Semiosphere

About: Semiosphere is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 219 publications have been published within this topic receiving 2698 citations.

Grafting Eco-Diasporic Identity in Randa Abdel-Fattah’s Selected Novels

Abstract: This paper is based on three selected novels entitled Does My Head Look Big In This? (2005), Ten Things I Hate About Me (2006), and Where The Streets Had A Name (2008) written by Randa Abdel-Fattah (1979), a Palestinian-Egyptian Australian Muslim diasporic writer. In this article, we examine the manifestations of grafting eco-diasporic identity by Abdel-Fattah in order to address how identity graft is operated by interacting with ideology, culture and nature in the contexts of the host land and the homeland as represented in the three selected novels. Using Colin Richards’ theory of graft as a framework, we explore identity contestations of Muslim young adults in the novels from an ecocritical and diasporic perspectives. In the novel Does My Head Look Big In This?, the images of Amal’s sense of being marginalised in the semiosphere of the host land and the sense of self-respect of her Muslim rootedness and heritage of the homeland semiosphere frame the fractured graft of identity. The character of Jamilah, in Ten Things I Hate About Me displays genuine manifestations of the collective emblem of the grafted identity. Finally, the symbol of the iconic jar of the homeland soil and its potentiality of regenerating Hayaat’s identity in Where the Streets Had A Name exhibits the ecological semiosphere in which the grafted identity is shaped. The current discussion, therefore, offers fresh insights into allowing a new horizon for identity grafting in Abdel-Fattah’s works as well as other writers within the tradition of Muslim Diasporic Literature.

Semiotica Tartuensis: Jakob von Uexkiill and Juri Lotman

Abstract: Abstract The essay provides a brief analysis of correspondence between two scholars whose heritage forms the basis of contemporary Tartu semiotics-Jakob von Uexküll (1864-1944) and Juri Lotman (1922-1993). A comparison between Uexküll's and Lotman's work demonstrates a series of features in which their approaches are in concord. We find some aspects of local culture as supportive of their way of thinking. We also claim that the theoretical integration of Jakob Uexküll's and Juri Lotman's approaches is at the heart of the contemporary semiotics, which has a task to develop a theoretical and methodological apparatus that would delimit and specify the scope of general semiotics and that could be used as a basis for all branches of semiotics.

Homo polyglottus: Semiosphere as a model of human cognition

Abstract: The semiosphere is arguably the most influential concept developed by Juri Lotman, which has been reinterpreted in a variety of ways. This paper returns to Lotman’s original “anthropocentric” understanding of semiosphere as a collective intellect/consciousness and revisits the main arguments of Lotman’s discussion of human vs. nonhuman semiosis in order to position it in the modern context of cognitive semiotics and the question of human uniqueness in particular. In contrast to the majority of works that focus on symbolic consciousness and multimodal communication as specifically human traits, Lotman accentuates polyglottism and dialogicity as the unique features of human culture. Formulated in this manner, the concept of semiosphere is used as a conceptual framework for the study of human cognition as well as human cognitive evolution.

Cognitive Sustainability in the Age of Digital Culture

Abstract: The aim of this article is to contextualize the implications of the expansion of digital culture in the on-going dis- cussions about the relations between sustainability and information and communication technologies. In order to relate the development of a global digital communication web, its effects on cultural processes and the issues of ecosystem and hu- man sustainability that humanity is facing, I will relate and elaborate on three aspects: 1) A Batesonean perspective on sustainability 2) The recent evolution of the technosphere, and 3) Yuri Lotman's notion of Semiosphere and his semiotic theory of culture. This path will lead me to delineate some of the eco-ethical dimensions implied in the development of pervasive digital-interactive-immersive-representational technologies.

Build your nation in 5′25″: social constructions of Italy in official and user-generated videos on YouTube

Abstract: This article focuses on the differences between the official video clip of a song dedicated to the nation and the remakes uploaded on social media by anonymous users. It argues that social media act as the semiosphere boundary, on which, for Lotman [2005. “On the Semiosphere.” Sign Systems Studies 33 (1): 205–229] central dominant texts and peripheral structures meet to generate new meaning. The work draws on Lotman's semiosphere, on nation-building, and on the bottom-up construction of reality of social media. Methodologically, semiotic analysis is applied to the images of all the videos. Results show that the peripheral elements theorised by Lotman adapt to and renew the language of the centre. In fact, they adopt the same structure of the official video but expand, revitalise and deconstruct the sedimented versions of Italy that it offers. As in Lotman, the periphery challenges the dominant hierarchy. Finally, all the videos agree on relegating the woman to a secondary role.