Semiotics for Beginners

        Daniel Chandler

        Suggested Reading

        [Please note that the current selection is primarily guided by my own teaching priorities, but that suggestions are welcome]

        • Introductions and General Works
        • Saussure
        • Other Semioticians
        • Structuralism and Poststructuralism
        • Cultural Semiotics
        • Language and Literature
        • Visual Media
        • Mass Communication
          • News Media
          • Advertising
          • Cinema
          • Television
        • Other Media

        Introductions and General Works

        • Bouissac, Paul (Ed.) (1998): Encyclopedia of Semiotics. Oxford: Oxford University Press
        • Chandler, Daniel (2001): Semiotics: The Basics. London: Routledge [the freeze-dried version of this online text!]
        • Cobley, Paul & Litza Jansz ([1997] 1999): Introducing Semiotics (originally entitled Semiotics for Beginners). Cambridge: Icon [part of an engagingly visual series]
        • Coward, Rosalind & John Ellis (1977): Language and Materialism: Developments in Semiology and the Theory of the Subject. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul [heavy going]
        • Danesi, Marcel (1994): Messages and Meanings: An Introduction to Semiotics. Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press [very readable]
        • Danesi, Marcel (1999): Of Cigarettes, High Heels and Other Interesting Things: An Introduction to Semiotics. London: Macmillan [a wide-ranging elementary introduction]
        • Deely, John (1990): Basics of Semiotics. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press [a philosophical discussion of semiotics, not really for the beginner]
        • Fiske, John (1982): Introduction to Communication Studies. London: Routledge (Chapter 3, 'Communication, Meaning and Signs'; Chapter 4, 'Codes'; Chapter 5, 'Signification'; Chapter 6, 'Semiotic Methods and Applications'); Chapter 8, 'Ideology and Meanings') [an excellent guide]
        • Guiraud, Pierre (1975): Semiology (trans. George Gross). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul [an accessible introduction]
        • Hodge, Robert & Gunther Kress (1988): Social Semiotics. Cambridge: Polity
        • Johansen, Jørgen Dines & Svend Erik Larsen (1988): Signs in Use. London: Routledge
        • Nöth, Winfried (1990): Handbook of Semiotics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press [very useful reference book]
        • Sless, David (1986): In Search of Semiotics. London: Croom Helm [quite idiosyncratic]

        Saussure

        • Culler, Jonathan (1985): Saussure. London: Fontana
        • Harris, Roy (1987): Reading Saussure: A Critical Commentary on the 'Cours de linguistique générale'. London: Duckworth
        • Holdcroft, David (1991): Saussure: Signs, Systems and Arbitrariness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
        • Saussure, Ferdinand de (1974): Course in General Linguistics (trans. Wade Baskin). London: Fontana/Collins [still the most widely-cited translation, dating from 1959]
        • Saussure, Ferdinand de (1983): Course in General Linguistics (trans. Roy Harris). London: Duckworth [beware of the rendering of signifiant as 'signal' and signifié as 'signification' instead of the more usual 'signifier' and 'signified']
        • Thibault, Paul J (1997): Re-reading Saussure: The Dynamics of Signs in Social Life. London: Routledge [not for beginners]

        Other Semioticians

        • Barthes, Roland (1967). Elements of Semiology (trans. Annette Lavers & Colin Smith). London: Jonathan Cape
        • Barthes, Roland (1977): Image-Music-Text. London: Fontana
        • Baudrillard, Jean (1988): Selected Writings (Ed. Mark Poster). Cambridge: Polity Press
        • Blonsky, Marshall (Ed.) (1985): On Signs: A Semiotics Reader. Oxford: Blackwell [short articles by key semioticians]
        • Eco, Umberto (1976): A Theory of Semiotics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press/London: Macmillan [not for beginners]
        • Eco, Umberto (1981): The Role of the Reader. London: Hutchinson
        • Eco, Umberto (1984): Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language. Bloomington: Indiana University Press
        • Eco, Umberto (1994): Apocalypse Postponed (Ed. Robert Lumley). London: BFI/Bloomington: Indiana University Press
        • Greimas, Algirdas (1987): On Meaning: Selected Writings in Semiotic Theory (trans. Paul J Perron & Frank H Collins). London: Frances Pinter [not an easy read]
        • Genosko, Gary (1994): Baudrillard and Signs: Signification Ablaze. London: Routledge
        • Innis, Robert E (Ed.) (1986): Semiotics: An Introductory Anthology. London: Hutchinson
        • Morris, Charles W (1946): Signs, Language and Behavior. New York: Prentice-Hall
        • Peirce, Charles S (1966): Selected Writings. New York: Dover
        • Sebeok, Thomas A (Ed.) (1977): A Perfusion of Signs. Bloomington: Indiana University Press
        • Sebeok, Thomas A (1994): An Introduction to Semiotics. London: Pinter [an introduction to Thomas Sebeok]

        Structuralism and Poststructuralism

        • Derrida, Jacques (1976): Of Grammatology (trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak). Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press [the translator's introduction is enlightening]
        • Derrida, Jacques (1978): Writing and Difference (trans. Alan Bass). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
        • Derrida, Jacques (1987): Positions. London: Athlone Press [a way into Derrida]
        • Foucault, Michel (1970): The Order of Things. London: Tavistock
        • Foucault, Michel (1974): The Archaeology of Knowledge. London: Tavistock
        • Genosko, Gary (1994): Baudrillard and Signs: Signification Ablaze. London: Routledge
        • Halperin, David M (1995): Saint Foucault: Towards a Gay Hagiography. New York: Oxford University Press
        • Jameson, Fredric (1972): The Prison-House of Language. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
        • Lacan, Jacques (1977): Écrits: A Selection. London: Tavistock
        • Lane, Michael (Ed.) (1970): Structuralism: A Reader. London: Jonathan Cape
        • Norris, Christopher (1982): Deconstruction: Theory and Practice. London: Methuen
        • Rajnath (Ed.) (1989): Deconstruction: A Critique. London: Macmillan
        • Sturrock, John (1979) (Ed.): Structuralism and Since: From Lévi-Strauss to Derrida. Oxford: Oxford University Press
        • Sturrock, John (1986): Structuralism. London: Paladin

        Cultural Semiotics

        • Barthes, Roland ([1957] 1987): Mythologies. New York: Hill & Wang [a classic text]
        • Barthes, Roland (1985): The Fashion System (trans. Matthew Ward & Richard Howard). London: Jonathan Cape [not for the beginner]
        • Danesi, Marcel (1998): Of Cigarettes, High Heels, and Other Interesting Things: An Introduction to Semiotics (Semaphores and Signs). London: St. Martin's Press
        • Leach, Edmund (1970): Lévi-Strauss (Fontana Modern Masters). London: Fontana
        • Lévi-Strauss, Claude (1972): Structural Anthropology. Harmondsworth: Penguin
        • Lotman, Yuri (1990): Universe of the Mind: A Semiotic Theory of Culture (trans. Ann Shukman). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press
        • O'Sullivan, Tim, John Hartley, Danny Saunders, Martin Montgomery & John Fiske (1994): Key Concepts in Communication and Cultural Studies. London: Routledge
        • Solomon, Jack (1988): The Signs of Our Time: The Secret Meanings of Everyday Life. New York: Harper & Row [primarily for US audience; very readable]
        • Strinati, Dominic (1995): An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture. London: Routledge
        • Thwaites, Tony, Lloyd Davies & Warwick Mules (2002): Introducing Cultural and Media Studies: A Semiotic Approach London: Palgrave
        • Turner, Graeme (1992): British Cultural Studies: An Introduction. New York: Routledge

        Language and Literature

        • Barthes, Roland (1974): S/Z. London: Cape [an influential classic, but not an easy read]
        • Culler, Jonathan (1975): Structuralist Poetics: Structuralism, Linguistics and the Study of Literature. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
        • Culler, Jonathan (1981): The Pursuit of Signs: Semiotics, Literature, Deconstruction. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
        • Eagleton, Terry (1983): Literary Theory. Oxford: Blackwell [very readable]
        • Hawkes, Terence (1977): Structuralism and Semiotics. London: Routledge
        • Lodge, David (1981): Working with Structuralism: Essays and Reviews on Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Literature. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
        • Lodge, David (1996): The Modes of Modern Writing: Metaphor, Metonymy and the Typology of Modern Literature. London: Arnold
        • Scholes, Robert (1983): Semiotics and Interpretation. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
        • Silverman, Kaja (1983): The Subject of Semiotics. New York: Oxford University Press

        Visual Media

        • Barry, Ann Marie Seward (1997): Visual Intelligence: Perception, Image and Manipulation in Visual Communication. New York: State University of New York Press
        • Burgin, Victor (Ed.) (1982): Thinking Photography. London: Macmillan
        • Davis, Howard & Paul Walton (Eds.) (1983): Language, Image, Media. Oxford: Basil Blackwell [including Don Slater: 'Marketing Mass Photography', pp. 245-263]
        • Floch, Jean-Marie (2000): Visual Identities (trans. Pierre Van Osselaer & Alec McHoul). London: Continuum
        • Gombrich, Ernst H (1977): Art and Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation. London: Phaidon
        • Gombrich, Ernst H (1982): The Image and the Eye: Further Studies in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation. London: Phaidon
        • Goodman, Nelson (1968): Languages of Art: An Approach to a Theory of Symbols. London: Oxford University Press
        • Kress, Gunther & Theo van Leeuwen (1996): Reading Images: The Grammar of Visual Design. London: Routledge
        • Messaris, Paul (1994): Visual 'Literacy': Image, Mind and Reality. Boulder, CO: Westview Press
        • Tagg, John (1988): The Burden of Representation: Essays on Photographies and Histories. Basingstoke: Macmillan [recommended]

        Mass Communication

        • Bignell, Jonathan (1997): Media Semiotics: An Introduction. Manchester: Manchester University Press [a very readable British introduction]
        • Burgelin, Olivier (1968): 'Structural Analysis and Mass Communication'. In Denis McQuail (Ed.) (1972): Sociology of Mass Communications. Harmondsworth: Penguin
        • Danesi, Marcel (2002): Understanding Media Semiotics London: Arnold
        • Hall, Stuart ([1973] 1980): 'Encoding/decoding'. In Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (Ed.): Culture, Media, Language: Working Papers in Cultural Studies, 1972-79. London: Hutchinson, p. 128-38 [important paper, particularly useful on denotation/connotation, though not initially an easy read]
        • Jensen, Klaus Bruhn (1995): The Social Semiotics of Mass Communication. London: Sage
        • Nöth, Winfried (Ed.) (1990): Semiotics of the Media: State of the Art, Projects and Perspectives. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter [expensive!]
        • Tolson, Andrew (1996): Mediations: Text and Discourse in Media Studies. London: Arnold

        News Media

        • Davis, Howard & Paul Walton (1983): 'Death of a Premier: Consensus and Closure in International News'. In Howard Davis & Paul Walton (Eds.), Language, Image, Media. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, pp. 8-49
        • Hartley, John (1982): Understanding News. London: Methuen

        Advertising

        • Cook, Guy (1992): The Discourse of Advertising. London: Routledge
        • Davis, Howard & Paul Walton (Eds.) (1983a): Language, Image, Media. Oxford: Basil Blackwell
        • Dyer, Gillian (1982): Advertising as Communication. London: Routledge
        • Langholz Leymore, Varda (1975): Hidden Myth: Structure and Symbolism in Advertising. New York: Basic Books
        • Leiss, William, Stephen Kline & Sut Jhally (1990): Social Communication in Advertising: Persons, Products and Images of Well-Being (2nd Edn.). London: Routledge [Includes an excellent guide to the history of magazine advertising codes]
        • Millum, Trevor (1975): Images of Woman: Advertising in Women's Magazines. London: Chatto & Windus
        • Myers, Kathy (1983): 'Understanding Advertisers'. In Davis & Walton (Eds.), op. cit., pp. 205-223
        • Stern, Barbara B (Ed) (1998): Representing Consumers: Voices, Views and Visions. London: Routledge
        • Umiker-Sebeok, Jean (Ed.) (1987): Marketing and Semiotics. Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter
        • Williamson, Judith (1978): Decoding Advertisements. London: Marion Boyars

        Cinema

        • Altman, Rick (Ed.) (1992): Sound Theory, Sound Practice. New York: Routledge
        • de Lauretis, Teresa (1984): Alice Doesn't: Feminism, Semiotics, Cinema. London: Macmillan [heavy going]
        • Eaton, Mick (Ed.) (1981): Cinema and Semiotics (Screen Reader 2). London: Society for Education in Film and Television
        • Lapsley, Robert & Michael Westlake (1988): Film Theory: An Introduction. Manchester: Manchester University Press (Chapter 2, 'Semiotics') [excellent]
        • Metz, Christian (1974): Film Language: A Semiotics of the Cinema (trans. Michael Taylor). New York: Oxford University Press [a classic, though much criticised]
        • Monaco, James (1981): How to Read a Film. New York: Oxford University Press (Part III, 'The Language of Film: Signs and Syntax') [very useful]
        • Nichols, Bill (1981): Ideology and the Image: Social Representation in the Cinema and Other Media. Bloomington: Indiana University Press
        • Stam, Robert (2000): Film Theory. Oxford: Blackwell
        • Stam, Robert, Robert Burgoyne & Sandy Flitterman-Lewis (1992): New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics: Structuralism, Post-Structuralism and Beyond. London: Routledge
        • Tudor, Andrew (1974): Image and Influence: Studies in the Sociology of Film. London: George Allen & Unwin
        • Willemen, Paul (1994): Looks and Frictions: Essays in Cultural Studies and Film Theory. London: BFI/Bloomington: Indiana University Press
        • Wollen, Peter (1969): Signs and Meaning in the Cinema. London: Secker & Warburg/BFI

        Television

        • Allen, Robert C. (Ed.) (1992): Channels of Discourse, Reassembled. London: Routledge [several useful and relevant papers, including Ellen Seiter: 'Semiotics, structuralism and television']
        • Berger, Arthur Asa (1982): Media Analysis Techniques. Newbury Park, CA: Sage (Chapter 1, 'Semiological Analysis'; also available in Oliver Boyd-Barrett & Peter Braham (Eds.) (1987): Media, Knowledge and Power. London: Croom Helm) [a simple introduction relating semiotics to television]
        • Fiske, John (1987): Television Culture. London: Routledge [very useful]
        • Fiske, John & John Hartley (1978): Reading Television. London: Methuen [very useful, despite the date, but see Woollacott 1982, op. cit.]
        • Hodge, Robert & David Tripp (1986): Children and Television: A Semiotic Approach. Cambridge: Polity Press [not easy, but a classic study]
        • Lewis, Justin (1991): The Ideological Octopus: An Exploration of Television and its Audience. New York: Routledge (Chapter 2, 'Rethinking Television')
        • Woollacott, Janet (1982): 'Messages and Meanings'. In Michael Gurevitch, Tony Bennett, James Curran & Janet Woollacott (Eds.): Culture, Society and the Media. London: Routledge [not easy; includes critique of Fiske & Hartley]

        Other Media

        • Andersen, Peter Bogh (1997): A Theory of Computer Semiotics: Semiotic Approaches to Construction and Assessment of Computer Systems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

        Contents

        • Contents Page
        • Preface
        • Introduction
        • Signs
        • Modality and representation
        • Paradigms and syntagms
        • Syntagmatic analysis
        • Paradigmatic analysis
        • Denotation, connotation and myth
        • Rhetorical tropes
        • Codes
        • Modes of address
        • Encoding/Decoding
        • Articulation
        • Intertextuality
        • Criticisms of semiotic analysis
        • Strengths of semiotic analysis
        • D.I.Y. semiotic analysis
        • Glossary of key terms
        • Suggested reading
        • Semiosis bookstore
        • References
        • Index
        • Semiotics: The Basics