TSSS_19 Semiotic dimensions of spaces and literacies

Seminar objectives The seminar on ‘Building strong brands with structuralist rhetorical semiotics’ is intent on discussing crucial conceptual and methodological challenges that were faced while constructing a novel approach to brand equity planning. Brand equity constitutes the pinnacle of branding research and the hallmark of applied brand management. It is both a process and set of S.M.A.R.T objectives with regard to how strong brands may be built and maintained over time. At the heart of brand equity lie brand associations. Brand associations have been amply theorized and operationalized in marketing research from a cognitive psychological point of view. However, the relationship between the diachronic deployment of a brand’s figurative language and its semantic nucleus has been unduly scrutinized. This seminar will display step-by-step how strong brands may be built and managed over time with the aid of structuralist rhetorical semiotics. By drawing on the conceptual construct of consumer-based brand equity, from a marketing literature point of view, and superior linguistic value, as its semiotic counterpart, the model of the brand trajectory of signification reinstates the time-hallowed generativist model that was initially put forward by Greimas and Courtés in a connectionist vein. The suggested 9-step methodological framework is intent on operationalizing the connectionist rendition of the trajectory of signification by adding dynamism to the morphologically and syntactically distinctive components of the trajectory. The suggested methodological framework focuses on the strength and uniqueness of brand associations as integral aspects of a brand’s equity structure and comprises a set of calculi that aim at addressing from a brand textuality point of view how associations may be systematically linked to their key sources with an emphasis on the ad filmic text. The framework draws on two pillars, interpretative semiotic analysis and content analysis. The qualitative research design is facilitated by quantitative analysis techniques, also featuring multivariate mapping, with view to adding rigour to the process of pattern generation, in quest for sources of differential figurative advantages, but also of modes of co-variation among semic and figurative elements of brand discourses. The benefits of adopting a brand textuality perspective in brand equity planning will be highlighted in line with the conceptual/methodological framework that underpins the connectionist approach to the brand trajectory of signification. Indicative references George Rossolatos (2014a). Brand equity planning with structuralist rhetorical semiotics. Kassel: Kassel University Press. George Rossolatos (2014b). A methodological framework for projecting brand equity: Putting back the imaginary into brand knowledge structures. Sign System Studies 42(1): 98-136. George Rossolatos (2014c). Exploring the rhetorical semiotic brand image structure of ad films with multivariate mapping techniques. Semiotica Vol.200: 335-358. You may view and download the presentation @ http://www.slideshare.net/grossolatos/george-rossolatos-building-strong-brands-with-structuralist-rhetorical-semiotics-new-bulgaria-university-19-9-2014

Sign Systems Studies, 2019

The main aim of this brief and purposely radical essay is to investigate further possibilities for empirical research in natural classification of semiosis (signs as wholes). Before introducing emon – a missing term in the taxonomy of signs – we make a distinction between the natural and artificial, and between the taxonomic and meronomic classifications of signs. Natural classifications or typologies are empirically based, while artificial classifications do not require empirical test. Meronomy describes the relational or functional structure of the whole (for instance triadic, circular, etc. composition of sign), while taxonomy categorizes individuals (individual signs). We argue that a natural taxonomy of signs can be based on the existence of different complexity of operations during semiosis, which implies different mechanisms of learning. We add into the taxonomy a particular type of signs – emonic signs, which are at work in imitation and social learning, while being more complex than indexes and less complex than symbols. Icons are related to imprinting, indexes to conditioning, emons to imitating, and symbols to conventions or naming. We also argue that the semiotic typologies could undergo large changes after the discovery of the proper mechanisms or workings of semiosis. Sign Systems Studies 47(1/2), 2019, 88–104

The 17th Gatherings in Biosemiotics take place in the University of Lausanne, Switzerland

Abstract This paper aims to explain how semiotics and constructivism can collaborate in an educational epistemology by developing a joint approach to prescientific conceptions. Empirical data and findings of constructivist research are interpreted in the light of Peirce’s semiotics. Peirce’s semiotics is an anti-psychologistic logic (CP 2.252; CP 4.551; W 8:15; Pietarinen in Signs of logic, Springer, Dordrecht, 2006; Stjernfelt in Diagrammatology. An investigation on the borderlines of phenomenology, ontology and semiotics, Springer, Dordrecht, 2007) and relational logic. Constructivism was traditionally developed within psychology and sociology and, therefore, some incompatibilities can be expected between these two schools. While acknowledging the differences, we explain that constructivism and semiotics share the assumption of realism that knowledge can only be developed upon knowledge and, therefore, an epistemological collaboration is possible. The semiotic analysis performed confirms the constructivist results and provides a further insight into the teacher-student relation. Like the constructivist approach, Peirce’s doctrine of agapism infers that the personal dimension of teaching must not be ignored. Thus, we argue for the importance of genuine sympathy in teaching attitudes. More broadly, the article also contributes to the development of postmodern humanities. At the end of the modern age, the humanities are passing through a critical period of transformation. There is a growing interest in semiotics and semiotic philosophy in many areas of the humanities. Such a case, on which we draw, is the development of a theoretical semiotic approach to education, namely edusemiotics (Stables and Semetsky, Pedagogy and edusemiotics: theoretical challenge/practical opportunities, Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, 2015).

Newsletter of the Nordic Association for Semiotic Studies, 2014

Studies in Philosophy and Education, 2016

Paper presented at the 17th Annual Conference of the European Association for the Study of Religions (EASR) Tartu, June 25 to June 29, 2019, “Religion – Continuations and Disruptions”, 2019

In the winter of 1548, a year before her death, in the small port of Mont-de-Marsan in Aquitaine, Marguerite de Navarre (1494-1549) composed a morality play for the festivity of the Mardi Gras. This mystical masquerade presents in quick succession four ladies: a worldly woman, a superstitious woman and a wise one discuss the true way of life and the relationship between body and soul. The plays ends with the enchanting and misunderstood apparition of a shepherdess, who enters stage singing popular love songs and declaiming an enraptured love for the Bridegroom. This mature composition of the queen of Navarre, always close to the more effervescent religious circles, represents a privileged point of view on an author who has proved to be difficult to label into narrow-minded religious categorization. The interplay between the four ladies allows Marguerite to show the slow unveiling of errors and the construction of more accurate definitions of the true faith. This paper proposes an in-depth analysis of the theological positions described in the comedy, often intended only as a defense against Calvin’s accusation of libertinism, directed against the French court. In particular, the paper will investigate the influence of Erasmus’ Origenian ecstatic love as a possible key of the representation.