AndreaL - Saussure

In the introduction to Section One titled Semiology, the author states, "...Semiology has developed as the study of signs, though it owes less to psychology (as Saussure thought) than to its association with theories of ideology and of subjectivity.  Its basic principle is that where there is signification and a text, there must be a knowable underlying system giving rise to meaning" (3).  From an early age, we are taught to give meaning to everything from an actual, physical sign, to words and objects.  The underlying meanings of these examples are instilled in us from the beginning, and from there, we are always subconsciously associating the meaning with the object, word, ect.  With this in mind, it is easy to understand that as the author of the introductory sections states, "the sign is not autonomous and self-sufficient but always determined within ideology and in relation to subjectivity" (4).  In CMC 100, we learned about the difference between the signifier and the signified -- which is also explained in Saussure's Course In General Linguistics. 



To Give an example, the logo above is the sign, or the signifier.  We see this logo and then we automatically think of it's meaning (or what it signifies), in this case being to reuse, reduce, recycle.  We know when we see this sign on the side of a bin, for example, that we are not meant to throw regular trash in it, but rather plastics.  This idea of seeing the recycle logo and automatically knowing what it represents, illustrates what the author of the Semiology section was stating about there being an underlying message or significance.  Many times, we don't realize that we are associating meaning with objects, but that's kind of the point...we don't realize it, because we've been doing it for as long as we can remember.