Lund University
Centre for Cognitive Semiotics
School of Linguistics
Chris Sinha
Department of Psychology, University of Portsmouth, UK
christopher.sinha@semiotik.lu.se
Lecture 6
Meaning and Materiality
How language grounds symbolic cognitive
artefacts
Part One
Language as a Social Fact and
Social institution
Social Facts: Durkheim
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“a category of facts which present very special
characteristics: they consist of manners of acting,
thinking, and feeling external to the individual, which
are invested with a coercive power by virtue of which
they exercise control over him.” (Durkheim, 1982
[1895]).
The objectivity of social facts thus consists in the fact
they are independent of any single individual’s
thoughts or will.
Ontology and methodology of
social facts
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social facts are irreducible to
psychological facts, structures or
processes, though they depend upon
these and influence them
Social facts are objects of shared,
mutual, intersubjective knowledge
Language is a social fact (institution)
The semiotic ontology of the social:
a brief formal account
John Searle on social (institutional) facts:
X counts as Y in C (ontext)
Example: a twenty dollar bill counts as a
monetary token with this particular exchange
value.
NB: the note does not stand for or represent
twenty dollars, it is twenty dollars. It is selfidentical; its value is subtended by (though
non-reducible to) its material existence.
Destroy the note, you destroy the value.
Representation and standing
for
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The conditions on representation
“To represent something … is to cause
something else to stand for it, in such a way
that both the relationship of ‘standing for’,
and that which is intended to be represented,
can be recognized.”
(Sinha 1988: 37)
Signs and signification
[X counts as S & S stands for M] in C
X= anything
S = sign
M = meaning (signified)
This simple notation clarifies the “double
articulation” of the sign, the conventional
unity of substance and signification.
Note:
C may now include Css, the sign system, and
Cc, the community of users
The subsystems of language
1. Grammar (in the wide sense):
X counts as S in Css for Cc or
X counts as S in L
L = This language
2. Semantics
Presupposing 1:
S stands for M in L
3. Pragmatics
Presupposing 1 & 2:
X counts as As in C
As = This speech act
(including reference)
Some consequences
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The semantic theory of meaning is underdetermined
by this formulation, and need not be truth-functional,
but is conventional and normative (as are all the
subsystems)
Semantics is distinguished from pragmatics without
necessitating a truth functional semantics
Contextual dependence characterises all subsystems,
but does not erase the distinctions between them
Language as a social object has its own proper
structure subtended by but irreducible to
intentionality
Part 2
How Language Grounds Symbolic
Cognitive Artefacts
Extended Embodiment
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The body is our general medium for
having a world … Sometimes the
meaning aimed at cannot be achieved
by the body’s natural means; it must
then build itself an instrument, and it
projects thereby around itself a cultural
world.
Merleau-Ponty 1962: 146.
Semiotics, Semiology, and the
(disputed) primacy of language
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There is a long standing dispute
between theories arguing for the
methodological primacy of language as
a semiotic system (Saussure, Barthes)
And theories that situate language
within the wider class of signs and sign
systems, without according
methodological primacy to language
(Peirce, Eco)
Language grounds symbolic
artefacts
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I will argue that
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The primacy of language consists in its
constitutive role as the evolutionarily
crucial human biocultural niche
There exists a sub-class of artefacts of
particular significance in the cultural history
of human cognition: symbolic cognitive
artefacts
Symbolic artefacts are grounded in
language
Language and cognitive artefacts
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Language is culturally and materially
situated, that is, dynamically embedded
within a semiotic network which
includes symbolic and non-symbolic
artefacts.
Language is the symbolic ground for a
specific class of artefacts that we can
designate as symbolic cognitive
artefacts
Technologies in general
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Amplify human powers (Bruner)
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Motor (hammer)
Perception (telescope, telephone)
Cognition/thinking (abacus)
Artefacts
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Made not found (cultural affordance)
Embody intentionality
Signify function or use value
Augmentation, potentiation,
constitution
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Technologies may augment existing
powers (bow and arrow)
They may potentiate new ones
(needle and thread)
Constituting new practices (sewing)
And bringing into being new social
relations
Eg print capitalism – Benedict Anderson
Artefact function, signification,
representation
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Artefacts have intentionally designed
canonical functions (eg cup / containment)
The function is afforded by the artefact
Artefacts signify their canonical function by
“counting as” (Searle) a category member,
and being “perceived as” such
Symbolic cognitive artefacts also
necessarily have a representational sign
function
Materiality and semiotic
mediation
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Vygotsky emphasized the importance of semiotic
mediation in transforming cognition and cognitive
development, focusing on the internalization of
conventional signs originating in contexts of
discursive practice.
He attributed great importance to the formative role
of language in the emergence of “inner speech” and
“verbal thought”, but his employment of the concept
of semiotic mediation also encompassed the use of
non-systematic signs, including objects-as-signifers
(Vygotsky’s handkerchief)
He paid little attention to systematic, linguistically
grounded cognitive artefacts
Tool and Sign
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Vygosky, Bühler and many others have
pointed to the analogy between tool and sign,
Vygotsky distinguishing the former as worlddirected and the latter as mind-directed
But these theories do not address that class
of artefacts that unite the sign and tool
functions, symbolic cognitive artefacts, which
are both world and mind directed
CULTURE
Material culture
Symbolic culture
Activity/Practice
TOOL
SIGN
World directed
Mind directed
COGNITIVE ARTEFACT
Cognitive artefacts and cultural
schemas
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Symbolic cognitive artefacts canonically
support conceptual and symbolic processes in
specific meaning domains
Examples: notational systems, dials,
calendars, compasses
Cultural and cognitive schemas organizing
e.g. time and number can be considered as
dependent on, and hence constituted, not
just expressed by, cognitive artefacts
Cognitive artefacts have a
material, cognitive and social
history
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The invention and perfection of the calendar
(going back to Babylon) and the clock is well
documented
These artefacts made possible thinking about
“Time as Such”, and time-based as opposed
to event-based time interval systems
Which are not universal
And the absence of which may be correlated
with the absence of linguistic constructional
space-time analogical mapping (Sinha et al in
press)
Representation and the sign
function
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Cognitive artefacts can now be defined as those
artefacts that intentionally, canonically and materially
incorporate or embody a representational sign
function, often supporting the cognitive organization
of a specific meaning domain
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A book
A spreadsheet
But not:
Vygotsky’s handkerchief (non-canonical)
A telephone (no sign function)
A computer (no intrinsic representational function)
Representation and notation
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Notational systems are by definition
cognitive artefacts, grounded in the
symbolic function of language
Many cognitive artefacts inherit their
sign function from notational systems
In doing so they may constitute new
conceptual domains (eg calendars and
“Time as Such”)
Cognitive artefacts in history
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The history of the human mind is the cultural
history of the invention and use of symbolic
cognitive artefacts, which materially bear and
augment Tomasello’s “ratchet effect”
Domain-constituting cognitive artefacts are of
particular significance, having dramatic
transformativer effects on symbolic cognition
Cognitive artefacts in turn transform wider
technologies and forces of production and
potentiate new relations of production
What about language
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Are languages cognitive artefacts?
No, because they are (for our species) found
not made
But the prehistory of language is cognitiveartefactual as well as biological, and language
is transformative of cognition
Language is a biocultural niche and social
institution to which we have adapted in
evolution, and which symbolically grounds
cognitive artefacts that are also
transformative of the biocultural niche
Future directions
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The cognitive sciences must move beyond the
classical (individualist-mentalist) cognitivist paradigm,
and take seriously the normativity constituting social
life
Language and language learning are matters of
participation and interaction in an intersubjective field
constituted by symbolic, as well as non-symbolic, but
signifying, artefacts
Embodiment extends beyond the body, meaning is
grounded not just in brains, but also in the world
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Thank you