Structuralism Semiotics

"This guide discusses the nature and development of structuralism and semiotics, calling for a new critical awareness of the ways in which we communicate and drawing attention to their implications for our society. Published in 1977 as the first volume in the New Accents series, Structuralism and Semiotics made crucial debates in critical theory accessible to those with no prior knowledge of the field, thus enacting its own small revolution. Since then a generation of readers has used the book as an entry not only into structuralism and semiotics, but into the wide range of cultural and critical theories underpinned by these approaches." "Structuralism and Semiotics remains the clearest introduction to some of the most important topics in modern critical theory. An afterword and fresh suggestions for further reading ensure that this new edition will become, like its predecessor, the essential starting point for anyone new to the field."--BOOK JACKET.

First published in 1992. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This classic guide discusses the nature and development of structuralism and semiotics, calling for a new critical awareness of the ways in which we communicate and drawing attention to their implications for our society.

Published in 1977 as the first volume in the New Accents series, Structuralism and Semiotics made crucial debates in critical theory accessible to those with no prior knowledge of the field. Since then a generation of readers has used the book as an entry not only into structuralism and semiotics, but into the wide range of cultural and critical theories underpinned by these approaches. It remains the clearest introduction to some of the most important topics in modern critical theory. A new afterword and fresh suggestions for further reading complete this new edition.

In recent decades, what is known as 'the subject' has been problematized by various old and new materialisms and today appears as decentered in and by language, split by the unconscious, deformed by social forces, governed by ideology and is either seen to have succumbed to the postmodern condition or to never have existed in the first place. Every materialist theory of the subject depends on a conception of materiality, which can delineate the character of what the material reality, which de-centers or constitutes the subject consists of. Materiality and Subject in Marxism, (Post-)Structuralism, and Material Semiotics investigates the relation between materiality and the subject in the materialist approaches of Marxism, (post-)structuralism, and material semiotics. None of these approaches subscribes to a reductionist materialism; rather, they conceive of materiality as multiple, complex, and not reducible to tangible matter. For each approach, the modalities of materiality of the respective materialism are defined. The relationship between the multiple materialities and the subject constituted and decentered in this relationship are presented as specific to the theoretical approaches discussed.

The last half of the twentieth century has seen the emergence of literary theory as a new discipline. As with any body of scholarship, various schools of thought exist, and sometimes conflict, within it. I.R. Makaryk has compiled a welcome guide to the field. Accessible and jargon-free, the Encyclopedia of Contemporary Literary Theory provides lucid, concise explanations of myriad approaches to literature that have arisen over the past forty years. Some 170 scholars from around the world have contributed their expertise to this volume. Their work is organized into three parts. In Part I, forty evaluative essays examine the historical and cultural context out of which new schools of and approaches to literature arose. The essays also discuss the uses and limitations of the various schools, and the key issues they address. Part II focuses on individual theorists. It provides a more detailed picture of the network of scholars not always easily pigeonholed into the categories of Part I. This second section analyses the individual achievements, as well as the influence, of specific scholars, and places them in a larger critical context. Part III deals with the vocabulary of literary theory. It identifies significant, complex terms, places them in context, and explains their origins and use. Accessibility is a key feature of the work. By avoiding jargon, providing mini-bibliographies, and cross-referencing throughout, Makaryk has provided an indispensable tool for literary theorists and historians and for all scholars and students of contemporary criticism and culture.

The aim of this paper is to display a conceptual and methodological framework for brand image research by drawing on the discipline of structuralist semiotics. Upon a critical review of existing research from key authors in the brand semiotics literature and through an engagement with the concept of brand image as formulated by key authors in the marketing literature, a semiotic model is furnished for the formation of brand image and brand identity. By drawing on the structuration process of brand image along the three major strata in a brand's signification trajectory, and the key operations of reduction, redundancy, recurrence, isotopy, homologation, I focus more narrowly on how the chaining [enchaînement] of elements from the three strata is effected with view to addressing how brand image may be operationalised in structuralist semiotic terms vis a vis a brand's intended positioning, how it may be linked to a brand's advertising discourse and how the conceptual framework may yield a platform for ongoing brand image analysis and management.

First launched in 1977, The New Accents series rapidly changed the face of literary studies. This collection is a reissue a library edition of all of the volumes from the series, many of which are now out of print.