What is cognitive semiotics? A new paradigm in the study of meaning

• Main Author: Per Aage Brandt
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Université de liège 2011-12-01
• Series: Signata
• Subjects: mental spaces; metaphor; reference
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/signata/526

Classical semiotics has evolved as either an extension of the linguistic paradigm (from F. de Saussure to R. Barthes and E. Benveniste) or an extension of the logico-behavioristic paradigm (from C.S. Peirce to T. Sebeok and U. Eco), or, exceptionally, including both paradigms (R. Jakobson). While important ideas and findings have been made in these frameworks, they also implied an important limitation to further growth: on one hand, the Peircean rejection of psychological foundations; and on the other hand, the culturalistic belief in the autonomy of language and discourse as origins of meaning. However, linguistic communication is but one of many expressive manifestations besides music, gesture, imagery, of the semiotic underpinnings of the human mind, and it cannot be understood as meaning production without a deeper study of these underlying semiotic properties of the human mind and psyche as such, which are inseparable from the properties of basic human cognition. This understanding is the core endeavor of cognitive semiotics. To find the principles that make signs and the use of signs possible and specific sign types necessary; to find the representational laws of the mind that allow human imagination and meaning creation to develop and differentiate into the manifold discourses and practices that characterize our cultures and genres; to find the basic principles that allow us to us make sense (and even nonsense) of the world we live in — these are the challenging tasks that motivate what we call cognitive semiotics.In this text, I will therefore present a cognitive view of sign typology, of conceptual integration (blending), and of metaphor. I will finally shift to a philosophical mode and briefly discuss the nature of meaning, being convinced that no study of meaning can prosper without philosophy.