RE: [xmca] Body expression as sign.

["Vera John-Steiner" <vygotsky@unm.edu>]

Andy and Larry,
I was just going to write a very similar note to Andy's. I believe that the
Peircian distinctions are very widely accepted,

Vera

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On
Behalf Of Andy Blunden
Sent: Thursday, May 24, 2012 9:23 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: Re: [xmca] Body expression as sign.

Larry are you intending to use these terms as in Peirce's system?
For Peirce "sign" is a global category including a wide array of 
relations between sign, interpretant and object.
For Peirce a *symbol* has only a conventional relation to the object for 
the interpretant. It is an *icon* which relies on resemblance to the 
object, and an *index* on a material connection. But there are other 
theories of semiotics I guess.

Andy
http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/us/peirce2.htm*

*Larry Purss wrote:
> Joseph, Jack, Rod and Christine
>
> I would like to explore the topic of *body expression AS signs* [the topic
> of the thread]
>
> The term *signs* and how it links to two other terms *gesture* and
*symbols*
>
> This is not to put in question the focus of this thread to open up and
> explore questions of *energy* *movement* *emotion* and *attunement*.  The
> overall general term *expression* and how expression is an *aesthetic
> REACTION* [Vygotsky's term] or an *aesthetic RESPONSE* [Gadamer's term]
> I seems to be  central to our understanding bodily expression
>
> Within this general notion of expression my question is if the following
>  statements are equivalent, different, or ambivalent?
> * Body expression AS gesture
> * Body expression AS sign
> * Body expression as symbol
>
> My understanding of the relation of *signs* to what they signify is that
> the relation is ESSENTIALLY arbitrary. One sign can replace another sign
> and either sign can equally represent the signified.
>
> Symbols, by contrast have a relation of RESEMBLANCE to the signified.  We
> cannot merely transfer one symbol to be replaced by another symbol
> without this change radically changing the meaning.
>
> Both signs and symbols are implicated in conceptual understanding.
>
> Body expression as *gesture* moves into the realm of *showing* and
> *perceiving* ACTUAL physical bodily movement. Some traditions assume this
> level of bodily expression is pre-conceptual.  However other traditions
> asumme bodily gesture is expressing cultural-historical conventionalized
> movements.
>
> My question is: When we are exploring aesthetic REACTION or aesthetic
> RESPONSE  to bodily *expression* [as a general term] are we
*understanding*
> this bodily expression at the level of gesture, symbol, or sign
> expressions? Do the adjectives used to modify *expression* change the
> meaning of our understanding of expression as a general term?
>
> Larry
> On Wed, May 23, 2012 at 9:24 AM, Joseph Gilbert
<joeg4us@roadrunner.com>wrote:
>
>   
>> Let us remember that spoken-word language is composed of sounds made by
>> the body, sounds that issue forth as expressions of emotions and that
cause
>> hearers bodies to assume patterns of motion analogous to those in the
>> generators of the sounds. Thereby motion and emotion are transferred from
>> originators to receivers. It is that sense of emotion, that we experience
>> by our spoken words, that provides us with a sense of meaning. Our own
>> emotion is the bottom line of our sense of meaning. Things have meaning
>> only in as much, and in how, they affect us. And our emotions are the way
>> we experience effects. Our words deal in the currency of meaning - our
>> emotions - , and they refer to things. Because of this dual nature, words
-
>> the very things that identify things - inform us of the meaning of our
>> world simply by affecting our emotions with their sounds. Since we are
>> normally preoccupied with the referential aspect of words, it is
>> subconsciously that we experience their emotional effects.
>>
>>                Joseph Gilbert
>> ______________________________**____________
>> _____
>> xmca mailing list
>> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>>
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/**listinfo/xmca<http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/list
info/xmca>
>>
>>     
> __________________________________________
> _____
> xmca mailing list
> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
>
>
>   

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
Joint Editor MCA: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/hmca20/18/1
Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
Book: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1608461459/

__________________________________________
_____
xmca mailing list
xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca

__________________________________________
_____
xmca mailing list
xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca