Semiotic Theory

Semiotic theory predicts that visual, verbal, written, and other forms of cultural text can be read as a system of signs with inscribed meaning within systems of signification. It is a structural theory of representation that links cultural codes with meanings that have reference in the real world. Scholars who apply the theory study texts, widely defined, that include words, images, and objects; that is, anything that has been created, recorded, made apart from the sender and receiver, and communicates. Signs and symbols exist throughout global media systems. As a form of hermeneutics (classically, the study of the interpretation of literature), semiotics is concerned with the meaning of things, be they words, images, or objects. Thus, this theory can be used globally to reveal meanings ...