MIGRAIN: Semiotics blog tasks

1) What meanings are the audience encouraged to take about the two main characters from the opening of the film?

The audience would initially think that the two main characters would be a "mischievous" and "troublesome" duo due to the fact that one of them was watching the lady load her car, they also kept making a lot of noise even when the old man asked them to stop.

2) How does the end of the film emphasise de Saussure’s belief that signs are polysemic – open to interpretation or more than one meaning?

In the end, the audience finds out that the two characters are deaf as they communicate in sign language and in the earlier stages if observed closely they would have found out that they didn't respond to the old man or the gang members as they could hear neither.

1) What did Ferdinand de Saussure suggest are the two parts that make up a sign?
They must require both the "signifier" and "signified"

2) What does ‘polysemy’ mean?
polysemy means to have multiple/open meanings

3) What does Barthes mean when he suggests signs can become ‘naturalised’?
Meaning is associated so much that the object/thing that the meaning has become one with the subject. 

4) What are Barthes’ 5 narrative codes?
-Hermeneutic code/enigma code
-Probiotic code/action code

-semantic code
-symbolic code
-cultural code

5) How does the writer suggest Russian Doll (Netflix) uses narrative codes?

The use of the name "Russian Doll" connotes the further you progress the smaller the doll goes just as in the show the more the days go by the more stuff goes missing. They also talk about the music and how certain instruments convey certain feelings of a character, eg the use of a violin conveys sadness and sorrow.

Icons, indexes and symbols

1) Find two examples for each: icon, index and symbol. Provide images or links.

Icon:

Index:

Symbol: 

2) Why are icons and indexes so important in media texts?

The icon would the physical manifestation of the object/thing while the index implies the icon using other icons to link the targeted icon, if they weren't a part of media texts then people would possibly get wrong ideas or have no idea at all, e.g a foreigner wouldn't understand some symbols we would use as they might not know what it means or it could mean something completely different to them.


3) Why might global brands try and avoid symbols in their advertising and marketing?
Symbols are learned by the person/targeted audience so for a global brand to use a symbol would mean various meanings to others around the world. In that case, using an icon or maybe even an index would be logical as it is the literal object or an implication of the object.

4) Find an example of a media text (e.g. advert) where the producer has accidentally communicated the wrong meaning using icons, indexes or symbols. Why did the media product fail?

In this picture, the company has associated colour with gender to a pen, this product failed due to it being a pen; an object that has no gender requirements that was assigned a gender by the company BIC.

5) Find an example of a media text (e.g. advert) that successfully uses icons or indexes to create a message that can be easily understood across the world.

This advert for a toothpaste company used an index to convey their message of how teeth decay happens, they convey the tooth as an ancient ruin or civilization for the bacteria living there. There is no need to read or understand the image further foreign audience can decode that this would be the result of tooth decay.