TINDER: OSTENSIÓN, INFERENCIA, PERFORMATIVIDAD E IDENTIDADES DE GÉNERO : TINDER: OSTENTION, INFERENCE, PERFORMATIVITY AND GENDER IDENTITIES

Relevance Theory (RT), by Sperber and Wilson (1986, 2012), has made fundamental contributions to the understanding of linguistic meaning. Research on iconic meaning, on the contrary, has few studies. In this article, a RT-based methodology for image analysis is developed and applied to several pictures from different Tinder profiles. The article has three goals. First, to demonstrate that pictures —from advertising, artistic or on Tinder— have a high degree of ostensive meaning as defined by the RT. Secondly, given the particular dominance in Tinder of the image over written text, to describe how the ostensive-inferential process is articulated when offering and processing gender identities. Finally, to analyze how the ostensive-inferential process affects the possibilities and limitations of the application to portray more or less hegemonic identities. La Teoría de la Relevancia (TR), de Sperber y Wilson (1986, 2012), ha hecho contribuciones fundamentales para la comprensión del significado lingüístico. La investigación relevantista del significado icónico, en cambio, cuenta con pocos estudios. En este artículo se desarrolla una metodología para el análisis de imágenes en base a la TR y se aplica a varias fotografías de perfiles distintos de Tinder. Los objetivos son tres. De entrada, demostrar que la fotografía —publicitaria, artística o en Tinder— tiene un alto grado de significado ostensivo, tal y como lo define la TR. En segundo lugar, dada la particular dominancia en Tinder de la imagen sobre el texto, describir cómo se articula el proceso ostensivo-inferencial a la hora de ofrecer y procesar identidades de género. Por último, analizar cómo el proceso ostensivo-inferencial afecta a las posibilidades y limitaciones de la aplicación para representar identidades más o menos hegemónicas. Abstract: Relevance Theory (RT), by Sperber and Wilson (1986, 2012), has made fundamental contributions to the understanding of linguistic meaning. Research on iconic meaning, on the contrary, has few studies. In this article, a RT-based methodology for image analysis is developed and applied to several pictures from different Tinder profiles. The article has three goals. First, to demonstrate that pictures —from advertising, artistic or on Tinder— have a high degree of ostensive meaning as defined by the RT. Secondly, given the particular dominance in Tinder of the image over written text, to describe how the ostensive-inferential process is articulated when offering and processing gender identities. Finally, to analyze how the ostensive-inferential process affects the possibilities and limitations of the application to portray more or less hegemonic identities.  Keywords: Iconic meaning. Ostention. Inference. Gender identity. Tinder

Sign, silence and creation in Antonio Méndez Rubio’s poem book “Va verdad”

En qué consisten las llamadas poéticas del silencio y de qué modo están presentes en “Va Verdad”, uno de los últimos poemarios de Antonio Méndez Rubio, es el doble propósito de este artículo. La metodología que lo orienta es inductiva: hallar en los poemas esas marcas o señas que permitan sostener la pertinencia del poemario a tales poéticas y, desde el texto, contribuir a la no siempre diáfana delimitación de las mismas. Iluminar, pues, el poemario de Méndez Rubio desde la perspectiva de las poéticas del silencio para aproximarse, a su vez y a través de “Va Verdad”, a la definición de tales poéticas.Both the exact meaning of the poetics of silence and how they appear in “Va Verdad” –one of Antonio Méndez Rubio’s last book of poems– are the dual purpose of this article. The methodology that leads this work is inductive: to find in these poems the marks that make it possible to sustain their belonging to such poetics and, from the very text, contribute to their not always apparent definition. In other words, shed light on Mendez Rubio’s poems from the perspective of the poetics of silence to identify, in turn and through “Va Verdad”, what such poetics are