230 research outputs found
Biosemiotics, politics and Th.A. Sebeokâs move from linguistics to semiotics
This paper will focus on the political implications for the language sciences of Sebeokâs move from linguistics to a global semiotic perspective, a move that ultimately resulted in biosemiotics. The paper will seek to make more explicit the political bearing of a biosemiotic perspective in the language sciences and the human sciences in general. In particular, it will discuss the definition of language inherent in Sebeokâs project and the fundamental re-drawing of the grounds of linguistic debate heralded by Sebeokâs embrace of the concept of modelling. Thus far, the political co-ordinates of the biosemiotic project have not really been made explicit. This paper will therefore seek to outline
1. how biosemiotics enables us to reconfigure our understanding of the role of language in culture;
2. how exaptation is central to the evolution of language and communication, rather than adaptation;
3. how communication is the key issue in biosphere, rather than language, not just because communication includes language but because the language sciences often refer to language as if it were mere âchatterâ, âtropesâ and âfigures of speechâ;
4. how biosemiotics, despite its seeming âneutralityâ arising from its transdisciplinarity, is thoroughly political;
5. how the failure to see the implications of the move from linguistics to semiotics arises from the fact that biosemiotics is devoid of old style politics, which is based on representation (devoid of experience) and âconstruction of [everything] in discourseâ (which is grounded in linguistics, not communication study).
In contrast to the post-âlinguistic turnâ idea that the world is âconstructed in discourseâ, we will argue that biosemiotics entails a reconfiguration of the polis and, in particular, offers the chance to completely reconceptualise ideology
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