Tartu Moscow Research Articles

The end of Sebeok’s century meets twenty-first century pandemic: modeling through and beyond Sebeok’s systems, semiotics, science

Abstract Thomas A. Sebeok’s name became all but synonymous with semiotics during the last half of the twentieth century. Sebeok located neglected semioticians in antiquity, and convinced many contemporary scholars that they were semioticians. One of his most fruitful encounters was with Juri Lotman of the Tartu–Moscow School of Semiotics, who had published in 1967 an ambitious model of human sign systems in which language would constitute a primary modeling system, and cultural phenomena a secondary modeling system. We inspect how Sebeok amended Lotman’s system, inserting another primary modeling system before language. This brings biological precursors to human language as a syntactic and learned faculty that builds on many nonsyntactic and sometimes nonconscious senses, including emotion, affect, and memory. We note how, in Sebeok’s final book in 2000 on modeling systems theory, co-authored with Marcel Danesi, there is a suggestion that the three layers of modeling systems may be colored by Peircean notions of firstness, secondness, and thirdness; we clarify how these layers are analogue. Finally, the fundamentals of the primary modeling system leak into languaging, as better understood through post-Sebeok cognitive and neurological sciences, and rendering less mysterious some of the strange effects of the COVID-19 pandemic’s proxemics crisis.

Bridging Sebeok and the Tartu circle

AbstractWe briefly sketch some characteristics of Thomas A. Sebeok’s program to develop semiotics and relate them to the approaches in the Tartu circle. It is not a historical, but effectively a paradigmatic insight into research in contemporary Tartu semiotics, where we can see the inevitability of cooperation between the large branches of semiotics such as bio-, socio-, and cultural semiotics that were, consciously or not, preceded by Sebeok. We take a closer look into Sebeok’s arguments in between the times when he re-introduced semiotics to contemporary audiences and when he seemingly departed from the conceptual realm of the Tartu–Moscow School of semiotics. Likewise, we aim to show how his practical engagement in “radwaste” is already acute today and demands realization of the connection between the biological and the cultural as mediated by the social.

Autokomunikācijas performativitāte: autora mnemoniskais ķermenis un autokatalītiskie aspekti

The notion of auto-communication – a communication from and to oneself – has been analyzed in-depth by Tartu–Moscow school semiotician Yuri Lotman (Юрий Лотман, 1922–1993). Such individual historiography forms as diary, marginalia, and notes, as Lotman defines, are communicative forms that not only operate on a mnemonic level but can also generate and supply a piece of new information through I–I and I–s/he models. From a perspective of performance studies, the process of auto-communication has not been analyzed with relation to the individual’s performativity. This combination raises a question on the autocatalytic connection: does auto-communication is a self-performance which is primarily intended to surpass auto-level? In terms of artistic modelling, we can conclude that those performances that are based on auto-communicative forms are never detached from 23the author’s mnemonic-body – either they are offering factual embodiment, or communicator’s fictional representation, or invariants of alternative presence. In recent years in contemporary Latvian theatre the author’s reflective mnemonic-body has been performed through multiple strategies. For instance, in a documentary theatre piece “Reading Room” (2015, theatre festival “Homo Novus”), the diary authors are individually reading their recordings in a dialogue form with spectators. In a docufiction “Being a Nationalist” (2017, Dirty Deal Teatro), dramatist Matīss Gricmanis is one of four actors introspectively tackling his personal experience linked with a right-wing party and nationalist formations. Whereas dilogy at the New Riga Theatre – “Lake of Hope” (2015) and “Lake of Hope is Frozen” (2018) – both by Vladislavs Nastavševs, are meta-auto-communication examples. In these performances, two different actors are playing the director and dissecting not only integration, cultural biases, and problematics of intolerance in Latvian society, but also polemics of artistic properties. The self-communication and its embodiment allow witnessing proto-autocatalytic phenomena regarding self-identity organization. In this article, I will argue whether I–I and I–s/he models that are later applied in artistic modelling of self-performativity as ‘products’ of the auto-communication are cause for their own reaction. Highly likely – it is both the catalyst and the final product.

Image of Zmeinogorsk in Fiction

Thematically, this article lies within the research field connected with the study of urban “supertexts” and is relevant for contemporary literary criticism. The subject of the research is the literary image of Zmeinogorsk, a town representative of the Ore Altai as a whole. The author refers to works of art about the town which she has discovered. They are based on folklore, historical, and geographic texts. The methodological basis of the article is the study of “urban texts” by representatives of the Tartu–Moscow Semiotic School (V. N. Toporov, Yu. M. Lotman) and their modern followers, as well as the geo-poetic approach that studies cultural forms of the structure of terrestrial space (V. V. Abashev). Analysis of fiction about Zmeinogorsk reveals the main tendencies in the literary representation of the urban theme. The image of Zmeinogorsk comes close to the image of Yekaterinburg on the typological and genetic levels. The historical story by P. A. Borodkin Secrets of Snake Mountain (1966) represents the key semantic opposition of the mining and metallurgical image of the town in the mid-eighteenth century. The author sees it as an antithesis of “paradise (nature) and hell (plant)”. The plot of transition from “paradise” to “hell” (P. A. Borodkin) and vice versa (A. P. Heidok) is an invariant for the “Siberian text”. It is realised on the “supertext” level. The “snake” toponymy actualises the corresponding mythology and imagery of the town as well as the plot of “fighting a serpent”, modified according to social circumstances. The mythological serpent becomes a metaphor of the authorities (P. A. Borodkin, E. Yevtushenko). In modern prose, the Serpent returns its mythological functions as the Guardian of the depths of the earth, but the conflict of the plot is removed in favour of partnership between man and nature (Eustasia Tarasawa). In general, the “supertext” of the town is in its infancy, a significant mythological and semantic potential of Zmeinogorsk is still to be realised.

Teoria russa e semiótica da cultura: história e perspectivas

RESUMO A Escola de Tártu-Moscou aceitou, como atitude profissional, reconstruir a tradição e ligar-se com as realizações - esquecidas ou reprimidas cultural e cientificamente - das primeiras décadas do séc. XX. Uma missão de Lotman como um de seus líderes foi conhecer e mediar a herança esquecida. Na situação de censura muitos contatos entre Lotman e a teoria russa não estavam visíveis. Dessa forma, a síntese de Lotman, Tynianov, Bakhtin, Vygotsky, Eisenstein e outros, num intenso diálogo implícito, pode ser a base para a formação da próxima etapa da semiótica da cultura. Enfim, a compreensão de Tynianov acerca da dinâmica literária e cultural, a teoria semiótica lotmaniana de texto e seus pensamentos sobre um modelo de espaço como uma das linguagens primárias da cultura, e a teoria bakhtiniana do cronotopo formam um complexo teórico que pode oferecer novas possibilidades para o desenvolvimento tanto dos princípios culturais teóricos e práticos quanto da análise textual.

On the semiotic aspects of visual arts

Publication of a translation of an article by Yurij Lekomtsev, member of the Tartu–Moscow School with the author’s comments and a short bionote.

Interpretation of Undefined Legal Concepts and Fulfilling of Legal Gaps, in Juri Lotman’s Semiotic Framework

The article examines whether the structure of meaning proposed in cultural semiotics by the Tartu–Moscow School of Semiotics is applicable for the interpretation of undefined legal concepts and to the filling of legal gaps. With the assistance of Lotman’s cultural semiotics, one is able to formulate the regularities that operate in legal interpretation in the same way as in culture. One of these is the binary structure of legal concepts and gaps. In interpreting norms and striving to overcome legal gaps, it is necessary to define the external reference (‘utterance’) and the self-reference (‘text’) in law. The article clarifies and examines these in the legal context and reiterates the value of bearing in mind throughout the process that interpretation always takes place in relation to this binary structure.

Alexandr Levich (1945–2016) and the Tartu–Moscow Biosemiotic Nexus

Alexandr Levich (1945–2016) and the Tartu–Moscow Biosemiotic Nexus.

Tartu–Moscow school of semiotics and history

<p>The article examines and contextualises a corpus of ideas by members of the Tartu–Moscow (semiotic) school, which was dedicated to various issues connected with theoretical aspects of history, historiography, the historian’s craft, and the nature of historical research per se.</p>

Biosemiotic criticism: modelling the environment in literature

This article elaborates a synthesis of the semiotics of the Tartu–Moscow Semiotic School, literary semiotics, ecocriticism and biosemiotics as a methodology for analysing nature writing. The methodology uses the concept of modelling as it was developed by Yuri Lotman and Thomas A. Sebeok. From this perspective, every piece of nature writing is essentially a model of the relationship between humans and nature, in its actual state as well as in its idealised form. The methodology distinguishes three levels of modelling: zoosemiotic modelling, linguistic modelling and artistic modelling. As a practical example, the author analyses Fred Jüssi’s nature essay Ohakas [The Thistle] (1976). The analysis demonstrates that the different modelling levels in the text are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary of one another. This also means that there is no need to oppose literature’s ability to represent nature and the complexity of its poetic structure.

The spaces of nature: introduction

The articles in this section aim at critical reappraisal of space from the viewpoint of the materiality of human action which is underpinned by a special focus on its dealings with nature. Space is primarily viewed by others than geographers and/or from outside Scandinavian and Anglo‐American research. The role of language and culture, as well as using the possibilities of ecosemiotics grown out of the Tartu–Moscow school, is highlighted in an attempt to enliven discussions of lived space and human relationships with nature.

Boris Uspenskij and the Tartu–Moscow School of Semiotics

Boris Uspenskij and the Tartu–Moscow School of Semiotics

Interview with Vyacheslav V. Ivanov about semiotics, the languages of the brain and history of ideas

The interview with one of the founders of the Tartu–Moscow school, semiotician Vyacheslav Vsevolodovich Ivanov (b. 1929) from August 2010, describes V. V. Ivanov’s opinions of several scholars and their work (including Evgenij Polivanov, Mikhail Bakhtin, Andrej Kolmogorov, Nikolaj Marr etc.), his relationships with his father Vsevolod Ivanov, as well as V. V. Ivanov’s views on the past and future of semiotics, with some emphasis on neurosemiotics, zoosemiotics, semiotics of culture, cybernetics, history of linguistics, study and protection of small languages. The interview also deals with V. V. Ivanov’s book Even and Odd.

Hegemonic signification from cultural semiotics point of view

This paper attempts to integrate discourse theories, mainly the theory of hegemony by Essex School, and Tartu–Moscow School’s cultural semiotics, and sets for itself the modest task to point to the applicability of semiotic approach in political analysis. The so-called post-foundationalist view, that is common for discourse theories, is primarily characterized by the rejection of essentialist notions of ground for the social, and the inauguration of cultural and discursive characteristics (such as asymmetry and entropy; explosion; antagonism; insurmountable tension between organization and disorganization, regularity and irregularity, etc.) into the wider social scientific paradigm. Customarily, those characteristics have been attributed to contingent or peripheral events and phenomena that by nature do not belong to the social structure proper. Grounds for such ‘groundless’ contingencies are found in philosophy (Marchart), or for instance from the psychoanalytic notion of affect (Laclau). Many discourse theorists proceed here from Derrida’s position that in the process of signification there is an overabundance of meaning which renders final closure impossible (Howarth; Glynos). However, it seems that despite placing communication at the heart of their conceptions of discourse, the communicative character of constructing power relations remains undertheorized in those conceptions. This article attempts to approach the above mentioned problem by way of the concepts of communication and autocommunication(Lotman). The outcomes stemming from the latter are unavoidable,since the result of any possible research (text) itself belongs to culture or a larger discourse and opera tes as the organizing function of the latter. Hence, research practice and its results always need to be looked at as mutually affecting each other.

On the independence of the humanities: Tartu–Moscow School and official Soviet politics of science

Review: Maxim Waldstein, Soviet Empire of Signs: A History of the Tartu School of Semiotics.

Mapping the child’s world: The cognitive and cultural function of proper names in the book series Paula’s Life

The article regards children’s literature as a certain cultural tool. This approach enables to reveal various characteristic aspects of the poetics of children’s literature, while relating them to children’s cognitive and cultural development. Focusing on a book series Paula’s Life by Estonian author Aino Pervik, it can be seen how two different ways of understanding — the initial, so-called mythological type of thinking of preschoolers and the emerging conceptual thinking — are combined. The article draws mostly on the concepts of cultural psychology and the authors of Tartu–Moscow school of semiotics, who have elaborated the idea that proper names form one of the central components of mythological consciousness, the latter being comparable to “the language of proper names”. The main attention is drawn on the functioning of names and the topic of naming and categorizing in these texts.

Semiotic study of landscapes: An overview from semiology to ecosemiotics

The article provides an overview of different approaches to the semiotic study of landscapes both in the field of semiotics proper and in landscape studies in general. The article describes different approaches to the semiotic processes in landscapes from the semiological tradition where landscape has been seen as analogous to a text with its language, to more naturalized and phenomenological approaches, as well as ecosemiotic view of landscapes that goes beyond anthropocentric definitions. Special attention is paid to the potential of cultural semiotics of Tartu–Moscow school for the analysis of landscapes and the possibilities held by a dynamic, dialogic and holistic landscape definition for the development of ecosemiotics.

Semiospheric transitions: A key to modelling translation

Lotman’s contribution to semiotic theory, anthroposemiotics, the study of artistic texts and defining the relationship between language and culture represent some of the most powerful work produced within the Tartu–Moscow School of Semiotics. The importance of translation is one of the central principles that unites all of Lotman’s work. In the following paper, we will consider Lotman’s definition of translatability in the context of (1) the definition of semiospheric internal and external boundaries and the importance of crossing these boundaries, (2) the role of no fewer than two languages as a minimal unit of semiotic meaning-generation, (3) culture text-level generation of collective memory, and (4) the ever-present tension in the communication act. In our concluding section, we will offer an extended model of the communication act, based on the fundamental principles given in Jakobson, Sebeok and Lotman, in order to specify important moments of the translation process.

On spatiality in Tartu–Moscow cultural semiotics: The semiotic subject

The article views the development of the Tartu–Moscow semiotic school from the analysis of texts to the study of spatial entities (semiosphere being most well known of them). It comes to light that ‘culture’ and ‘space’ have been such notions in Tartu–Moscow School to which, for instance, the ‘semiosphere’ does not add much. There are studied possibilities to join Uexküll’s and Lotman’s basic concepts (as certain grounds of Estonian semiotics) with Tartu–Moscow School’s treatment of culture and space through the notion of ‘semiotic subject’. Such an approach allows to see transdisciplinarity, which has come to issue only during the last decade, already in the first conceptions of Tartu–Moscow School where transdisciplinarity revealed itself in the symbiotic use of ‘culture’ and ‘space’.

Towards an integrated methodology of ecosemiotics: The concept of nature-text

The aim of the article is to elaborate ecosemiotics towards practical methodology of analysis. For that, the article first discusses the relation between meaning and context seen as a possibility for an ecological view immanent in semiotics. Then various perspectives in ecosemiotics are analyzed by describing biological and cultural ecosemiotics and critically reading the ecosemiotic works of W. Nöth and K. Kull. Emphasizes is laid on the need to integrate these approaches so that the resulting synthesis would both take into account the semioticity of nature itself as well as allow analyzing the depiction of nature in the written texts. To this end, a model of nature-text is introduced. This relates two parties intertwined by meaning-relations — the written text and the natural environment. In support of the concept of nature-text, the article discusses the Tartu–Moscow semioticians’ concepts of text, which are regarded as broad enough to accommodate the semiotic activity and environment creation of other animals besides humans. In the final section the concept of nature-text is used to describe nature writing as an appreciation of an alien semiotic sphere and to elucidate the nature writing’s marginality, explaining it with the need to interpret two different types of texts.