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semiotics

semiotics

4 9.6
The study of signs, like words or pictures, and how people use them to send messages
  • noun
  • /ˌsɛmɪˈɒtɪks/
  • Specialized
translation icon : semiótica
  • The study of semiotics allows us to understand how signs and symbols communicate meaning.
  • social semiotics
  • semiotics and structuralism
  • literary semiotics

Examples

  • My goal has been to set the foundation for a Peircean exploration of the semiotics of emotional expression.

    Academic text (2017)
  • During this social process of interaction, language as well as semiotics—such as signs, symbols, and pictures—are resources for meaning-making.

    Academic text (2015)
  • Now, semiotics is not in itself a literary theory.

  • The designer clearly did not study semiotics.

  • To be clear, this is a thesis about the semiotics.

    Academic text (2017)
  • One comment on how to observe the semiotics that form the basis of your consciousness.

    Blog text (1)
  • She's the new Semiotics Professor.

  • We have included it under the rubric of Semiotics because of its primary interest in the study of language.

    Academic text (1993)
  • If the social, economic, and moral implications of a semiotics of physical impairment are merciless, its metaliterary significances offer no compassion either.

    Academic text (2017)
  • The required interdisciplinary sensitivity encourages eye-opening dialogues between geographers and scholars in such fields as semiotics, aesthetics, and material-culture studies.

    Academic text (2011)

Synonyms

symbolism
vssemiotics
  • Literature
46 5.5

A way of using images or objects to stand for ideas and qualities

focuses on signs and symbols as part of communication theory
symbology
vssemiotics
4 9.5

The study or use of symbols that show ideas

includes both signs and symbols within a communication system
semiology
vssemiotics
  • Specialized
9.9

The study of signs and symbols, like words or pictures, and how they create meaning in language and communication

focuses on signs and symbols as a communication system

How Specialized

semiotics
  • Specialized
4 9.6
symbology
4 9.5
symbolism
  • Literature
46 5.5

Surface Forms

semiotics singular
semiotics plural

Etymology

The word semiotics comes from the Greek root semeion meaning 'sign', and it is the same idea behind English words like sign and signal. So, semiotics is the study of signs and symbols and how they give meaning and help people communicate.