Preliminary Exercise 1: Barthes’ Theory of Denotative and Connotative Signs Semiotic Analysis Table

Hello everyone,

During Media Studies class, I have been learning about semiotics. Semiotics is the study of signs and symbols and what they are used for or interpretation (hidden meaning). Roland Barthes proposed this idea. Roland Barthes was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' theory focused on reading signs and their hidden meanings. It focused on their interpretation by different cultures or societies. Suggesting that the physical form of a sign can be interpreted to have a hidden meaning, used to signify something. He uses the example of a photograph of his mother. The photograph corners were faded signifying his mother is dead but still has a great love for her for he still has the picture. Denotation is the actual meaning of a word or picture, while connotative is the meaning or symbolization of the word or picture. For example, a red rose symbolizes love and romance. The red rose will be the denotation, while the feeling of love and romance are the connotative. Another example would be a tree. The denotation would be describing the tree as a having green leaves and a brown trunk with a bunch of branches. The connotation would be it signifying nature and life. I have had many practices in class to decipher both of these.

One way I have learned to decipher denotation and connotation is by making a semiotic analysis table. This included drawing 3 images and defining their denotation and connotation. This assignment objective was to make me be able to recognize and define signs (visually and audibly) when analyzing media products for the following: denotative and connotative meanings. I worked on this assignment with one other teammate. This assignment was able to achieve its objective as I am now an expert at being able to analyze the denotation and connotation of a media product.

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