Semiotics

1. Sign – Something which can stand for something else.
2. Code – Technical, written and symbolic tools used to construct or suggest meaning in media forms or products eg use of a camera, special effects, typography.
3. Convention – The generally accepted way of doing something.
4. Dominant Signifier – The main representative.
5. Anchorage – words that go along with an image to give it meaning in a specific context eg taglines in adverts.

Ferdinand de Saussure:

1. Signifier – What you call the object, word, image or action.
2. Signified – the concept behind the object, word, image or action being represented.

C S Pierce:

1. Icon – A sign which has characteristics in common with the thing that it signifies.
2. Index – A sign that has a link with the thing that it signifies.
3. Symbol – A sign which has a random link to the thing that it signifies.

Roland Barthes:

1. Signification –  Structural levels of signification, meaning or representative.
2. Denotation – Often refers to something literal – the first level of analysis.
3. Connotation – Something suggested by a word or a thing – the second level of analysis.
4. Myth – How words and images are systematically used to communicate cultural and political meanings
5. Ideology – A set of ideas or beliefs that people have regarding different kinds of technologies.
6. radical – Something that goes against and challenges dominant, typical ideas.
7. reactionary – Something that goes with and agrees with dominant, typical ideas.

1. Paradigm – A collection of signs that all have some sort of connection.
2. Syntagm –  How signs and things are put together and fitted together.

Sign – Stands in for something else.

Code – used to construct meaning in media forms

Convention– the accepted way of doing something.

Dominant signifier– the main thing that stands in for something else.

Anchorage– words that go along with an image to give meaning of context.

1. Paradigm – A collection of signs that all have some sort of connection.
2. Syntagm –  How signs and things are put together and fitted together.

Ferdinand De Saussure – Swiss linguist, semiotician and philosopher. Ferdinand de Saussure: Saussure believed in a concept, that can be described as “the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation.” One of the two founders of semiotics, introduced these terms as the two main planes, these terms being the ‘signifier’ and the ‘signified’.

1. Signifier, stands in for something else
2. Signified, thing or idea trying to be evoked

C S Pierce: Pierce believed that there were only 3 signs ever, Iconic, Indexical and symbolic. Furthermore this implies that everything is made up of these 3 signs.

1. Icon, a sign that looks like its object (think of camerawork, sets, props, and Mise-En-Scene) (eg. a picture of a cat)
2. Index, A sign that has a link to its object (Think of sounds, props) (campfire smoke, or the smoke coming from a campfire.)
3. Symbol, a sign that has an arbitrary or random link to its object (think of colours, textures, shapes, sounds)

Roland Barthes: Barthes semiotician work focused on the signs in the news and how to read them, he would take apart scenes in the news to analyse them more easily and find out what the news is actually saying.

1. Signification – The process of constructing meaning the from the sign itself.
2. Denotation – The first level of analysis (what the person can see)
3. Connotation – The meanings or associations we have with the image
4. Myth – Information that is being told with assets which may differ the way you view it from reality of the information
5. Ideology – To grasp the idea between relation and power
6. radical – something that goes against people thoughts and ideas (eg. driving through a red light is normal)
7. reactionary – something that everyone accepts (eg. like the fact that you should stop at a red light)
8. Paradigm – A typical sign or ideal of something in a collection.
9. Syntagm – Where objects have relations symbolic of each other in a sequence

Key language:

Semiotics

1. Sign – Something that can stand for something else.
2. Code – A combination of semiotic systems.
3. Convention – What signs are meaningfully organised into.
4. Dominant Signifier – Main signifier that stands out.
5. Anchorage – Describe how the combination of elements within a sign fit together and fix the meaning. 

Ferdinand de Saussure:

1. Signifier – Any material thing that signifies something.
2. Signified – The concept that a signifier refers to.
3. Paradigm – Collection of similar signs.
4. Syntagm – Order of in which signs go and how they link with each other.

C S Pierce:

1. Icon – A sign that looks like its object.
2. Index – A sign that has a link to its object.
3. Symbol – A sign that has an arbitrary or random link to its object.

Roland Barthes:

1. Signification – Structural levels of signification, meaning or representation.
2. Denotation –  The most basic or literal meaning of a sign.
3. Connotation – The secondary, cultural meanings of signs; or “signifying signs,” signs that are used as signifiers for a secondary meaning.
4. Myth – The most obvious level of signification, but distorts meaning by validating arbitrary cultural assumptions in a way similar to the denotative sign.
5. Ideology – codes that reinforce or are congruent with structures of power.
6. Radical – Something that challenges dominant ideas.
7. Reactionary – Something that confirms dominant ideas.

C.S. Peirce – Peirce’s seminal work in the field was anchored in pragmatism and logic. He defined a sign as “something which stands to somebody for something,” and one of his major contributions to semiotics was the categorization of signs into three main types: (1) an icon, which resembles its referent (such as a road sign for falling rocks); (2) an index, which is associated with its referent (as smoke is a sign of fire); and (3) a symbol, which is related to its referent only by convention (as with words or traffic signals). Peirce also demonstrated that a sign can never have a definite meaning, for the meaning must be continuously qualified.

Ferdinand De Saussure – Swiss linguist, semiotician and philosopher. His ideas laid a foundation for many significant developments in both linguistics and semiotics in the 20th century.

Roland Barthes – French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes’ ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of many schools of theory, including structuralism, semiotics, social theory, design theory, anthropology and post-structuralism.