Semiology

Semiology is the study of signs and meaning, from the signs we know as language to other forms of communication by means of images, symbols, gestures, and so on. All messages have a relational component. Language is communal in that it has meaning only within a community of people who accept that meaning, and meaning exists only as shared meaning. Semiotics has been applied to language in various ways, including an analysis of how we read and write and understand the written word, with written language seen as a form of symbolic interaction between writer and reader. The semiology of language analyzes the morphemes of language and how they acquire meaning in both spoken and written speech. Signs also come in the form of images, pictures, symbols, and so on, and these have meaning also within a community context.

As Keane (1997) points out, behaviors, actions, and material productions in a society also have shared meaning within that society, meaning which can be ascertained and "translated" by others. He tells a story of a feud between two families in an unidentified village, noting that the story "encapsulates the physical and semiotic mobility and the density of objects and hints at the critical role played by speech in the effort to control them" (Keane, 1997, 33). In this case, the feud included the exchange of gifts, which had meaning and which had to be just so in order to "say" what each side wanted said. Keane points to studies by

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de and the interactive mode. The observational mode is limiting and keeps the filmmaker to the moment. It also requires that the filmmakers maintain a disciplined detachment from the events. Interactive documentary makes the perspective of the filmmaker more evident, allowing the filmmaker to engage with individuals more directly while not reverting to classic exposition. Interview styles and interventional tactics are used so the filmmaker can participate in the events. The observational and interactive modes are similar in the way they record reality but differ in the degree of commentary. The film about the Vietnam Memorial designed by Maya Lin mixes the observational and interactive modes, and the voice of the filmmaker enters only infrequently, such as to identify the essence of the film at the beginning. Some sequences are almost pure observation, as when people coming to the wall to look for names or to remember the war are observed as they react to names, to the idea of the memorial, or to their memories of the war and fallen comrades and relatives. It is in their faces that the real meaning of the wall is etched, while much of Maya Lin's explanation for the elements that make up the wall is an added emphasis on

Category: Philosophy - S