General language

General language

Use this category for general terms related to languages.

Contributors in General language

General language

A phenomenon is said to be overdetermined when it can be attributed to multiple determining factors. Overdetermined readings of texts are those in which the preferred reading is very clear from the ...

Ontology

Language; General language

This philosophical term (from metaphysics) refers to assertions or assumptions about the nature of reality: about what 'the real world' is like and what exists in it. It concerns what Foucault called ...

Oppositional code

Language; General language

Within Stuart Hall's framework, this is an ideological code in which the reader, whose social situation places them in a directly oppositional relation to the dominant code, understands the preferred ...

Open and closed texts

Language; General language

Eco describes as 'closed' those texts which show a strong tendency to encourage a particular interpretation - in contrast to more 'open' texts. He argues that mass media texts tend to be 'closed ...

Overcoding

Language; General language

'Overcoding' refers to structurally simple, conventional and repetitive texts having what information theorists call a high degree of redundancy.

Single articulation

Language; General language

Semiotic codes have either single articulation, double articulation or no articulation. Codes with single articulation have either first articulation or second articulation only. Codes with first ...

Simulacrum

Language; General language

This was Baudrillard's term (borrowed from Plato); 'simulacra' are 'copies without originals' - the main form in which we encounter texts in postmodern culture.