This Means This, This Means That

Summary and Reflection of Sean Hall's User Guide to Semiotics:

Semiotics: the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation


Divided into 76 key semiotic concepts, each section of the book begins with a single image or sign, accompanied by a question that invites us to interpret what we are seeing. Turning the page, we can compare our response with the theory behind the sign. In this way, we actively engage in creative thinking. The left hand side pages are dominated by text and information, while the right side pages have single images dominating with questions like briefly mentioned above. We see signs every day but we don't always realize what our culture has caused us to think about those signs. The book is meant to create more individualized thinking for designers and anyone who happens to pick it up.

 

 



I thought that the arrangement of text, questions and images was so clever and helped me understand the book even more.  I realized that the majority of the time, my answer to the questions were the same for the author and what his theory was. For instance, when the author asks, "What does this symbol mean?" on page 13, I knew right away that it was a Nazi swastika and I thought in my head that it was a negative symbol and I thought about things such as the Holocaust. That lead to realizing that the author wanted me to think that way so that I could see that symbols connect to emotions or traits, such as a lion being associated with strength. On the other hand, some images I didn't get right away. On the last pages, 29 and 30, it was probably the vectors used but I didn't have the answer before turning the page. It was supposed to be Elvis, and the first vector was supposed to be his most iconic hairstyle but I didn't see only Elvis. I got the point though. Even without a face and just hair or any tiny detail about a person, they can be noticed by many because of the excessive amount of media about them. For example, if I did a vector image of a blonde woman with nothing but a beauty mark mole on her face, most would get that it's Marilyn Monroe. Moving on, there was one section that stuck in my mind. Page 23 with the shapes, some colored and others stood out to me. The question given was "Which three items are most alike? Being attracted to pops of bright color as a designer, I immediately picked out the 3 different shapes that were all red. I then realized each row had 3 of the same shapes, 3 triangles for example. I liked how the author didn't give a right or wrong answer. He said it all depends on how you look at it. That's definitely true and exactly why we are designers. We try to communicate ideas through imagery, type, illustration, etc but not everyone will have the same interpretation. But the overall point is that the viewer will still understand it.