University of Tikrit

College of Arts

Translation Department

Difference between Semantics and Semiotics

Prepared by:

Akthem Abdulhussein Abdullah

Baydaa Yassir Jasim

Ibrahiem Nabiel Abd-Alhamied

Submitted to:

Assist. Prof. Dr. Sameer Mohammed Ahmed

2021 AD 1443 Hijri

Difference between Semantics and Semiotics

Overview:
When we open our mouths to speak, a boost of air comes out as a
result of the articulation parts of speech. It is surprising that an
‘acoustic blast’ can convey meaning, both simple and complex. The
famous linguistics professor Roy Harris (1988) explains the
importance of the study of language:

“Words are not mere vocal labels or communicational adjuncts

superimposed upon an already given order of things. They are
collective products of social interaction, essential instruments through
which human beings constitute and articulate their world. This
typically twentieth-century view of language has profoundly
influenced developments throughout the whole range of human
sciences.”
Consequently, the following important question arises: How does an
acoustic blast acquire semantic features? A similar question asks, how
does a human mind decode the intended meaning of the acoustic
blast? Many disciplines of cognitive science contribute to the answers
to these two questions. However, here, we are concerned with
linguistics. Broadly speaking, an acoustic boost transfers a message.
According to the Jakobson model of linguistic communication, this
message represents what the speaker is trying to convey to the listener
(Jakobson, 1960). However, the famous linguist Chomsky et al (2000)
raises the following concern:

“…very often, I seem to be thinking and finding it hard to articulate

what I am thinking. It is a very common experience… to try to
express something, to say it and to realize that is not what I meant… it
is pretty hard to make sense of that experience without assuming that
you think without language. You think and then you try to find a way
to articulate what you think and sometimes you can’t do it at all; … if
you are thinking, then presumably there’s some kind of conceptual
structure there.”

To convey a linguistic message or to infer a meaning in any given

linguistic message, two linguistic analytical tools are utilized:
semantics and semiotics. However, first, it is important to remember
that linguistics concerns language. In a broad sense, a message can
take the form of a photo, music or a body gesture; in other words, a
‘non-verbal’ form. Although, language is described as a ‘verbal’ form
of communication and can independently or in conjunction with non-
verbal forms convey meaning. Daniel Chandler (1994) elaborates
further by saying that a ‘text’ can exist in any medium and may be
verbal, non-verbal, or both. Here, the term text usually refers to a
message that it is physically independent of its sender or receiver. For
instance, Fairclough (1995) demonstrates the differences in channel
and technology and how they have significant wider implications in
terms of the meaning potential of the different media. It is worth
mentioning that semioticians commonly refer to films, television and
radio programmes and advertising posters and so on as texts (Fiske
and Hartley, 1978). Therefore, to arrive at a better understanding of
semantics and semiotics and their roles in decoding meanings.

Definition of Semantics and Semiotics:

Semantics:
Semantics is the study of language and its meaning, and it is
concerned with the meanings provided by language-specific resources
including vocabulary, phrases, clauses and sentences. Semantics is
described as a narrow field of study since it is restricted only to the
study of meaning, unlike Pragmatics for instance.
Semantics is interested in the meanings as represented by the
linguistic units in their own right, regardless how they are interpreted
or received by other users of language. Semantics deals with the
signification of signs in all modes of signifying.
Semantics also can be defined as the study of literal, decontextualized,
grammatical meaning, and it is concerned with the conceptual
meaning related to words. Semantics does not focus on the context,
hence it deals with the meaning according to grammar and
vocabulary.
Semantics is all about question of meaning, and it is limited to the
relation of words to which they refer. Moreover, semantics is the
study of the toolkit for meanings. It studies the knowledge encoded in
the vocabulary of the language and its patterns for building more
elaborate meanings, up to the level of sentence meanings.
Semiotics:
Semiotics is defined by De Saussure as the science that studies the
conceivable signs and symbols. It is based on the relationship between
sign, object and meaning. It is a term derived from the Greek term
“seimion” which refers to signs.
Semiotics is the study of sign phenomena and sign processes which
are any activity, conduct, or process that involves signs, where a sign
is defined as anything that communicates a meaning that is not the
sign itself to the sign's interpreter. The meaning can be intentional
such as a word uttered with a specific meaning, or unintentional, such
as a symptom being a sign of a particular medical condition.

Semantics and meaning interpretation:

Semantics is known as the branch of linguistics concerned with the
meaning of a word. However, do not let the simplicity of the
definition deceive you; the ambiguity behind the assumption of
meaning makes this a difficult topic to investigate. The ambiguity
stems from the idea that meaning can encompass many elements. In
addition, it can presumably be found anywhere. The meaning of
words is derived from the relationship between words, concepts and
objects in the real world. The meaning of a sentence in a language is,
to a large extent, dependent on the ways in which the words and
phrases in a sentence are related to situations in the world.

Semantics has devised many theories to arrive at a better definition of

meaning. One such theory is the referential theory of semantics. It
postulates that meaning must refer to something in the real world,
either abstract or tangible. Another important theory is the truth-
conditional theory of semantics. For example, if someone says “Tom
is a student”, this sentence will not contain a truth property unless we
can determine sufficient and necessary conditions for the truth of that
sentence. This theory of semantics does not determine whether a
certain theory or hypothesis is correct, although surely it offers a
crucial account of the denotative meaning of a word. After all, these
theories and studies are merely attempts to delve into such a complex
concept, namely, meaning.

Semiotics and the context of meaning:

Semiotics has been defined by many linguists as well as many

other scientists from various other fields. Most of these definitions are
vague or difficult to grasp. The source of this vagueness, as de
Saussure (1993) speculated more than a hundred years ago, stems
from the fact that many fields of study intersect with semiotics.
Semiotics covers not only what is known as a sign in a linguistics
analysis of human speech but also considers the whole context that
frames the situation in which the words are uttered. In the same
manner, many researchers assume that any semiotic approach to
meaning aims to reduce all meaning to a code model of
communication. It is worth mentioning that in semiotics, signs can
include words, images, sounds, gestures and objects. In that sense, we
can confidently say that semiotics must encompass semantics, and it
offers a wider scope than semantics for understanding human speech.
Now, we will elaborate further on how semantics and semiotics
cooperate together to encode the meaning of texts. Here, it should
perhaps be noted that a text can exist in any medium and may be
verbal, non-verbal, or both.

Semantics and Semiotics as Analytical Tools:

To understand the relation between semantics and semiotics in

communicating meaning, we must remember that both fields share a
mutual interest in the meaning of signs. John Sturrock (1979)
emphasizes that whereas semantics exclusively focuses on the
denotative dimension of the meaning of words, semiotics offers a
broader prospective of the meaning by focusing on connotative and
denotative dimensions of signs. Noel Burton-Roberts (2011) believes
that meaning is not a (semantic) property but a semiotic relation (to
semantic properties). In the same manner, Patrick Zabalbeascoa
(1997) elaborates further on the role of semantics and semiotics in
interpreting a meaning of a text: “no text can be made entirely of
verbal signs because such signs always need some sort of physical
support.” His statement implies that the physical support will gain a
semantic sense within a semiotic context. A helpful analogy is to
consider how computers deal with input. Computers convert input
given through a keyboard to either a zero or a one value. The human
mind receives speech input in a similar manner. For example,
consider a simple conversation between two people. Any conversation
consists of at least one sender and one receiver or what Jacobson calls
an addresser and an addressee. The addresser’s main mission is to
convey a message to the addressee. The message represents the
sender’s thoughts. The conversation will not be of value unless the
addresser successfully communicates his thoughts and the addressee
understands the message. However, this is a superficial account of
what really happens in a conversation. In a more scientific analysis,
the principles of semantics and semiotics can be applied.
Semantically, the main concern is the smallest constituent element of
a sentence, which is a word. Consequently, a correct sentence must
have subject-verb agreement, proper use of gender or what is called
syntactic building of a sentence, and together, the components must
communicate an idea that makes sense. In contrast, semiotics
addresses elements such as codes, signifier and signified, iconicity
and symbolism.
References
 Burton-Roberts, N. (2011). Meaning, semantics and semiotics1. In
A. Capone (Ed.), Perspectives on Philosophy and Pragmatics (p.
2). Newcastle, UK: Newcastle University.

 Chandler, D. (1994). Semiotics for beginners by Daniel Chandler.

Retrieved April 16, 2013,
from http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/semiotic.html

 Chomsky, N; Mukherji, N; Patnaik, B; & Agnihotri, R. (2000). The

architecture of language. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.

 Fairclough, N. (1995). Media discourse. London: E. Arnold.

Fiske, J., & Hartley, J. (2003). Reading television (new accent).
London: Routledge.
Harris, R. (1988). Language, saussure, and wittgenstein: How to
play games with words. London: Routledge.
 Jakobson, R. (1960). Closing statement: linguistics and poetics. In
T. Sebeck (Ed.), Style in Language
 Saussure, F. (1993). Course in general linguistics (R. Harris,
Trans.). London: Duckworth.
 Sturrock, J. (1979). Structuralism and since: From Levi Strauss to
Derrida. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 Zabalbeascoa, P. (1997). Dubbing and the nonverbal dimension of
translation. In F. Poyatos (Ed.), Nonverbal communication and
translation: New perspectives and challenges in literature,
interpretation and the media (p. 327). Amsterdam: J. Benjamins.