2.1.2. Types of signs

The conventional classification of signs is grounded on designation, or the character of link between the sign and its designatum. The focus is on the physical aspect of a sign, or its material ‘vehicle’. According to the nature of their relation to the designatum, signs are classified into indexes, icons and symbols (Fig. 1.3).

• Indexes (indexical signs) are physically linked to the designatum, being its part or property; the type of relation is contiguity. E.g. yellow leaves as a sign of autumn, high temperature as a sign of some disease.

• Icons (iconic signs) have physical resemblance to the designatum; the type of relation is similarity / iconicity. Icons can be natural (e.g. a white line in the sky which marks the trajectory of a jet-plane’s flight) and artificial (e.g. road signs, pictures, photographs, movies, etc.). Natural icons may be also treated like indexes. Artificial icons happen to be rather sophisticated (cf. abstract paintings) and not easily interpreted.

• Symbols are linked to the designatum arbitrarily; the type of relation is convention based on an agreement within the society. E.g. an owl stands for wisdom, a bell stands for a break, a road sign stands for some instruction to the driver, etc. All linguistic signs are symbolic. Symbolic signs allow the human mind to go beyond the limitations of contiguity and similarity and establish symbolic links between any form and its designatum.

Material vehicles of signs may be complex, combing two and more signs that belong to the same type or different types. E.g. road signs, all of which are symbolic, may include icons (Fig. 1.4a), other symbols (Fig. 1.4b) or both (Fig. 1.4c). Linguistics signs – derived words, phrases, sentences and texts – are complex symbols, where one symbol hierarchically includes other symbols, thus creating symbolic ensembles.

Another classification of signs is grounded on signification, or the character of link between the signifier (the form of a sign) and the signified (its meaning). The signifier may evoke the meaning either directly, without involving any subsidiary associations, or indirectly, i.e. by means of involving such associations. In the latter case, the signifier becomes a ‘vehicle’ for two kinds of form: (a) the outer / external form which is the physical ‘body’ of a sign, and (b) the inner / internal form which is a concept immediately linked to the outer form (Fig. 1.5). The outer or inner form of the signifier serves as a ‘cue’ that facilitates an access to the signified as the sign’s meaning proper. Such ‘cues’ are primarily provided by linguistic symbols.

Linguistic forms are called non-motivated (e.g. a man, to run, blue) if the signified evokes the meaning directly (Fig. 1.5a), and they are called motivated if the meaning is ‘prompted’ by the outer or inner form of the signified. Motivated signs are classified into those with iconic, metonymical, metaphorical / analogical, generalizing and specifying motivation.

• Signs with iconic motivation (Fig. 1.5b) ‘prompt’ their meaning via the outer, physical body of a sign which imitates a fragment of meaning. In language, an example is onomatopoeic words; e.g. a cuckoo, to hiss, to buzz, etc.). Iconic motivation for syntactic units is exhibited in the sequential order, distance and quantity of their elements. E.g. cause and effect (sequential order); He made her leave / He wanted her to leave / He hoped that she would leave (distance); Don’t smoke / Don’t smoke, will you? (quantity: more form, more meaning).

The signs with other types of motivation ‘prompt’ their meaning via their inner form which is a fragment of meaning (Fig. 1.5c).

• Signs with metonymic motivation have the inner form which is contiguous with the meaning (here, motivation demonstrates ‘indexical’ principle). E.g. a four-wheeler ‘a car’, the yellow ‘the central part of an egg’.

• Signs with metaphorical / analogical motivation have the inner form which exhibits likeness (a metaphoric link) or similarity (an analogical link) with the meaning; E.g. a lion ‘a strong and brave person’ (metaphor), a second Einstein ‘a bright scholar’ (analogy).

• Signs with generalizing motivation have the inner form which is a kind that ‘prompts’ the type represented in the meaning, i.e. the meaning is more schematic than the inner form of a sign. E.g. a picture ‘something pained’ > ‘something vivid: a painting, a drawing, a photograph, a landscape view, a motion picture, etc’; ME dogge ‘a dog of a particular breed’ > a dog ‘any dog’.

• Signs with specifying motivation have the inner form which is the type that ‘prompts’ a kind represented in the meaning, i.e. the meaning is more specific than the inner form of a sign. E.g. OE mete ‘food’ > meat ‘edible flesh’, OE hound ‘any dog’ > a hound ‘a hunting dog of a particular breed’; corn ‘seeds of serial grasses’ > AE ‘maze’, BE ‘wheat’, in Ireland and Scotland – ‘oats’.

The inner form of signs may trigger a chain of derived meanings, which accounts for the phenomenon of polysemy. E.g. a chair ‘a piece of furniture’ (direct meaning / the inner form) > ‘a person presiding at the meeting’ (metonymy) > ‘the position of this person’ (metonymy) > ‘high position (generalization) > ‘position of the head of a university department’ (specification) > ‘a person who occupies this position’ (metonymy) > ‘professorship’ (metonymy).