Semiotics of Culture and Language

Source: Current Anthropology , Jun., 1976, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Jun., 1976), pp. 352-354
Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation
for Anthropological Research

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2741570

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teacher and pupil as mirrored in and constructed by the
discourse patterns of instruction. A long-time student of the
Whorf hypothesis, Regan presented data suggesting that the
discourse patterns employed with surprising uniformity by
teachers in various countries exert a powerful influence on the
child's conceptual system quite apart from the content of the
instructional material which is overtly being conveyed.
Yoshihiko Ikegami presented a wealth of evidence exploring
the notion that all linguistic expressions of change and state
are modeled after those of the most concrete types of change
and state, i.e., motion and existence in a location. He concluded
that although there is clearly a set of common underlying
patterns in the linguistic representation of change and state
and these patterns can very closely be approximated to those
for representing motion and location, the claim of universal
priority of the localistic notions does not hold.
Keith Basso offered a rich study of metaphor, based on the
"wise words" of the Western Apache, and attacked transforma-
tional linguistics for its exclusion of various types of information
which are essential to an adequate theory of metaphor, in
particular for its literalist treatment of meaning, which leaves
figurative speech unaccounted for, and for its limited view of
creativity. In his oral presentation (which, like Halliday's,
departed substantially from the written), Basso extended the
notion of metaphor to nonlinguistic behavior and discussed
various desiderata for a general theory of culture which would
be able to include an account of such behavior.
Ruqaiya Hasan explored semantic distance across languages,
using data from English and Urdu, and argued that a culture
has a characteristic semiotic style whose crucial characteristics
are reflected in all systems of communication, whether verbal
or nonverbal. She concluded that semantic differences between
languages cannot be properly studied without consideration of
their sociocultural settings and that the failure of most testers
of the Whorf hypothesis properly to include such consideration
"effectively bears Whorf out in his assertion that it is a charac-
teristic of the SAE cultures to treat the abstract relational
notion as a concrete object."
John Sinclair offered a theoretical study of discourse in rela-
tion to language structure and semiotics. Making use of notions
of linearity, levels of abstraction, and the exchange as important
tools in his analysis, Sinclair concluded that language provides
the primary organizing principle of discourse units up to a
certain size, just above the level of the exchange, while for
large-scale units the structuring is predominantly extra-
linguistic; between the two levels he hypothesizes a transitional
zone where stylistic patterns thrive and point both ways.
L. M. O'Toole compared two contrasting models for the
analysis and interpretation of fictional narrative: an analytic
model that he has used for some time in the interpretation of
Russian short stories and a generative model proposed by the
Russians Zholkovsky and Scheglov. He emphasized, among
other things, the patterns of relations between the social roles
and functions of the dramatis personae and the linguistic
devices used by the author in characterizing them.
Jeffrey Ellis offered "some speculations on language contact
in a wider setting" in which he explored relationships among
descriptive linguistics, historical linguistics, and sociolinguistics,
with particular reference to the sociocultural aspects of language
contact. He drew extensively upon data for language use in
Ghana, including problems of contact between English and
native languages and sociocultural aspects of the use of English
by British as opposed to its use by natives as a second language,
though as the main channel of education, commerce, and
politics.
Three of the presentations offered general schemata for the
study of semiotics, each based upon a somewhat different
approach. Ashok R. Kelkar drew more heavily on philosophy
than the other participants and presented a lengthy and highly
Vol. 17 . No. 2 J
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structured "prolegomena to an understanding of semiotics and
culture" so broad in its scope that it was quickly nicknamed a
cosmology by the other participants. Robin Fawcett proposed
an extension of Hallidayan system-network theory into the
general area of semiotics, giving particular attention to the
treatment of communication and knowledge of the universe;
Sydney Lamb, in a similarly oriented paper, explored the
possibilities of extending the relational-network theory of
stratificational grammar to a general relational semiotics which
would endeavor to account for the structure of a culture as a
network of relations.
The remaining contributions are perhaps best considered as
falling into independent categories:
Alexander Piatigorsky discussed the notions of the sign and
the word from the point of view of Buddhist philosophy. Ruth
S. Day provided a perspective from the standpoint of cognitive
psychology, presenting evidence indicating that people (at least
in American society) fall into two general classes with respect
to the extent to which cognitive processes are linguistically
bound. Her written contribution in the proceedings will include
also a cognitive viewpoint of some of the considerations raised
by other participants. Donald Preziosi's study of relations
between linguistic and environmental structure examined the
interdependence between man, his culture, and the spatial
structures that he surrounds himself with. Among other things,
he demonstrated the use of relational-network analysis for the
study of architectural form and concluded that "it remains a
reasonable assumption. . . that common cognitive operations
underlie" the deep semantic organizations of both language and
architecture. W. C. Watt offered some general considerations
concerning evidence and criteria in semiotics and presented a
specific semiotic study devoted to structural patterns in the
Roman alphabet, from which he drew various conclusions, and
posed some problems, for cognitive semiotics.
Two participants, William Davenport and Adam Makkai,
were assigned the roles of contributing overviews after studying
the other contributions. Davenport, who was given the job of
relating the proceedings to cultural anthropology, discussed
various theories of culture and their historical development
and compared them with respect to their abilities to treat
certain aspects of language, cognition, and general semiotics.
Makkai's linguistic overview article in the proposed publication
will relate various contributions of the other participants to the
development of modern linguistics and the theory of the sign.
In the last two days of the symposium various participants
offered shorter contributions and general discussion on some
basic problems: (1) Semiotics, meaning, metaphor, and semantic
styles. (2) What does one expect of a semiotic analysis (and
why is it worth the trouble)? (3) What is semiotic theory, and
what is semiotic evidence? (4) The interrelations among social,
cognitive, literary, etc., semiotics.
The general flavor of the symposium can perhaps best be
conveyed by a glimpse of the semantic style which, as Halliday
pointed out in one of the concluding sessions, developed during
the discussions. That semantic style is marked by certain key
words which kept recurring with favor, such as "shared,"
"system," "meaning," "interpretation," "exchange," "trans-
action," "ongoing,". "relevant," and "metaphor," and by
certain key phrases which were found particularly cogent, such
as "meaning embedded in behavior," "the social organization
of reality," "continuing exercise in meaning-conferral," "the
open-endedness of culture/language/knowledge," "knowledge
as a set of resources," "inertia in the code," and "stability-
maintaining ritual."
The tone of the meeting was immeasurably influenced by the
skill with which Lita Osmundsen and her well-trained staff
enhanced the structures of the social organization and the
environment of the group during its brief existence as a mini-
society on the hill above Gloggnitz.
June 1976 353
 The proceedings of the conference, after revision, will be
published in a volume tentatively entitled, New Approaches to
the Semiotics of Language and Culture, to be edited by Halliday,
and are aware that the totality of the subject could by no
Lamb, and Makkai.
Participants in the symposium were as follows:
Keith Basso, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz., and Institute
for Advanced Study, Princeton, N.J., U.S.A.
William Davenport, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia,
Pa., U.S.A.
Ruth S. Day, Yale University, New Haven, Conn., U.S.A.
Jeffrey Ellis, 11 Marchmont Rd., Edinburgh, Scotland.
Robin P. Fawcett, West Midlands College, Walsall, England.
M. A. K. Halliday, University of Essex, England, and Univer-
sity of Illinois at Chicago Circle, Chicago, Ill., U.S.A.
Ruqaiya Hasan, University of Essex, Colchester, England.
Yoshihiko Ikegami, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
Ashok R. Kelkar, Deccan College, Poona, India.
Sydney M. Lamb, Yale University, New Haven, Conn., U.S.A.
Adam Makkai (Rapporteur), University of Illinois at Chicago
Circle, Chicago, Ill., U.S.A.
L. M. O'Toole, University of Essex, Colchester, England.
Alexander M. Piatigorsky, School of Oriental and African
Studies, London, England.
Donald Preziosi, Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A.
John Owen Regan, Claremont Graduate School, Claremont,
Calif., U.S.A.
John Sinclair, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, England.
W. C. Watt, University of California, Irvine, Calif., U.S.A.
Ethnological Problems
in Human Ecology
situations created by the impending confrontation of non-
industrial societies with industrial ones. The participants were
means be covered in a single meeting.
Contributions by M. Mohseni (University of Teheran), Y.
Simonis (Universite Laval), A. Moroni and P. Menozzi (Uni-
versita di Parma), and M. Leroy (St. Francis Xavier University)
stressed the importance of monitoring demographic factors-
their structure and their regulating mechanisms. P. Charest
(Universite Laval) and M. I. Pereira de Queiroz (Universidad
de Sao Paulo) illustrated examples of modificatory processes,
the latter (from the Amazon region) showing nonadaptation
and the former (from the lower north shore of the Gulf of St.
Lawrence) the development of adaptive strategies. U. S. Misra
(Vidyant Hindu Degree College) and D. Tyagi (Anthropologi-
cal Survey of India) illustrated adaptation in a village context.
Helmuth Fuchs (Royal Ontario Museum), using a CBC film on
the Yanomami of Venezuela and Brazil, showed how some
vanishing societies successfully adapted in the past. J. L.
Swauger (Carnegie Museum) presented a series of techniques
that might assist groups to adapt to inevitable ecological
change. All these contributions, based on case studies, will
doubtless be useful in the formulation of a theory of human
ecology, particularly with regard to the systematics and
terminology of the new discipline.
Throughout the meeting, we kept reminding each other of
the growing interest in human ecology within the framework
of the anthropological sciences and of the fact that many very
active colleagues were not present to contribute their concerns,
experiences, and insights. There is no doubt that anthropology
could contribute towards fuller understanding of the many
forms of adaptation and adjustment achieved by both non-
industrial and industrial societies. Our participation in the
international meeting should be seen as a modest attempt to
represent the field within a larger extra-disciplinary context.

by HELMUTH FUCHS
Department of Ethnology, Royal Ontario Museum, 100 Queen's
World Social Science Development:
Park, Toronto, Ont., Canada M5S 2C6. 23 ii 76
The First International Meeting on Human Ecology, held in
Opportunity for Anthropologists
Vienna, Austria, September 15-19, 1975, included a panel on
ethnological problems. As things stand, there is as yet no
by C. S. BELSHAW
certainty whether the mushrooming interest of social scientists
Department of Anthropology and Sociology, University of
in human ecology is to be considered a real concern or an ecologi-
British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6T 1W5. 6 ii 76
cally conditioned adjustment to what seems to be a favourable
situation on the scientific scene. Looking at the contributions The International Social Science Council has created a Com-
listed in the general programme,1 one is tempted to ask what mittee on World Social Science Development with the objective
the "nonindustrial" ethnologists, who contributed only 6% of of sponsoring, generating, and supporting projects which have
that programme, were expected to offer to the overwhelming the effect of improving the international balance of social
majority dealing with problems of the industrialized world. science. The committee consists of nominees of each of the
Throughout the evolution of mankind, a great diversity of international discipline associations, drawn from scholars in
adaptations and adjustments have been devised to balance this Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East; I am initial
species's impact on the natural and social universe. One might convenor and the representative of the ISSC. The nominee of
therefore reasonably assume that a panel entitled "Ethnological the IUAES is Laila El-Hamamsy (who, unfortunately, could
Problems" would attempt to embrace all the alternatives, viable not attend the first meeting).
and otherwise, that mankind has experimented with since its The organising meeting was held, with the support of the
beginning. Furthermore, one might expect that it would help Conjunto Universitario Candido Mendes and the Canadian
to elucidate problems dealing with the interaction between International Development Agency, in Rio de Janeiro in early
human groups and their physical, social, and psychic environ- December 1975. The representative of the International
ments. Keeping in mind the comparative character of the an- Economics Association, Malcolm Adiseshiah, formerly Deputy
thropological sciences, it would also call attention to ecological Director-General of UNESCO and at present Vice-Chancellor
of the University of Madras, was elected Chairman and is now
in charge of the work of the committee. As reported in the
1 Formal panels: Humano-ecological Ethics, Health Attitudes, Re-
February newsletter of the ISSC, the committee defined its
source Ecology, Environment Impact due to Building and Construc-
tion, Communication as Man-Environment System, Theoretical function as comprising, for the countries of Africa, Asia, and
Background, Landscape Ecology, Ethnological Problems, Legal Latin America: (1) the development of social sciences and a
Problems, Residential Habitat, Adaptability to the Chemical En- body of social scientists in a manner which makes them more
vironment, Ecology of Children and Adolescents, Human Ecology
relevant or relevant to their societies; (2) the identification of
of the Polar Zone. Special discussion groups: Adaptability to the Ra-
diation Environment, Gerontology, Human Ecology of the Arid and problems confronting social scientists and societies in these
Semi-Arid Zones, Urban Ecology. countries; (3) the initiation of action to meet some of the most

354 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY

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