discourse-semiotics

One of the most characteristic features and components of postmodern storytelling is the intermingling of the border between the world of reality and fantasy, which affects all the actions and narrative trajectory of the story. In this article, the main goal is to investigate and analyze the actions in one of the contemporary postmodern novels called "Malakoot" by the contemporary author "Bahram Sadeghi" based on the theory of semiotics of discourse by Lithuanian linguist Algirdas Julien Greimas.

The method of conducting the present research is descriptive-analytical, based on library studies and document analysis, centered on the theory of discourse semiotics of Greimas. The statistical population includes the novel Malakoot by Bahram Sadeghi and the samples were selected purposefully and selectively.

The narrative and action structure of the postmodernist novel Malakoot is actually a contrast between the system of good and evil, in which a doctor named Dr. Hatam, as the main actor and symbol of absolute and demonic evil, seeks to achieve the desired value, which is to kill people. Anonymity and meaninglessness form the main infrastructure in the inner layers of this story for the action of its actors.

Malakoot"s novel is formed with emphasis on the action of the two main actors of the story, Dr. Hatam and Mr. M. L. Based on the action model of Greimas, the active actor has resorted to killing people. The main factor of the narrative, which is formed in the narrative chain of the story, is the battle between good and evil. The author has used the illusory, metareal and surreal atmosphere to play the role of the main and secondary actors (Saghi, Sheko, Mr. Mavaddat, etc.). The secondary actors of the story are all extravagant and lustful people who are sentenced to death at the end of the story.

Discourse semiotics is a discipline that carries out a process study of language. This discipline considers the sign as the source and meaning as the goal of its work. Semiotics chooses discourse as its field of work. Since literature is one of the examples of dynamic discourses, discourse semiotics aims to discover hidden semantic spaces by examining the elements involved in these discourses and the relationships between these elements. This research used the discourse-semiotic approach to investigate the process of meaning generation in the narrative elements of Zal and Rudabeh of Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh. The results indicated that the actional subject wants to have a child in order to gain value and eliminate the disadvantage. However, amending this shortcoming causes the first tension and challenge in the course of the narrative. The subject tries to solve the challenge by abandoning the albino baby, which is incompatible with social norms, but the abandonment of the child poses more challenges to the main character and even other narrative actors. The abandonment of the child in this narrative provides the possibility of the degeneration of meaning. In the meantime, what keeps the process of meaning-making going is the transformation of the actional subject into a sensible subject and the change of the narrative space into a sensory-perceptive space. Thus, Ferdowsi continues the meaning-making flow by using emotional solutions and applying semantic systems such as action, sensation, existence, imagination, and myth.

One of the meaning-making phenomena in the perspective of discourse semiotics is tension. The tension takes the narrative flow out of its logical path and prompts the main actors to react in order to resolve this tension and get out of the crisis and challenge. But sometimes, the tension arouses the feelings and emotions of the main actors and thus recovers the meaning, which is decomposing due to the tension. This paper calls this phenomenon as Emotion-Making Tension and analyzes the story of “Zal and Roudabe” from Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh in order to explore such tensions. The main goal of the present research is to detect different emotion-making tensions and their impact on the procession of the narration and meaning retrieval. Having established the emotion-making tensions in the narrative, we tried to trace the emotional impact of these tensions on the performance of the characters. The analysis revealed that the story begins with a tension, namely the birth of an abnormal child, which pushes the main actor (Sam) toward a reaction and the subsequent incidents are also the result of this very initial action by Sam in abandoning his child. The most important tension from the middle to the end of the story is the engagement of Zal in the forbidden love of Roudabeh. We tried to identify the tension relations which are either external, cognitive and quantitative or internal, affective and qualitative. The cooperation of these relations in the formation of meaning and semantic value was investigated in the narrative.

The present article deals with the comparative study of literary Fiction and music in the short story "Marsh al-Ghroub" by Youssef Idris, based on comparative literature criticism studies and with a Semiotics of discourse approach. In this story, in addition to the musical title; A kind of folk music related to the profession. A kind of folk music related to the profession, in the overall structure of its plot, advances the narrative sequence. In this discourse three types of active, tensif and aesthetic presence are formed and the main core of the process of meaning is aesthetic presence. At this stage, the music becomes the essence of music. Therefore, the issue that arises is what the aesthetic presence is based on. How the dialogue between literature and music guarantees the transformation of the world. This research examines three types of presence in this story with a descriptive-analytical method, and at the same time, they refer to the role of title, place and time. This study shows that the subject, passing through two relations of action and tension due to the phenomenological view, reaches one of presence and aesthetic moment, and its manifestation is shown in his improvisation and his ecstatic and transcendental relationship with existence. At this stage, due to the disturbance in the action and tension relationship, the literary narrative suffers a deficiency in its progress, from here, literature and music enter a dialogue, and the reflection of the voice of the narrative is entrusted to music.

Abstract The connotation (implicit meaning) is one of the approaches of semiotics that deals with the hidden and deep meanings of texts as systematic wholes and seeks to overcome the appearance of sign systems and reach the underlying layers of the text by relying on the context of the word and the characteristics of the audience. Due to its interpretable and nested structure, Masnavi is apt to be analyzed from this point of view. Through analyzing its implicit meanings, one can understand its cohesiveness and unity, as well as many hidden concepts. This study aims to explain how the implied meanings arise from the appropriateness of words in Masnavi. Therefore, in this study, some of the implicit meanings of Masnavi were investigated and analyzed from two perspectives. The findings of the study indicate that the connotations arising from the appropriateness of the words in Masnavi can be seen in two ways: Firstly, the combination and appropriateness of prominent words of a famous religious and historical event or story in the axis of the verse is reminiscent of that event for the audience and induces another implicit meaning that is also in harmony with the appearance of the verse and the main topic of discussion in the vertical axis of the poem. Secondly, from a famous and related story with his own words, these linguistic signs do not give a secondary meaning to the verse; rather, the presence of those words in several consecutive verses guides the audience to the implicit meaning in all the verses.IntroductionImplicit meaning is the second-order meaning that results from the applied context of the word and often has an emotional, situational, social, and cultural load. In some verses of Masnavi, although each of the words separately comes to the meaning of each verse, in proportion to other words and with a connotative meaning association, they connect the different parts of each story and give a body-like coherence to the text. The two research questions of the study are: In what ways are the implied meanings arising from the appropriateness of the words in Masnavi? What are their functions? This study aims to investigate the connotative meanings of Masnavi verses and to introduce and explain one of Rumi's artistic tricks in dealing with this great literary work, which proves more than ever the power of his mind and language for indirect references and presenting multiple meanings. Thus, the reader can understand the depth and layers of his words.Materials and MethodsIn this research, due to the study length, a number of verses of Masnavi were extracted in which the use of appropriate words in the horizontal and vertical axis, based on some evidence and documentation, instilled a connotative meaning into the writes’ mind.  With the help of other internal textual and contextual pieces of evidence and using content analysis based on discourse semiotics, their implicit meanings were explained.Research FindingsThe multi-layeredness and interpretability of Masnavi and its nested structure, clusters, external discreteness, and internal continuity, which are influenced by the language, style, and context of the Qur'an, have kept this wonderful book alive and dynamic, and receiving the indirect meanings and hidden layers of the text, always has opened up new research in this field. The evolution of semiotics has progressed from Saussure's two-dimensional perspective to a multifaceted perspective and a process in which they understand the hidden meanings and deep structures of literary or artistic works beyond the apparent dimensions of symbolic systems. This topic is introduced under the title of connotative meaning.Due to his extensive knowledge and deep understanding and comprehensive coverage of the events, stories, and biographies of prominent religious and historical figures, Molavi associates another similar character or story in the audience's mind and implicitly establishes a similar relationship between those two characters. This method can be considered one of the hidden artistic techniques of Rumi in writing poetry, which has been effective in deepening it, expanding the meaning, and connecting the concepts. This has made Rumi's poems scrutinized from the discourse semiotic point of view, and their implicit meanings can be deduced at different levels. In this way, evaluating and justifying the difference between Masnavi versions regarding some words is also possible.Discussion of Results and ConclusionsThe connotative meanings of words are one of Rumi's hidden artistic tricks in creating brevity, internal order, and coherence in the text, expanding the meaning and connecting concepts. The dynamics of the text lead to the intellectual participation of the audience and a better understanding of Rumi's thoughts. In all these cases, the words chosen by the poet are in harmony with the atmosphere of his poetry and confirm and complete the views expressed by Molavi.Sometimes, the coincidence and appropriateness of some words in the axis of companionship, along with clues such as the semantic context of the discussion, as well as other views and opinions of Molavi in ​​Masnavi, guide the audience to the implied meanings. According to the apparent meaning of the verses and the topic of the speech, the words "ascetic", "six hundred thousand" and "calf" refer to the story of the Samaritan calf. The words "cow", "calf", and "God" refer to the calf worship of Moses' people. "Yar" and "cave" refer to the story of Laila Al-Ambit and the divine protection and concealment of the Prophet (PBUH) and Abu Bakr. Finally, "cow", "color", "red", and "yellow" refer to the story of the yellow cow of the Israelites and inject an implicit meaning into the verse.Rumi sometimes uses important passages from famous stories that somehow have something in common with the subject of his speech in the service of harmonizing verses and choosing words and processing his images. Although these signs often have the same vocabulary and are different in terms of function or example in consecutive verses, in proportion to each other, they evoke another similar story for the audience.An example of the connotation can be seen in the story of Jafar bin Abi Talib. He, who in Masnavi, is an example of the saints of truth and perfect human beings, enjoys divine approval and special strength and steadfastness due to his death in the truth. Based on the idea of ​​repeating the truth of the nature of people, in Maulavi's opinion, like Iskandar Zulqarnain, another manifestation of the perfect man is shown in Masnavi, which, after reaching the knowledge of the sun of truth, shines everywhere like the sun. Inspired by the words and interpretations related to the story of Iskandar, Rumi created various themes and beautiful images in the story of Jafar bin Abi Talib and sometimes made mystical use of those interpretations.

Content analysis of textbooks, with the semantic semantics model approach of discourse, is a suitable way to understand how to select and use stories and narratives in each level of education to acquaint children with discourse systems in life.The purpose of this study is to use Paul Ricoeur model in analyzing the narrative identity of book stories in the fourth and fifth grades of elementary school in Iran in 1998-99 and to explain the types of discourse systems so that among the stories in the fourth and fifth grade textbooks, 2 stories Both samples were selected by purposive sampling method.The research method in the present study is descriptive-analytical. The main questions of the present study are: 1- The emotional process in stories is a function of which functions and features of the semantic sign of discourse? 2- How is the emotional and moral impact as well as the belief in another formed?In these stories, it is the individual identity that, according to the preservation of national identity, values and patriotism, based on the author's discourse systems, directs the character of the stories towards Shush altruism, patriotism and individual identity. In order to preserve the national identity, one culture remains in itself and does not become another cultural. The process of nostalgia in this story changes during two stages from the crisis of tension to the aesthetic system.

The present study aims to investigate the concept of wine (Mey in Persian) as a fundamental concept in Persian lyric literature focusing on the most important transformations in the poems of Rudaki, Sanaie, Nezami, Atar, Molavi, and Hafez. As discourse semiotics is studied within the evolution of structuralism, this study, with an emphasis on the structuralism view, first investigates the evolution of Mey based on the syntagmatic, paradigmatic and contrastive relations and then using discourse semiotics, it deals with the meaning boundaries to show the evolution path of Mey as one of the most fundamental concepts in Persian lyric poetry. The reason for considering such a continuum in the investigation of Mey (from word study to discourse analysis) is that such fundamental concepts are not merely the words which are used only for naming and referencing, but they change into a complicated integration and floating signifier and have a profound connection with the poet's lived discourse. They are on a continuum from meaning boundaries of reference to the interactive and ultimately to the melting in evolution.

Language learning is not just the learning of vocabulary and grammar. Idioms are the useful structures between language speakers, especially in spoken language.  Maybe the mysterious nature of these structures makes the speakers to be interested in using them. It was said mysterious because they do not have combinational meaning. Idioms have their own context of use and it motivates speakers to use them because the proper use of idioms shows the high level of communication skill of a foreign language learner. But due to the special structure of idioms, it is so hard to learn them.Besides, cartoon is a kind of image which is simple, attractive and borderless.It seems that the interaction between idiom and cartoon results in revealing connotational meaning of idiom and in this way, cartoon develops the literal meaning of idiom.There are various studies on the relationship between text and image in book illustration, teaching language and different sciences and they have confirmed the positive impact of image especially in the form of cartoon or caricature in learning but there is no research about the role of cartoon in learning English idioms to Persian native speakers from the semiotic point of view.This paper aims to evaluate the effect of interaction between speech and cartoon and achieve the effective features of cartoons in revealing the covert meaning of idioms, in the process of English idioms teaching to Persian speakers from semiotic point of view. In this paper, the main problem is how the cartoon, in relation to idioms, changes the space of sense-making from an unpredictable semiotic space to a creative one and how this interaction causes a creative semiotic space to develop the concept of idioms. To evaluate this paper`s hypotheses, we used visual semiotics approach and discourse analysis method. The statistical population of this research includes 60 English language learners in intermediate and advanced level including 30 girls and 30 boys from north and south of Tehran. The hypotheses of this study are that: firstly, cartoons can cause the semiotic development via the sign spaces interaction, inducing a new cognition and developing the scope of imagination. Secondly, speech and cartoon can cause creative usage of idioms via making referential space, using the discourse dimensions and developing the linguistic game in inter-semiotic space.The results show that, cartoons with the appropriate functions of cognitive, sensory- perceptual, emotional and aesthetic dimensions of discourse in which there are maximal transdiscourse relationship with idioms and make an effective interpretation or metadiscourse, cause a creative process and transcend the denotational meaning of idioms to connotational one. So, they can be considered as prosthesis for idioms. As a result, the hypotheses of this research are confirmed.