Aesthetic Constituents in the Courtly Culture of Renaissance England

TLDR: In this paper, the authors define a complex text consisting of various linguistic and non-linguistic signs, and apply the same paradigms and criteria of analysis to all manifestations of a culture, regardless of their constitutional (medial) differences.

Abstract: _C ULTURAL SYSTEMS are manifested in specific forms of expression, such as literature, for example, painting, dress, architecture, music, eating habits, and so on. The totality of such expressions is, by our definition, a complex text consisting of various linguistic and nonlinguistic signs.' This definition makes it possible to apply the same paradigms and criteria of analysis to all manifestations of a culture, regardless of their constitutional (medial) differences. That is to say, it creates the preconditions for taking a look at culture as a total phenomenon. For according to the constitution of the signs, there exist cultural subtexts that diverge from one another. Such subtexts can be made up of a single sign type or of several of them. An example of the former is the portrait, and of the latter, say, a theatrical production. Cultural subtexts thus possess a differing complexity. They are subject, moreover, to the normative pressure of certain fundamental principles, which every cultural system formulates differently for itself. Certain social instances are entrusted with the upholding of these principles. For this purpose they appeal to a politico-cultural center (such as monarchy, or a democratic constitution) which is normally not further inquired into but presupposed as self-evident. All of the products of a cultural system ultimately proceed from such a center and, from the standpoint of the interpreter, must also be referred to it.