Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler

Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler
depicted in the top right-hand corner of the drawing! Being absorbed in the task led them to
unconsciously accept the terms in which reality was constructed within the medium. This is not likely
to be a phenomenon confined to children, since when absorbed in narrative (in many media) we
frequently fall into a 'suspension of disbelief' without compromising our ability to distinguish
representations from reality. Charles Peirce reflected that 'in contemplating a painting, there is a
moment when we lose the consciousness that it is not the thing, the distinction of the real and the
copy disappears' (Peirce 1931-58, 3.362).
Whilst in a conscious comparison of a photographic image
with a cartoon image of the same thing the photograph is
likely to be judged as more 'realistic', the mental schemata
involved in visual recognition may be closer to the
stereotypical simplicity of cartoon images than to
photographs. People can identify an image as a hand when
it is drawn as a cartoon more quickly than when they are
shown a photograph of a hand (Ryan & Schwartz 1956).
This underlines the importance of perceptual codes in
constructing reality. Umberto Eco argues that through
familiarity an iconic signifier can acquire primacy over its
signified. Such a sign becomes conventional 'step by step,
the more its addressee becomes acquainted with it. At a certain point the iconic representation,
however stylized it may be, appears to be more true than the real experience, and people begin to
look at things through the glasses of iconic convention' (Eco 1976, 204-5).
Modality cues within texts include both formal features of the medium and content features such as
the following (typical high modality cues are listed here as the first in each pair), though it is their
interaction and interpretation, of course, which is most important.