science and ideas and in transnational history. (shrink)

In his first research project, Greimas developed and applied new methods in the historical lexicology of modern French. His theoretical articles formulate a sociological approach that analyses vocabulary as a history of culture, illustrated in his two dissertations on fashion in 1830. In the 1980s, from the perspective of his semiotics, Greimas dismissed his early scholarship as failed experiments that taught him what not to do. In the changed epistemological context of the 21st century, the work appears as pioneering research (...) in cultural studies which possesses clear scholarly value. Greimas’ philological and lexicological training bore fruit directly and indirectly throughout his career. Two decades before he launched his semiotics, his project for lexicology proposes a semantic methodology, envisions the construction of an organon for the human sciences, and explicitly calls for a multi-generational collaborative enterprise. Like his structural semantics and semiotics, this lexicology entails three inseparable components: epistemological foundations, concrete methodologies, and robust applications. Moreover, a focus on the lexeme characterizes Greimas’ structural semantics and persists in his semiotics.В своей первой научно-исследовательской работе Греймас разработал и применил новые методы в исторической лексикологии современного французского языка. В его теоретических статьях сформулирован социологический подход, который анализирует лексику как историю культуры. Это иллюстрируют две диссертации Греймаса о моде в 1830 году. В 1980-х годах он отошел от своих ранних работ, считая их неудачными. Но в изменившемся эпистемологическом контексте 21-го века эти работы выглядят в культурных исследованиях новаторскими, обладающими несомненными академическими достоинствами. Филологическое и лексикологическое образование Греймаса давало прямые и косвенные результаты в течение всей его карьеры. За два десятилетия до начала семиотических исследований Греймас предлагает в своем лексикологическом проекте семантическую методологию, строительство органона для гуманитарных наук, а также призывает к междисциплинарному сотрудничеству. Как и структурная семантика и семиотика Греймаса, эта лексикология включает в себя три неразделимых компонента: эпистемологические основы, конкретные методологии и возможности применения. Кроме того, внимание к лексеме характеризует всю структурную семантику Греймаса и сохраняется в его семиотике. Oma esimeses teadusprojektis tootas Greimas valja nuudisprantsuse keele ajaloolise leksikoloogia uued meetodid ning rakendas neid. Tema teoreetilistes artiklites sonastatakse sotsioloogiline lahenemine, mis analuusib sonavara kui kultuuriajalugu ja mida illustreerivad tema kaks vaitekirja 1830ndate aastate moe kohta. 1980ndatel aastatel taandus Greimas oma varajastest uurimustest kui ebaonnestunud katsetustest. 21. sajandi muutunud epistemolooglises kontekstis osutub tema looming teedrajavaks uurimistooks kultuuriuuringute vallas. Greimase fi loloogiline ja leksikoloogiline ettevalmistus kandis kogu tema karjaari valtel vilja nii otseselt kui kaudselt. Kaks aastakummet enne seda, kui ta tuli valja oma semiootikaga, pakkus tema leksikoloogiaprojekt valja semantilise metoodika, nagi ette humanitaarteaduste organoni loomist ning kutsus otsesonu ules multidistsiplinaarsele koostoole. Nagu tema strukturaalne semantika ja semiootika sisaldab ka see leksikoloogia kolme uksteisest lahutamatut komponenti: epistemoloogilisi aluseid, konkreetseid meetodeid ja julgeid rakendusi. Lisaks iseloomustab lekseemile keskendumine Greimase strukturaalset semantikat ning jaab pusima tema semiootikas. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2017 Heft: 214 Seiten: 129-137.

According to Greimas, the semiotic square is far more than a heuristic for semantic and literary analysis. It represents the generative “deep structure” of human culture and cognition which “define the fundamental mode of existence of an individual or of a society, and subsequently the conditions of existence of semiotic objects” (Greimas & Rastier 1968: 48). The potential truth of this hypothesis, much less the conditions and implications of taking it seriously (as a truth claim), have received little attention in (...) the literature. In response, this paper traces the history and development of the logical square of opposition from Aristotle to Greimas and beyond, to propose that the relations modelled in these diagrams are embodied relations rooted in gestalt memories of kinesthesia and proprioception from which we derive basic structural awareness of opposition and contrast such as verticality, bilaterality, transversality, markedness and analogy. To make this argument, the paper draws on findings in the phenomenology of movement (Sheets-Johnstone 2011a, 2011b, 2012, Pelkey 2014), recent developments in the analysis of logical opposition (Beziau & Payette 2008), recent scholarship in (post)Greimasian semiotics (Corso 2014, Broden 2000) and prescient insights from Greimas himself (esp. 1968, 1984). The argument of the paper is further supported through a visual and textual content analysis of a popular music video, both to highlight relationships between the semiotic square and mundane cultural ideologies and to show how these relationships might be traced to the marked symmetries of bodily movement. In addition to illustrating the enduring relevance of Greimasean thought, the paper further illustrates the neglected relevance that embodied chiasmus holds for developments in anthropology, linguistics and the other cognitive sciences. (shrink)

This article concentrates on a couple of semiotic approaches working out, on the one hand, the mediated character of reducing interpretative trajectories to the actual translation into the language of narratives (A. J. Greimas) or the language of textuality (F. Rastier), and, on the other, the direct, apparently unmediated passage to the visceral physicality of the verbal signifying system, which make semantic and syntactic components perfunctory to interpretation in a way (J. Kristeva). Greimassian universal narrative grammar dismantles signifying units, navigating (...) in the network of narrative utterances. Rastier's approach structures textual artifacts by unearthing semantic constituents crucial for semiotic analysis. Kristeva examines what is behind the curtain instead of sorting out the significance of the text's content as a special category and the possibility of procedure allowing its interpretation. These three authors are compared in the context of two approaches that come to grips with the author/reader pair. (shrink)

Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

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The essay deals with the formation of the Greimassian thought from its earliest origins in his young years at Kaunas University, i.e. his connections with Wilhelm Sesemann, Lev Karsavin and Russian formalism, to the rise of structuralism in Paris. The Paris School approach stems from Semantique structurale (1967) leading to the ‘third semiotic revolution’, as Greimas called it, by the invention of the modalities. This made his method close to even analytic philosophy and modal logics. In both, a linguistic turn (...) and use of formal logics took place. Yet Greimas’ semiotics grew out of a purely linguistic framework into a broader philosophical approach. Nowadays, considered one of the classics of the semiotic scene, his method still has not lost anything of its analytic acuity and epistemic temptation. Even such new paradigms as existential semiotics grow organically from some Greimas’ ideas which have kept their relevance.В статье исследуется формирование научных взглядов Греймаса: юность в Каунасском университете, знакомство с Василием Сеземаном, Львом Карсавиным и идеями русского формализма, рождение структурализма в Париже. Основой парижской школы семиотики стала книга Греймаса Semantique structurale (1967), которая, по его словам, привела к ≪третьей семиотической революции≫ благодаря изобретению модальностей. Это сблизило метод Греймаса с аналитической философией и модальной логикой. В обеих науках произошел лингвистический поворот и стали пользоваться формальной логикой. Семиотика Греймаса преодолела рамки чистой лингвистики, став более широким философским подходом. Сейчас его метод считается классикой семиотики. Однако метод Греймаса не потерял своей аналитической остроты и эпистемологической привлекательности. Даже такие новые парадигмы, как экзистенциальная семиотика, органически вырастают из идей Греймаса, сохранивших свою актуальность.Artikkel kasitleb Greimase mottemaailma valjakujunemist alates selle varaseimatest allikatest, mis parinesid noorusaastatest Kaunase Ulikoolis, s.t tema sidemetest Wilhelm Sesemanni, Lev Karsavini ja vene vormikoolkonnaga, kuni strukturalismi tekkimiseni Pariisis. Pariisi koolkonna lahenemise aluseks on Semantique structurale (1967), mis toob kaasa “kolmanda semiootilise revolutsiooni”, nagu Greimas seda nimetas, leiutades modaalsused. See muutis tema meetodi sarnaseks ingliskeelse analuutilise fi losoofi a ja modaalloogikaga, kus molemas toimus lingvistiline poore ning hakati kasutama formaalloogikat. Ent Greimase semiootika kasvas puhtlingvistilisest raamistikust valja avaramaks fi losoofi liseks lahenemiseks. Tanapaeval, mil tema meetodit peetakse semiootikavaldkonna klassikasse kuuluvaks, ei ole see kaotanud midagi oma analuutilisest teravusest ja episteemilisest koitvusest. Isegi sellised uued paradigmad nagu eksistentsiaalne semiootika kasvavad orgaaniliselt valja monedest Greimase ideedest, mis on sailitanud oma relevantsuse. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2017 Heft: 214 Seiten: 409-438.

La rencontre de Ricœur avec Greimas n’a pas été un événement éphémère, mais une discussion qui s’est étalée sur plus de trente ans. Anne Hénault retrace ici les différentes étapes de ce que Ricœur appelait son “combat amoureux” avec Greimas, et qui illustre à merveille le poème de René Char: “Les loyaux adversaires.” On y retrouve les qualités propres du philosophe dans ses dialogues, le souci de faire avancer son propre raisonnement de façon rigoureuse, mais aussi l’effort pour donner à (...) l’interlocuteur “la chance de son meilleur argument.” Anne Hénault raconte la traversée d’un structuralisme “ennemi” et la conquête d’une “amitié” réciproque exigeante, et fondée sur de véritables convergences intellectuelles. (shrink)

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One of a handful of truly pioneering figures in visual semiotics, Jean-Marie Floch elaborated an approach that combined an analysis of the basic perceptual qualities and compositional strategies of the image, with a study of the cultural and historical significance of its representational dimension. A key collaborator of A. J. Greimas, Floch situated his project within the theoretical framework of Paris semiotics, which he helped to develop. He positioned his visual studies of familiar cultural objects in proximity to cultural anthropology (...) and the work of Claude Lévi-Strauss. His five published monographs explore abstract painting, art photography, Russian icons, magazine advertisements, and comic books. (shrink)

A semiotic study seeks to find sign significance in its relation with others. This paper is a search for the semiotic manifestation of certain signs in the contemporary campaign against corruption in mainland China. It uses Greimas’s semiotic square as a theoretical base upon which an examination of official discourse pertaining to anti-corruption is conducted. Power, agency, and sexual relation are the three parameters of analysis. The study comes to the tentative conclusion that the marked combinatory presence of women in (...) anti-corruption discourse implicates women as the primary benefactors in the male-dominated corruption practice, thus directing the public attention to a gender issue of minor importance. (shrink)

How may Greimassian narrative semiotics join forces with feminist inquiry? This essay begins with an analysis of a cake recipe from Alasdair MacIntyre’s.

Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

Artykuł jest próbą analizy wybranych elementów z komiksów Henryka Chmielewskiego o Tytusie, Romku i A’Tomku przy pomocy kwadratu semiotycznego i werydykcyjnego Algirdasa Greimasa. Kwadraty, użyte jako poręczne narzędzia analityczne o dużej i łatwo osiągalnej mocy eksplikacyjnej, służą tu do ujawnienia wewnętrznie dwuznacznej, wywrotowej natury komiksu.

Two recently translated monographs by J.-M. Floch provide English-language scholars with a substantial sample of this original and prolific visual semiotician’s work. The articles making up the two volumes present and illustrate the methods and concepts that Floch developed: “figurative semiotics”, “plastic semiotics”, and “visual identities”. Privileging the close description of particular images, Jean-Marie Floch’s work systematically brings to bear a complex and explicit semiotic theory to the exploration of visual images. The books raise crucial questions for research in the (...) visual arts, in marketing, in perception and cognition, and in intercultural communication. This essay describes the main procedures Floch proposes for analyzing visual images, examines his concept of a visual identity, and evaluates the two English editions and translations. (shrink)

The concept of immanence occupies today a central and, at the same time, uncomfortable place among semioticians. Some criticize it overtly, others feel the concept has fulfilled its role as a methodological regulator of descriptions and its scope that should be enlarged so as to integrate context, practices, interactions, in short, the human experience. This paper presents immanence through another light. According to Hjelmslev’s.

This entry addresses the action theoretical semiotics derived from A. J. Greimas’s theory and positions it in the context of edusemiotics. Greimas’s narratological theory is discussed and investigated in terms of its fruitfulness for education. The entry focuses on the major features of Greimas’s theory such as his famous actantial model as well as the anthropomorphic, or human- and subject-centered, approach in general. According to Greimas, at the core of the meaning of every significant discourse, there lies a typical human (...) situation within which the actants – or entities that assume certain roles in a narrative story – function as Subject and Object, Sender and Receiver, and at times also as Helper and Opponent. Greimas’s central analytic tools, the semiotic square and the generative model, are interpreted in dynamic terms and applied to the analysis of education as a meaningful practice. These tools help us see education as a value-based action and shed a critical light on the presupposed dualism between nature and culture in the context of education. For the analysis of action, Greimas’s major concepts prove themselves to be especially useful. The conception of competences expressed, specifically, in modal verbs such as want, can, know, and must is significant for education. As such, education becomes an action that strives to develop students’ competences. (shrink)

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The emergence of New Realism in philosophy and the Ontological Turn in anthropology testify to the increasing attention paid in the human sciences to the topic of ‘reality’. The aim of this essay is to reread and translate Greimas’ proposal of a semiotic of the natural world, so as to suggest how his concepts might contribute to the contemporary intellectual debate. From a discussion of Greimas’ attempt to solve the problem of the relation between ‘language’ and ‘world’ in nonreferentialist terms, (...) the essay will then move to identify the four forms of correlation that constitute natures and worlds, objects and subjects. In bringing his argument to the extreme consequences, I will call for a reevaluation of structuralism, and propose to distinguish ‘reality’ from ‘the real’. Both hypotheses rest on the idea that relations are the matter we are made of.Появление нового реализма в философии и ≪онтологического поворота≫ в антропологии свидетельствует о росте внимания к теме ≪реальности≫ в гуманитарных науках. Цель статьи – перечитывание и интерпретация греймасовского определения ≪семиотики естественного мира≫ (semiotics of the natural world), чтобы понять, каким образом его концепции могли бы способствовать решению вопросов в интеллектуальных дебатах современности. Автор статьи исследует попытку Греймаса решить проблему взаимосвязи между ≪языком≫ и ≪миром≫ в нереференциальных терминах, затем переходит к определению четырех возможных форм корреляции, которые создают природы и миры, объекты и предметы. Доводя аргументы Греймаса до крайних выводов, автор призывает к переоценке структурализма и предлагает отличать ≪реальность≫ от ≪реального≫. Обе гипотезы опираются на идею, что именно отношения создают нашу основу.Uusrealismi esiletous fi losoofi as ja ‘ontoloogiline poore’ antropoloogias annavad tunnistust uha kasvavast tahelepanust, mida humanitaarias pooratakse ‘tegelikkkuse’ teemale. Kaesoleva kirjutise eesmargiks on ule lugeda ja tolgendada Greimase esitatud “loomuliku maailma semiootikat”, et naidata, kuidas tema moisted voiksid kaasa aidata praegusele intellektuaalsele debatile. Greimase katsest lahendada ‘keele’ ja ‘maailma’ vahelise suhte probleemi mittereferentsiaalsetes terminites liigutakse edasi maaratlema nelja korrelatsioonivoimalust, mille moodustavad loomused ja maailmad, objektid ja subjektid. Greimase vaidete aarmuslike jareldusteni joudes kutsun ules strukturalismi umber hindama ning teen ettepaneku eristada ‘reaalsust’ ‘reaalsest’. Molemad hupoteesid lahtuvad ideest, et suhted moodustavadki ainese, millest me koosneme. (shrink)

Greimas’s conception of narrative is based on a causality linked to basic paradigms establishing the deep meaning of a story; Girard’s conception of narrative is rooted in a universal mimetic desire which leads the “lynchers” to justify exclusion by producing mythical narratives demonstrating that the excluded was evil; Kymlicka’s perspective on cultural relationships is based on the necessity to create a socio-political framework helping people to cooperate in order to invent a better world. These three important thinkers analyze stories people (...) tell themselves or believe in in order to organize a controlled and safer way of life for themselves. We compare the theoretical perspectives of these three thinkers in order to understand in what way contemporary writers of the Americas structure their narratives and explore encounters while aiming at fostering a vision of the world oriented towards multi and transculturalism. (shrink)

This essay addresses the relationships between prescription and description in legal rules. The analysis will focus on the culture-laden connotations of factual categories implied in all legal sentences and/or provisions. This investigation is spurred by the need to assess the impact of cultural difference in people’s understanding of legal imperatives and, symmetrically, how that impact is to be considered in the application of law. Differences in ways of categorizing the world could position the cultural pre-understanding required by law, and the (...) pluralism recognized and protected by constitutional principles and human/fundamental rights discourse, at a crossroads. Hence, even when we find an illegitimacy or an ignorance about what legal rules do not explicitly state but instead implicitly presuppose, this does not exclude that behind that ignorance there may be something worthy of legal protection. A question emerges: is it legitimate and reasonable to consider the ignorantia facti resulting from differing ways of categorizing the factual world as automatically and uncritically subject to the principle ignoratia legis non excusat? The essay continues with an assessment of the possible consequences of ignorantia facti in the administration of justice in multicultural societies and migration contexts. For this purpose, the opportunity for an intercultural use of law—including within national law—will be considered as a means of avoiding the discriminatory application of ignorantia facti. This topic will be addressed by leveraging both semiotic and cultural-anthropological analytical tools, including the well-known greimasien “contrat de véridiction”. (shrink)

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Despite the proliferation of studies on corporate social responsibility (CSR), there is a lack of consensus and a cardinal methodological base for research on the quality of CSR communication. Over the decades, studies in this space have remained conflicting, unintegrated, and sometimes overlapping. Drawing on semiotics—a linguistic-based theoretical and analytical tool, our article explores an alternative perspective to evaluating the quality and reliability of sustainability reports. Our article advances CSR communication research by introducing a theoretical-cum-methodological perspective which provides unique insights (...) into how to evaluate the quality of CSR communication. Particularly, we illustrate the application of our proposed methodology on selected U.K. FTSE 100 companies. Our two-phased analysis employed the Greimas Canonical Narrative Schema and the Semiotic Square of Veridiction in drawing meanings from selected sustainability/csr reports. In addition, we present a distinctive CSR report quality model capable of guiding policy makers and firms in designing sustainability/csr reporting standards. (shrink)

This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the significance and meanings of faces within monuments and memorials. The presence of faces in monuments and memorials transcends cultures and spans throughout history. Faces serve as vital components of public statues, conveying the emotions of depicted characters and establishing communicative connections with observers. Moreover, they are employed within memorials to commemorate the deceased. Memorial museums frequently feature corridors adorned with portraits of those who perished in wars, terrorist attacks or natural disasters. The (...) aim of this paper is twofold: firstly, to develop a theoretical and methodological framework for the analysis of faces in monuments and memorials, drawing upon the cultural semiotics of Juri Lotman as well as theories proposed by Algirdas J. Greimas and Umberto Eco. Secondly, to construct a typology that elucidates the various ways faces are utilized within monuments, memorials, and commemorative practices. A historical roadmap of the facial presence in monuments and memorials is then presented. By achieving these aims, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the meanings of faces within monuments and memorials in particular and memory politics in general. (shrink)