Umberto Eco

Bio: Umberto Eco is an academic researcher from University of Bologna. The author has contributed to research in topics: Semiotics & Interpretation (philosophy). The author has an hindex of 67, co-authored 340 publications receiving 20836 citations. Previous affiliations of Umberto Eco include Columbia University.

A Theory of Semiotics

Abstract: Foreword Note on graphic conventions 0 Introduction-Toward a Logic of Culture 01 Design for a semiotic theory 02 'Semiotics': field or discipline? 03 Communication and/or signification 04 Political boundaries: the field 05 Natural boundaries: two definitions of semiotics 06 Natural boundaries: inference and signification 07 Natural boundaries the lower threshold 08 Natural boundaries: the upper threshold 09 Epistemological boundaries 1 Signification and Communication 11 An elementary communicational model 12 Systems and codes 13 The s-code as structure 14 Information, communication, signification 2 Theory of Codes 21 The sign-function 22 Expression and content 23 Denotation and connotation 24 Message and text 25 Content and referent 26 Meaning as cultural unit 27 The interpretant 28 The semantic system 29 The semantic markers and the sememe 210 The KF model 211 A revised semantic model 212 The model "Q" 213 The format of the semantic space 214 Overcoding and undercoding 215 The interplay of codes and the message as an open form 3 Theory of Sign Production 31 A general survey 32 Semiotic and factual statements 33 Mentioning 34 The prolem of a typology of signs 35 Critique of iconism 36 A typology of modes of production 37 The aesthetic text as invention 38 The rhetorical labor 39 Ideological code switching 4 The Subject of Semiotics References Index of authors Index of subjects

The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts

Abstract: Preface Introduction: The Role of the Reader I. Open 1. The Poetics of the Open Work 2. The Semantics of Metaphor 3. On the Possibility of Generating Aesthetic Messages in an Edenic Language II. Closed 4. The Myth of Superman 5. Rhetoric and Ideology in Sue's Les Mysteres de Paris 6. Narrative Structures in Fleming III. Open/Closed 7. Peirce and the Semiotic Foundations of Openness: Signs as Texts and Texts as Signs 8. Lector in Fabula: Pragmatic Strategy in a Metanarrative Text Appendix 1 Appendix 2 Bibliography

Semiotics and the philosophy of language

Abstract: Introduction 1. Signs 1.1. Crisis of a concept 1.2. The signs of an obstinacy 1.3. Intension and extension 1.4. Elusive solutions 1.5. The deconstruction of the linguistic sign 1.6. Signs vs. words 1.7. The stoics 1.8. Unification of the theories and the predominance of linguistics 1.9. The 'instructional' model 1.10. Strong codes and weak codes 1.11. Abduction and inferential nature of signs 1.12. The criterion of interpretability 1.13. Sign and subject 2. Dictionary vs. Encyclopedia 2.1. Porphyry strikes back 2.2 Critique of the Porphyrian tree 2.3. Encyclopedias 3. Metaphor 3.1. The metaphoric nexus 3.2. Traditional definitions 3.3. Aristotle: synecdoche and Porphyrian tree 3.4. Aristotle: metaphors of three terms 3.5. Aristotle: the proportional scheme 3.6. Proportion and condensation 3.7. Dictionary and encyclopedia 3.8. The cognitive function 3.9. The semiosic background: the system of content 3.10. The limits of formalization 3.11. Componential representation and the pragmatics of the text 3.12. Conclusions 4. Symbol 4.1. Genus and species 4.2. Expressions by ratio facilis 4.3. Expressions produced by ratio difficilis 4.4. The symbolic mode 4.5. Semiotics of the symbolic mode 4.6. Conclusions 5. Code 5.1. The rise of new category 5.2. The landslide effect 5.3. Codes and communication 5.4. Codes as s-codes 5.5. Cryptography and natural languages 5.6. S-codes and signification 5.7 The genetic code 5.8. Toward a provisonal conclusion 6. Isotopy 6.1. Discursive isotopies within sentences with paradigmatic disjunction 6.2. Discursive isotopies within sentences with syntagmatic disjunction 6.3. Discursive isotopies between sentences with paradigmatic disjunction 6.4. Discursive isotopies between sentences with syntagmatic disjunction 6.5. Narrative isotopies connected with isotopic discursive disjunctions generating mutually exlusive stories 6.6 Narrative isotopies connected with isotopic discursive disjunctions that generate complementary stories 6.7. Narrative isotopies connected with discursive isotopic disjunctions that generate complementary stoies in each case 6.8. Extensional isotopies 6.9. Provisional conclusions 7. Mirrors 7.1. Is the mirror image a sign? 7.2. The imaginary and the symbolic 7.3. Getting in through the Mirror 7.4. A phenomenology of the mirror: the mirror does not invert 7.5. A pragmatics of the mirror 7.6. The mirror as a prosthesis and a channel 7.7. Absolute icons 7.8. Mirrors as rigid designators 7.9. On signs 7.10. Why mirrors do not produce signs 7.11. Freaks: distorting mirrors 7.12. Procatoptric staging 7.13. Rainbows and Fata Morganas 7.14. Catoptric theaters 7.15. Mirrors that 'freeze' images 7.16. The experimentum crucis References Index of authors Index of subjects

The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts

Abstract: Preface Introduction: The Role of the Reader I. Open 1. The Poetics of the Open Work 2. The Semantics of Metaphor 3. On the Possibility of Generating Aesthetic Messages in an Edenic Language II. Closed 4. The Myth of Superman 5. Rhetoric and Ideology in Sue's Les Mysteres de Paris 6. Narrative Structures in Fleming III. Open/Closed 7. Peirce and the Semiotic Foundations of Openness: Signs as Texts and Texts as Signs 8. Lector in Fabula: Pragmatic Strategy in a Metanarrative Text Appendix 1 Appendix 2 Bibliography

We Have Never Been Modern

Abstract: What makes us modern? This is a classic question in philosophy as well as in political science. However it is often raised without including science and technology in its definition. The argument of this book is that we are modern as long as we split our political process in two - between politics proper, and science and technology. This division allows the formidable expansion of the Western empires. However it has become more and more difficult to maintain this distance between science and politics. Hence the postmodern predicament - the feeling that the modern stance is no longer acceptable but that there is no alternative. The solution, advances one of France's leading sociologists of science, is to realize that we have never been modern to begin with. The comparative anthropology this text provides reintroduces science to the fabric of daily life and aims to make us compatible both with our past and with other cultures wrongly called pre-modern.

English as a Global Language

Abstract: Preface 1. Why a global language? 2. Why English? The historical context 3. Why English? The cultural foundation 4. Why English? The cultural legacy 5. The future of global English References Index List of tables.