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Semiotics and ArchitectureSHREYA DESHPANDE

Topics Introduction to SemioticsAbout semiotics and key termsExamples Semiotics and architectureExamples

Semiotics Semiotics is the study ofmeaning-making or Interpretation of signs, the study of sign processes and meaningful communication.This includes the study ofsignsand sign processes , indication, designation, likeness,analogy,metaphor,symbolism, signification, and communication.

Ferdinand de Saussure (so-SIR) (1857-1913) It is possible to conceive of a science which studies the role of signs as part of social life. It would form part of social psychology, and hence of general psychology. We shall call it semiology . It would investigate the nature of signs and the laws governing them.

Signs and symbols can be studied, not only in language (both written and spoken forms), but also in rituals, culture, images and art in fact, anything that can be read.Basically, semiotics is the study of signs and their meanings! Signs include words, gestures, images, sounds, and objects.

The form Concept

Saussure and American philosopherCharles Sanders Peirce brought the term into awareness and are thus called as the founders of Semiotics

REDAPPLELOVEFIREBLOOD

SIGNIFIER: Blonde HairSignifies:beauty, Innocence, Looks goldSIGNIFIER: Perfume BottleSignifies: Looks Jewel-like, Buried Treasure

SIGNIFIER: JewelerySignifies:Extravagance, Excess, Glamour, Decadence

SIGNIFIER: Colour GoldSignifies:Luxury, Riches, Expense, Success, ShimmeringSIGNIFIER: FontSignifies:Dior Logo, Brand Name, Designer

Key terms Denotation - What we actually seeThe surface meaning.Connotation - What you associate with this imageThe deeper or hidden meanings and associations or INTERPRETATIONS

Denotation (meaning):Text Fight Cancer. Motivation for women.Strong black-white contrast.Woman because of long hair, feminine face.Woman looks to the left.Holds sword.Snakes attached to sword.Connotation (deeper meaning): Fight seems to express masculine values . Masculinity also is expressed in the totalitarian style. Sword underlines fight & bravery. Looking to the left is looking against reading direction; stresses fight against. Black-white contrast seems to stress good-bad duality. Picture of woman because this is an ad for women so, women can identify. Snakes express symbol for medical profession.

OBJECTIVES Identify the conventions of their use ,in a particular culture of a particular society.Decode the meanings conveyed by the signs and understand what it denotes and what it connotes.The idea is to uncover the rules that govern human behavior

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SEMIOTICS AND ARCHITECTUREIf semiotics, beyond being the science of recognized systems of signs, is really to be a science studying all cultural phenomena as if they were systems of signson the hypothesis that all cultural phenomena are, in reality, systems of signs, or that culture can be understood as communicationthen one of the fields in which it will undoubtedly find itself most challenged is that of architecture.

UMBERTO ECO, Semiotician and Architectural critic (Rethinking Architecture)

Most architectural objects do not communicate (and are not designed to communicate), but function.Thus , Architectural objects communicate through their form and function accordingly.

ARCHITECTURE AS COMMUNICATIONA phenomenological consideration of our relationship with architectural objects tells us that we commonly do experience architecture as communication, even while recognizing its functionality

ROLAND BARTHES (semiotician)-As soon as there is a society, every usage is converted into a sign of itself

Every object communicates the function to be fulfilled.

To use a spoon to get food to ones mouth is still, of course, the fulfilment of a function, through the use of an artefact that allows and promotes that function.the fact that someone uses a spoon becomes, in the eyes of the society that observes it, the communication of a conformity by him to certain usages

Need Satisfaction Convention

The architectural sign is the presence of a sign vehicle whose denoted meaning is the function it makes possible Architectural objectForm and Functions Observable and Describable Variable

Different forms, same denotations, different connotation

Through materialization in the architectural-spatial environment, society leaves its anthropomorphic trace, reflecting direct and indirect interrelations between man and his environment, between human ideas, intentions, bodies, human organism proper and the architectural-spatial environment, rich in volumes, shapes and volumes.Eventhese interrelations manifest themselves in the interaction of thesignifierand the signified, with the latter able to act both as adenotationand connotation.

the form of the object must, besides making the function possible, denote that function clearly enough to make it practicable as well as desirableFORMFUNCTIONDENOTATIONCONNOTATION

In human perception,theurban architectural-and-spatial environment acts as a system of mutually replacing and interacting emotional-aesthetic signs, symbols and images recognized in architectural bodies. This systemcauses and determines the emotional-aesthetic, symbolic and figurative perception of theimageof the worldby man . Directly or indirectly, all the object-spatial world surrounding man acts on him. At that, from 85 to 90 percent of information about the surrounding world comes to humansbyvision, while only 10-15 percent,bythe senses of hearing, smell,touchandkinaestheticfeelings (Barabanov, 1991, 1992, 1997).

SEMIOTICS AND HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY

Powerfulstilobateunderscored with rows of repeating steps, producing a general feeling of peace, satisfaction and strength

Bunches of vertical lines rush upwards, and line-vectors of the fluted columns converge above generating the feeling of noble loftiness and exaltation,

At that, an ultimate feeling of strength, nobleness, reliance, exaltation and balance is born in the whole system of interacting line-vectors and shapes.

Form lines are the emotional-aesthetic signs personifying certain sensations, ideas, phenomena, human virtues and culture, appearing as kind of substitutes to some phenomena of the reality.

The combination of ideas as well as the different kinds of memory involved in the process of human perception allows both the architect-creator and the perceiving consumer, to reconstruct and create new ideas. This is strongly dependent on subjective factors of perception, such as ability to aesthetic perception, orientation to perception, emotional state, etc.

CONCLUSIONThe form of the building itself suggests its mode of inhabitation or function. Its aesthetic properties like volume,mass,texture,material suggest the concept behind it.Several ancient to postmodernist architectural buildings have been purposefully designed to evoke certain feelings into peoples minds.

Literature Eco, Umberto- Rethinking Architecture : function and sign, the semiotics of space.Seiler, Robert- SemiologyJenks ,Charles- What is postmodernism? Gaines ,elliot- Space and semioticsKristina Juodinyt-Kuznetsova -Architectural Space And Greimassian Semiotics

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