Metadatos

• Autor: Daniel Chandler
• Publicado en: Semiotics. The basics
• Año de publicación: 2017

Dennotation and connotation

• the two parts of meaning
• Dennotation: informational function
  • definitional, literal, obvious meaning of a sign
• Connotation: aesthetic function
  • more polysemic aspect of signs
  • secondary overtones that may be read into any sign, regardless of connotation
• there is no denotation without connotation
• Connotation requires knowledge of social context
• they require interpretation and thus challenge the notion of communication as decoding
• Barthes states that connotation creates the illusion of denotation, denotation os just another connotation
• Dennotation can rather be see as a naturalization process
• Althusser states that together with dennotation we also learn dominant connotations, which position us within ideology
  • connotations tend to support cultural stereotypes
  • connotational frameworks are organized around key positions and equations within cultural codes, each pole aligned with a cluster of symbolic attributes
• connotation and dennotation are not easily or neatly separated
  • there is no depiction or description without an evaluative element
• there is no literal meaning, denotation simply has a broader consensus
• connotation is looser, less conventional
  • some connotations are widely recognized unconsciously
• Barthes created a stratified model of connotation
  • dennotation is the first order of signification
  • connotation is the second: the denotative sign becomes the signifier of a connotative sign
  • idea that dennotation is a primary meaning has been challenged by other theorists
  • Language is not neutral and transparent
    • outr paradigmatic choices generate connotations
  • Connotation is not purely paradigmatic, sytagmatic relations are also relevant. The way connotations are perceived depends on the context
• connotations depend more on social intersubjectivity than on individual subjectivity
• they are dynamic and subject to change
• connotational codes: pervasive patterns of connotations
• connotation is very important in the advertising discourse

Myth

• Cultural myths help us make sense of our experiences within a culture
  • they express and organize shared ways of conceptualizing phenomena within a culture
  • they draw upon a ‘cultural vocabulary’
• they account for contradictions within cultures
  • brand myth: a brand offers a solution to a contradiction
• Like connotation, myths belong to a higher order of signification, according to Barthes
• the dennotative sign also becomes the signifier of the connotative sign
  • in the case of myth, modes of representation which myth uses to build its own system become the signifier of mythical metalanguage- myths are the pervasive ideologies of our time