1. Ch. 2 Fundamental Concepts in Semiotics Part One
2.1 Semiology and semiotics 2.2 Signs, semiosis, and abduction 2.3 Sign Classifications, their origin, and their Use 2.4 Pragmatics, speech acts, and culture 2.5 Sign Production, Communication and Discursive competence 2.6 Metaphors and Metonymies

2. Ch. 1 Important Review Semiotic Engineering Framework
Instead of HCI’s producing of new technology
SE introduces
Introduction of technology
aims at making adopters understand strategic aspects of the new technology
Users must be told how technology can add value.

3. Chapter focus certain Semiotic Theories
Meaning-making and representation in many forms by Chandler 2002
Everything that can be taken as a sign by Eco 1976
Meaning-makers
Meaning-takers
psychology, anthropology, biology,
logic, linguistics, philosophy, media
studies, software engineering, etc.
Domain of meanings
Semiotic Theories that play a fundamental role

4. Meaning of meaning Nature & purpose of representations
asking what is known
why or how they know
Therefore Semiotic Engineering favors a philosophical perspective on:
Investigating,
Designing,
Evaluating, and
Practicing Human Computer Interaction.

5. 2.1 Semiology and semiotics
Ferdinand de Saussure
Language = system of arbitrary signifying units
Abstract system langue
Realization in instances of sign usage parole
Charles Peirce
Based on conventions
Rule-based representations

6. Ferdinand de Saussure
He was a Swiss linguistic who created the term “semiotics”.
He distinguished between signifier and signified.
Sign is made up of:
Signifier
The image or sound that gives a meaning e.g.
blue color
Signified
The concept or meaning that the sign refers to e.g. blue color is often associated with sadness or the sea.

7. Ferdinand de Saussure 1857 – 1913 Swiss Linguist
Therefore for a sign to be considered a sign it must have a signifier and the signified.
Saussure argues that words are verbal signifiers that are personal to whoever is interpreting them .
A signifier can have many different representations which can turn into a different sign
Key figure in the study of language
Work inspired ideas of later writers in film theory, cultural studies and media studies
Important contribution – recognition of the nature of language as a relational system of signs

8. Charles Peirce
He followed a career in math , philosophy and was a logician.
Every thought is a sign and every act or reasoning of the interpretation of signs
Signs function as mediators between the external world of objects and the internal world or ideas.
Semiotics is the process of co-operation between signs, their objects and their interpretants.

9. 2.2 Signs, semiosis, and abduction
The three most basic semiotic concepts used:
Signs,
semiosis, and
abduction
Signs (for de Saussure) were a relational structure binding a representation (a perceptible form) to what it represents (a conceivable content)
Signs (for Peirce) were three fold structure and functioned as a process
Let’s take a look at Peirce’s idea

10. The structure of the Peircean sign
Interpretant
-meaning-
Object
-referent-
Representamen
-representation-
Sign

11. Interpretant Meaning of a representation
--thus the meaning of the sign – (defined by Peirce as another sign.
Interpretation = process by which meanings are associated to signs

12. Indefinitely many meanings to a sign
Impossible to Predict
the exact path
the meaningful association made
during interpretation….
This interpretive process is semiosis

13. Result of inference and episodic memory associations
InferenceThe conclusion to the associations of the representation
EpisodicThe branch of philosophy that studies the nature of knowledge, its presuppositions and foundations, and its extent and validity

14. Observation vs. Inference
Make 2 columns on your paper
Observations Inference
Write down:
observation – things you can see in the picture
Inferences – things that you suppose are likely to happen based on what you see in the picture

17. 2.2 Signs, semiosis, and abduction (cont..)

18. 2.2 Signs, semiosis, and abduction (cont..)

19. 2.3 Sign Classifications, their origin, and their Use
Sign classification: enhances its descriptive power enhances its predictive power enhances its explanatory power

20. Forms of signs
The signifier is perceived as resembling the signified. A pictorial representation , a photograph, an architect’s model of a building are all icons because they imitate or copy aspects of their subjects
A symbol has an arbitrary relationship between the signifier and the signified.
The interpreter understands the symbol through previous knowledge and experience.
Spoken or written words are symbols.
For example flags..
An index has a factual or casual connection that points towards a subject.
Example
A nest image is an icon but also an index of a bird.
Index
Icon
Symbol

21. Peircean Semiotics in HCI
Famous classification of signs into:
Icons – the representation brings the 1ST of its referent.
Indices - the representation brings the 2ND of its referent.
Symbols - the representation brings the 3RD
of its referent.
Semantic Directness = function of the distance between a user’s conception of a goal to achieve and the structure of actions in the abstract model