Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler

Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler
USA, who runs the most widely-used webpage of semiotic links, has suggested that my own online
text was a key factor in the remarkable growth of interest in semiotics online: it was the focus, he
says, for the emergence of a semiotic community. If I had believed that I think I would have been
paralysed by a sense of the inadequacies of my text and of the limitations of my knowledge and
capabilities to address such a task. Luckily I wasn't originally aware of any such possibility: my online
audience was invisible.
Clearly, publication of academic papers on the web offers the potential of a far larger audience than
that to which academics are accustomed. I urge fellow academics to retain on-line publishing rights
for their papers by adding to their publishing contracts and to their manuscripts submitted for print
publication a line to the effect that 'the author reserves the right to publish on-line versions of this
text'. I have so far resisted the temptation to include a comment form copying readers' comments
automatically to my Head of Department so that my colleagues would realize that my ventures into
cyberspace are appreciated by someone! I do try to answer e-mail from readers, but am not always
able to spare the time, so I hope I will be forgiven for thanking here anyone who has not received an
individual reply. I continue to welcome comments and suggestions.
I occasionally get e-mail messages asking whether any payment is due in return for the use of this
resource. Unless you propose to distribute copies no payment or licence is required. However, if you
want to support the site and are feeling generous are some options you might consider:
• buy the book of this online text
• buy a book which is now surplus to my own requirements (times are that tough for UK
academics!)
• send me a book from my wishlist at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
You do not have to ask my permission to include a link to it from a webpage. You may also store a
copy on your own PC for personal use. However, please do not store a 'local copy' on a server or
store and distribute the text on a CD. I am happy to negotiate official mirror sites.
In quoting from the text of Saussure's Course in General Linguistics that the translation used is that of
Roy Harris (Saussure 1983), although, following the practice of John Sturrock in using this translation
(Sturrock 1986, 31, 32), I have retained the terms 'signifier' and 'signified' rather than use Harris's
translation of signifiant as 'signal' and signifié as 'signification'. Whilst it is far more recent (1983) than
the Wade Baskin translation (1959), Harris's translation is rarely cited in the texts which most
students are likely to encounter. I have therefore cited page references for Baskin's translation (the
1974 edition) alongside those for Harris's translation. The status of the French 'original' is
problematic, since not only was it first published posthumously in 1916 (Saussure having died in
1913), but it was not written by Saussure himself - being a compilation based on notes taken by his
students from lectures delivered between 1907 and 1911.
The main text is periodically updated (sometimes intensively). The on-line text is now
available in English in the frozen form of print. The online version has special
advantages: notably, for the writer revisability, for the reader, being able to 'search' the
text and for both, the 'connections' made possible by hypertextual links. However, the
main problem for the reader (other than the discomfort of extended reading from the
screen) may be that it doesn't stand still long enough to get to know it - one can 'know