Greimasean phenomenology and beyond: From isotopy to time consciousness

TY - JOUR

T1 - Greimasean phenomenology and beyond

T2 - From isotopy to time consciousness

AU - Sonesson, Göran

PY - 2017

Y1 - 2017

N2 - In spite of appearances, the true encounter between Husserlean phenomenology and Parisian school semiotics still has not occurred. In this paper, I suggest that, by adopting ideas from phenomenology, many of which have received new currency in contemporary cognitive science, we can retain a basic formality of the theory, without yielding to any reductionist tendency. After a brief look at the hidden phenomenology of Hjelmslev's work, which was a fundamental inspiration to Greimas, I delve deeper into the Greimasean notion of isotopy to the point where it can be seen to have a counterpart in the notion of schema, which has a long history in psychology and phenomenology, before its brief hour of fame in cognitive science. The fundamental advantage of the notion of schema, as against that of isotopy, is that the former is structured, while the latter is not; and, in particular, that the former is temporally structured, which means that it also can be differently organized. This leads us on to the suggestion that the schema, as the successor term to isotopy, has an existence not only in the everyday life of any human being, but also in the evolutionary history of the human species.

AB - In spite of appearances, the true encounter between Husserlean phenomenology and Parisian school semiotics still has not occurred. In this paper, I suggest that, by adopting ideas from phenomenology, many of which have received new currency in contemporary cognitive science, we can retain a basic formality of the theory, without yielding to any reductionist tendency. After a brief look at the hidden phenomenology of Hjelmslev's work, which was a fundamental inspiration to Greimas, I delve deeper into the Greimasean notion of isotopy to the point where it can be seen to have a counterpart in the notion of schema, which has a long history in psychology and phenomenology, before its brief hour of fame in cognitive science. The fundamental advantage of the notion of schema, as against that of isotopy, is that the former is structured, while the latter is not; and, in particular, that the former is temporally structured, which means that it also can be differently organized. This leads us on to the suggestion that the schema, as the successor term to isotopy, has an existence not only in the everyday life of any human being, but also in the evolutionary history of the human species.

KW - connotation

KW - isotopy

KW - Phenomenology

KW - schema

KW - sign

U2 - 10.1515/sem-2017-0084

DO - 10.1515/sem-2017-0084

M3 - Review article

AN - SCOPUS:85035110396

VL - 2017

SP - 93

EP - 113

JO - Semiotica

JF - Semiotica

SN - 0037-1998

IS - 219

ER -