Joaquim da Silva Fontes, Significação e Estabilidade do Género no ...

This triad of entities constitutes for Peirce the process of semiosis, or the production
of meaning, which, in my opinion, becomes clearer by adding this component of what the
sign stands for. Illustratively, he states, the traffic light sign for “stop” is composed of a
representamen (the red light), the object (the car stopping) and the interpretant (the idea
conjured by the red light indicating a vehicle must halt). In such a case, one could perhaps
associate the quality of the interpretant to that of the signified. However, Peirce noted too
that the interpretant is itself a sign in the mind of the interpreter, or, as he also called it,
“the interpretant of the first sign”. 76 To that degree, Eco is also aware that this “unlimited
semiosis”, as he calls it, can mean an infinite series of consecutive interpretants, showing
and stressing that after all any first interpretation may be re-interpreted.
For the purpose of this thesis, it is my intention to focus on Peirce’s second major
contribution to semiotics: his tripartite classification of the kinds of signs accessible to
human consciousness. Note that in the subsequent account, I have continued to employ the
Saussurian terms “signifier” and “signified”. Peirce defined the “iconic sign” as “a sign
determined by its dynamic object by virtue of its own internal nature”; or, in Saussurean
terms, “a mode in which the signifier is perceived as resembling or imitating the signified”
(Chandler 2007:36). Hence the portrait of an orange resembles what it stands for, the fruit
it represents. As the relation between the sign and interpretant is mainly one of
resemblance, it is applicable for cases like the portrait of the orange, for example, but also
for statues or diagrams, onomatopoeia or sounds of a soundtrack in a dubbed film. Peirce
then defined the “indexical sign” as a “sign determined by its Dynamic object by virtue of
being in a real relation to it” (in Stam 1992:5). An indexical sign implies an association
between the sign and the interpretant, like a cause-effect relationship, as for example, the
smoke usually indicating fire. Here the signifier is not arbitrary but rather directly
connected to the signified (another example, a pain in the chest can indicate heartburn or
other medical anomalies).
It has to be noted that in such cases these relationships and connections may be
easily observable or simply inferred, depending on whether the link is a physical one or
simply based upon other “signals” such as a medical symptom or a knock on the door.
Finally, “the symbolic sign involves an entirely conventional link between sign and
76 This idea reinforces the post-structuralist vision of “infinite semiosis” or Eco’s “unlimited semiosis”. It
basically underlines the process by which signs refer only to other signs (this is so because his system shows
that the conversion of sign to interpretant occurs not within the mind but within the sign system itself).
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