Victoria Welby and the Science of Signs


Book Description

Victoria Welby (1837–1912) dedicated her research to the relationship between signs and values. She exchanged ideas with important exponents of the language and sign sciences, such as Charles S. Peirce and Charles S. Ogden. She examined themes she believed crucially important both in the use of signs and in reflection on signs. But Welby's research can also be understood in ideal dialogue with authors she could never have met in real life, such as Mikhail Bakhtin, Susanne Langer, and Genevieve Vaughan. Welby contends that signifying cannot be constrained to any one system, type of sign, language, field of discourse, or area of experience. On the contrary, it is ever more developed, enhanced, and rigorous, the more it develops across different fields, disciplines, and areas of experience. For example, to understand meaning, Welby evidences the advantage of translating it into another word even from the same language or resorting to metaphor to express what would otherwise be difficult to conceive. Welby aims for full awareness of the expressive potential of signifying resources. Her reflections make an important contribution to problems connected with communication, expression, interpretation, translation, and creativity.




What is Meaning?


Book Description




Significs and Language


Book Description

This is the facsimile 1911 reprint of Victoria Lady Welby's very last publication Significs and Language. The Articulate form of our Expressive and Interpretative resources. This volume also includes two major essays from the author's hands, 'Meaning and Metaphor' (reprinted from The Monist 3:4, 1893), and 'Sense, Meaning and Interpretation' (reprinted from Mind 5:17 and 18, 1896), and a selection of several noteworthy and unpublished essays. In the introduction to this volume the editor H. Walter Schmitz exemplifies how Lady Welby developed her significs in discussion and cooperation with numerous highly divergent scientists and scholars of her times; how her ideas influenced other scholars in Europe and the US; and how significs sank to near oblivion and was finally recovered.




Semioethics as Existential Dialogue


Book Description

This collection brings together perspectives on the interplay of communication, dialogue, and responsibility, exploring communicative acts of disruption toward a social environment attuned to short-sighted individualism. Semioethics highlights the condition of inevitable entanglement with the other at the origin of sociality, which demands a response to the other based on listening and accountability. The volume introduces readers to the theoretical foundations of semioethics, an emergent direction within sign and language studies which relies upon a commitment to otherness, unindifference, and dialogue. Building on the dialogic approaches of Mikhail Bakhtin and Emmanuel Levinas, chapters, grouped into five sections, are all guided by the notion of responsibility toward the other outside do ut des logic and greedy exchange. This collection highlights the ways in which semioethics considers the ethical implications of the signs that mediate dialogue among persons in the social sphere, public and private, sacred and profane. It presupposes the notion that signs are only meaningful in their relation to other signs and the intersubjectivity among persons in dialogue. Chapters also variously examine how the interplay of semioethics and dialogue underpins public life and the existential gifts that sustain a healthy polis. This book will be of interest to scholars in semiotics, dialogue research, communication ethics, and philosophy of communication.




The Bloomsbury Companion to Contemporary Peircean Semiotics


Book Description

This book considers the work and influence of Charles Sanders Peirce, showing how the concepts and ideas he developed continue to impact and shape contemporary research issues. Written by a team of leading international scholars of semiotics, linguistics and philosophy, this Companion examines the growing impact of Peirce's thought and semiotic theories on a range of different fields. Discussing topics such as narrative, architecture, design, aesthetics and linguistics, the book furthers understanding of the contemporary pertinence of Peircean concepts in theoretical and empirical fashion. The Bloomsbury Companion to Contemporary Peircean Semiotics is the definitive guide to the enduring legacy of one of the world's greatest semioticians.




Signifying and Understanding


Book Description

This book introduces and provides commentary on a selection of published and unpublished works by Victoria Welby and exponents of the Signific Movement in the Netherlands. Beyond offering an important contribution to the reconstruction of a neglected phase in the history of ideas, it evidences the theoretical topicality of significs, in particular the focus on the relation of signs to value, meaning, and understanding, on verbal and nonverbal behavior, and on language and communication.




International Handbook of Semiotics


Book Description

This book provides an extensive overview and analysis of current work on semiotics that is being pursued globally in the areas of literature, the visual arts, cultural studies, media, the humanities, natural sciences and social sciences. Semiotics—also known as structuralism—is one of the major theoretical movements of the 20th century and its influence as a way to conduct analyses of cultural products and human practices has been immense. This is a comprehensive volume that brings together many otherwise fragmented academic disciplines and currents, uniting them in the framework of semiotics. Addressing a longstanding need, it provides a global perspective on recent and ongoing semiotic research across a broad range of disciplines. The handbook is intended for all researchers interested in applying semiotics as a critical lens for inquiry across diverse disciplines.




Bloomsbury Semiotics Volume 2: Semiotics in the Natural and Technical Sciences


Book Description

Bloomsbury Semiotics offers a state-of-the-art overview of the entire field of semiotics by revealing its influence on a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. With four volumes spanning theory, method and practice across the disciplines, this definitive reference work emphasizes and strengthens common bonds shared across intellectual cultures, and facilitates the discovery and recovery of meaning across fields. It comprises: Volume 1: History and Semiosis Volume 2: Semiotics in the Natural and Technical Sciences Volume 3: Semiotics in the Arts and Social Sciences Volume 4: Semiotic Movements Written by leading international experts, the chapters provide comprehensive overviews of the history and status of semiotic inquiry across a diverse range of traditions and disciplines. Together, they highlight key contemporary developments and debates along with ongoing research priorities. Providing the most comprehensive and united overview of the field, Bloomsbury Semiotics enables anyone, from students to seasoned practitioners, to better understand and benefit from semiotic insight and how it relates to their own area of study or research. Volume 2: Semiotics in the Natural and Technical Sciences presents the state-of-the art in semiotic approaches to disciplines ranging from mathematics and biology to neuroscience and medicine, from evolutionary linguistics and animal behaviour studies to computing, finance, law, architecture, and design. Each chapter casts a vision for future research priorities, unanswered questions, and fresh openings for semiotic participation in these and related fields.




Women in Pragmatism: Past, Present and Future


Book Description

This book offers a selection of the papers of the Women in Pragmatism International Conference held at the University of Barcelona in January 2020. The conference gathered women and non-binary scholars from twelve different countries. This was the first pragmatist conference organized entirely by women and non-binary persons. It has initiated a stable network of mentoring and support analogous to other women philosophers’ organizations. The book provides paths to reconstruct the roots of pragmatism, integrating the works of women pragmatists of the past and linking them to the current developments of feminist and pragmatist topics. Scholars of different countries, status, and backgrounds serve as a powerful example of the trend toward interdisciplinary cooperation and versatility we might expect for the future of pragmatism. The book is of interest for scholars interested in both pragmatism and feminism, from various perspectives ranging from psychology to semiotics, logic, and sociology, wishing to expand their horizons and understand their relevant interactions.




Giambattista Vico and the New Psychological Science


Book Description

Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) was an Italian philosopher, rhetorician, and historian. As one of the great thinkers of the Enlightenment, he exerted tremendous influence on the social sciences. He was the first to stress cultural and linguistic dimensions in the development of both the human mind and social institutions. Although his ideas on the relationship between mind and culture and his epistemology have inspired the work of many scholars in psychology, his sizeable influence has been scarcely acknowledged. The volume is organized in two sections. The first locates Vico in his historical context and in the landscape of contemporary human and social sciences. The second part presents those of Vico’s concepts that seem promising for the development of a new way of looking at psychological phenomena. In the book’s conclusion, Luca Tateo gathers the ideas of the volume’s contributors to suggest future development of the psychological sciences. This book aims to show how Vico’s insights can inspire future research in the psychological sciences. It collects multidisciplinary contributions of leading international scholars that draw upon the thought of this original thinker. Collectively, the contributors remind us of the legacy and continuing influence of this inspiring historical figure.