Doing Semiotics

The semiotics discipline - a hybrid of communication science and anthropology - accounts for the deep cultural codes that structure communication and sociality, endow things with value, move us through constructed space, and moderate our encounters with change. Doing Semiotics shows readers how to leverage these codes to solve business problems, foster innovation, and create meaningful experiences for consumers. In addition to the key principles and methods of applied semiotics, it introduces the basics of branding, strategic decision-making, and cross-cultural marketing management. Through practical exercises, examples, extended team projects, and evaluation criteria, this book guides students through the application of learning to all phases of semiotics-based projects for communications, brand equity management, design strategy, new product development, and public policy management. In addition to tools for sorting data and mapping cultural dimensions of a market, it includes useful interview protocols for use in focus groups, in-depth interviews, and ethnographic studies, as well as expert case studies that will enable readers to apply semiotics to consumer research.

The semiotics discipline - a hybrid of communication science and anthropology - accounts for the deep cultural codes that structure communication and sociality, endow things with value, move us through constructed space, and moderate our encounters with change. Doing Semiotics shows readers how to leverage these codes to solve business problems, foster innovation, and create meaningful experiences for consumers. In addition to the key principles and methods of applied semiotics, it introduces the basics of branding, strategic decision-making, and cross-cultural marketing management. Through practical exercises, examples, extended team projects, and evaluation criteria, this book guides students through the application of learning to all phases of semiotics-based projects for communications, brand equity management, design strategy, new product development, and public policy management. In addition to tools for sorting data and mapping cultural dimensions of a market, it includes useful interview protocols for use in focus groups, in-depth interviews, and ethnographic studies, as well as expert case studies that will enable readers to apply semiotics to consumer research.

This book showcases interviews with nine women who have made pioneering contributions to social semiotics and systemic functional linguistics (SFL), highlighting how these women have taken the discipline into new and innovative directions, and the enduring impact of their work. The volume features interviews with a generation of scholars inspired by the prominent linguists Michael Halliday and Ruqaiya Hasan in Sydney, reflecting on their achievements in the advancement of theory, knowledge, and practical application as well as the establishment of research centers in different parts of the world. A consistent interview format helps to illustrate the different directions the work of these scholars has taken and their different takes on key concepts to the discipline such as register, genre, text and context, and multimodality. Taken together, the interviews offer insights into key strands of social semiotic and SFL scholarship and give inspiration toward moving the field into new theoretical and applied directions. Reflecting on the groundbreaking work of renowned women scholars in social semiotics and SFL and their continued global impact, this book will be key reading for students and scholars in these fields, as well as those in the areas of language pedagogy, literacy, and multimodality.

Everyday consumers buy into the concept of brands and their associated meanings - the perception of quality, a symbolic relationship, a vicarious experience, or even a sense of identity. Marketing Semiotics suggests that the extent to which consumers recognize, internalize, and relate to brand meanings is not only an academic question. These meanings contribute to 'brand equity', the financial value of intangible brand benefits that exceed the use value of goods, and impacts upon a firm's financial performance. Therefore, the management of brand equity demands first and foremost the management of brand meanings, or semiotics. The book uses structural semiotics, a discipline that extends the laws of structural linguistics to the analysis of verbal, visual, and spatial sign systems, to shed light on the cultural codes and discourse of brands. It proposes that semiotic research should form the cornerstone of brand equity management, since brands rely so heavily on sign systems that contribute to profitability by distinguishing brands from simple commodities, from competitors, and engaging consumers in the brand world. The book includes dozens of global business cases where semiotics has been used to refocus, reposition, or extend the brand to new products, customers, and markets. Drawing upon twenty years of academic and consulting experience, the book provides actionable direction for steering brands through technological and cultural change, differentiating brands in the competitive environment, and counteracting the natural depletion of brand meaning over time.

It has often been claimed that the aim of semiotics is to establish a general theory of systems of signification. However, as Jean-Claude Coquet notes in a recent collection of essays, what distinguishes one school of semiotics from another is the initial definition given of sign. If, for certain semioticians, the sign is first of all an observable phenomenon, for the Paris School it is first of all a construct and this point of departure has crucial theoretical and practical consequences. The essays appearing in these two volumes are representative of recent work carried out by members of this semiotic school. Essays in Volume I study problems more closely related to theoretical issues, while Volume II focuses more specifically on various fields of application.

It has often been claimed that the aim of semiotics is to establish a general theory of systems of signification. However, as Jean-Claude Coquet notes in a recent collection of essays, what distinguishes one school of semiotics from another is the initial definition given of sign. If, for certain semioticians, the sign is first of all an observable phenomenon, for the Paris School it is first of all a construct and this point of departure has crucial theoretical and practical consequences. The essays appearing in these two volumes are representative of recent work carried out by members of this semiotic school. Essays in Volume I study problems more closely related to theoretical issues, while Volume II focuses more specifically on various fields of application.

M.A.K Halliday’s work has been hugely influential in linguistics and beyond since the 1960s. This is a collection of interviews with key figures in the generation of social semioticians who have taken Halliday’s concept of social semiotics and developed it further in various directions, making their own original contributions to theory and practice. This book highlights their main lines of thought and considers how they relate to both the original concept of social semiotics and to each other. Key themes include: Linguistic studies, multilinguality and evolution of language; Text, discourse and classroom studies; Digital texts, computer communication and science teaching; Multimodal text- and discourse analysis; Education and literacy; Media work and visual and audio modes; Critical Discourse Analysis. Featuring interviews with leading figures from linguistics, education and communication studies, a framing introduction and concluding chapter summing up commonalities and differences, connections and conflicts and key themes, this is essential reading for any scholar or student working in the area of social semiotics and systemic functional linguistics. Additional video resources are available on the Routledge website. Featuring: Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen, Theo Van Leeuwen, James R. Martin, Jay Lemke, Gunther Kress

Using applied semiotics, this book shows readers how to leverage the cultural codes that structure communication and sociality, endow things with value, and help us navigate social space and cultural change to solve business problems, foster innovation, and create meaningful experiences for consumers.