Semiotic Evolution and the Dynamics of CultureMarcel Bax, Barend van Heusden, Wolfgang Wildgen This book is about patterns of development in the history of culture. Bringing together three areas of research: semiotics, cultural history, and evolutionary psychology, it attempts to bridge the gap that still separates the study of culture from the cognitive sciences. The multidisciplinary approach chosen by the contributors derives its impetus from the deep conviction that in order to understand the logic of cultural development, one must take the building blocks of culture, that is, signs and language, as a starting point for research. Central issues related to patterns of cultural evolution are dealt with in contributions on the development of mind and culture, the history of the media, the diversity of sign systems, culture and code, and the dynamics of semiosis. Theoretically oriented contributions alternate with in-depth case studies on such diverging topics as the evolution of language and art in prehistory, ritual as the fountainhead of indirect communication, developments in renaissance painting, the evolution of classification systems in chemistry, changing attitudes toward animal consciousness, and developments in computer technology. |
Contents
A bandwidth model of semiotic evolution | 3 |
vi | 10 |
Evolution of culture and the history of the media | 35 |
The evolution of semiosic dynamics | 53 |
Semiosis as evolution in the development of mind | 69 |
Dealing with the diversity of sign systems | 89 |
Semiotic questions raised by the evolution of talk | 105 |
Out of ritual A semiolinguistic account of the origin | 155 |
From alchemy to chemistry A chapter in the evolution | 215 |
Mythicreligiousesthetic | 231 |
License to kill Epistemological frames | 267 |
This | 268 |
Culture isas code? Semiotic and systemic perspectives | 289 |
Epilogue | 303 |
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Common terms and phrases
abstract action Adet analysis animals basic behavior Bellini biological Cassirer cave cave paintings cf Section challenge Charles Sanders Peirce codification cognitive communication complex concept consciousness context Cro-Magnon cultural Dutch dynamics emergence energy epistemological Ernst Cassirer evolutionary example experience Figure Franco francoism Frankfurt/Main function genre Giovanni Bellini groups guage Hárbarðsljóð hemisphere Heusden iconic ideologies images indexical indirect conveyance individual inferentially indirect interaction interpretation knight Lanceloet language Lascaux linguistic meaning mediasphere memory mental Mesolithic metanarrative Middle Dutch mimetic mind natural Neanderthal norms object orig painting patterns Peirce Peircean Peircean semiotics perception perspective Pietà pragmatic pragmatic indirectness re)constructions reality refer relation representamen representation represented ritual indirection schemata semiosis semiotic semiotic evolution semiotic process Sigfrid sign systems social Spanish society specific speech act stage structure symbolic forms talk texts theory thought tion University Press verbal whereas words Ydier