WHAT IS “SEMIOTIZATION OF MATTER”?


My first encounter with the word “semiotic” can be traced back to my reading of Material Feminisms during my visit as an academic student at Bath Spa University (UK) last summer. I did not understand quite well about semiotics at that time but after reading Timo Maran’s “Semiotization of Matter” in Material Ecocriticism (2014), I have a better sense of the term and theory now.


As Serenella Iovino notes, “[t]he ‘Material turn’ is the search for new conceptual model apt to theorize the connection between matter and agency on the one side, and the intertwining of bodies, natures, and meanings on the other side” (“Stories” 450; qtd. in ME 141). To put it in a simple way, Material Ecocritics suggest that matter has agency and embodied meanings. The difference between ME and semiotics is that the former focuses on human social and cultural process while the latter does not. As to the similarities, both “identify environmental objects with semiotic potential for living organisms” and further study “how these objects function in multispecies environments”; “how they trigger semiotic processes and narrative sequences in human cultures” (146).

Regarding the term “semiotic,” it is derived from biosemiotics, “a discipline that studies semiotic and communicational processes in and between organisms” (ME 141). In order to perceive, respond to, and adapt for the environment, all biological organisms communicate through signs and sign exchange or what they say “codes and coding” (141). This idea is linked to Charles S. Peirce’s principle of continuity, in which a sign is a “triple connection of sign [representamen], a thing signified [objects], cognition produced in the mind [interpretant]” (Collected Papers 1:372; qtd. in ME 143). Peirce’s idea allows us to regard “material objects and perceptions of them as being connected to each other,” that material objects have the potential to initiate meanings and participate in semiotic processes (of course, “we cannot talk about meaning content without considering the organism in its environmental context”) (143, 146). Indeed, there are features of the environment that “trigger signs and influence interpretations and subsequent behaviors” (144). For instance, the image of certain sized “pebbles” can initiate “pecking behavior among waterfowl, as the pebbles are interpreted as being suitable for swallowed as gastroliths” (144); “the signs of drought” influence humans’ (as well as nonhuman) behavior in a way that it leads to “the creation of mythical narratives, art, and literature” (146). Most of us do not recognize this semiotic process that occurs between the material objects and living organisms as we often limit our interpretations of them based on our own dualistic point of view. Hence, we should adopt a nondualistic perception in order to break down the hierarchal distinction between “semiotically active humans and a semiotically inactive nature” (142).


In order to change our dualistic perception toward the nonhuman nature, we first have to understand the difference between humans and other living beings lies in the process of modeling. A good example that shows human modeling and its effects on the environment is “mapping and map usage” (151) (other examples include “modified generic material that has escaped into nature” and “sunken ships at the bottoms of oceans” (150)). Through the process of mapping, “a diversity of biological communities is reduced to a few symbols” and only some obvious landscapes are shown (151). When the map users use this modeled map as a guide for real activities, they tend to “imprint the distinctions and forms used in the mapping onto real landscape” (151). After all, the modified landscape becomes a matter semiotized by humans. With regard to how other species interact with matter semiotized by humans, it requires a case-by-case analysis. For instance, “herring gulls” have been successful in adopting roofs of houses as nesting grounds in Europe; however, they are unable to recognize glass walls of modern buildings and hurt or kill themselves due to that (153). From this respect, we understand that each species has its own modeling process and semiotic organization. Unable to understand this difference creates not only conflicts but also serious environmental problems. After all, we should not neglect “the cyclical feedback loop between human culture and the environment” as this is the essential element that constructs our lives and future (154).


Returning to the modeling process, we should remember that the ground for modeling is “never neutral (as it is selected consciously or unconsciously by us)” (149).  And because the modeling is not neutral, the semiotized matter is never neutral as well—it always embodies “the imprint of the culture and organism that has created it” (149). Another thing that we should also remember is that “matter itself does not model” and therefore, the only way to semiotize matter is through “making analogies with living organisms or humans” (148). Here, if we depict material processes based on our hierarchal anthropomorphic modeling, then matters will/can never be viewed as active semiotic agents that initiate meanings and influence interpretations and behaviors. Hence, understanding Peirce’s and Maron’s philosophy and adopting a less- or non-dualistic perception toward modeling and semiotization of matter is a good start for us to reconnect with our natural world.


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