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Home > Bonta, Steven (2015). A Peircean typology of cultural prime symbols: Culture as category

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Type: 
Article in Journal
Author: 
Bonta, Steven
Title: 
A Peircean typology of cultural prime symbols: Culture as category
Year: 
2015
Journal: 
Semiotica
Volume: 
2015
Issue: 
207
Pages: 
251-277
Keywords: 
Culture, Prime Symbol, Categories, Degeneracy
Abstract: 
Oswald Spengler first showed that every macroculture can be conceived of as an accretion of signs representing in various contexts a single abstract Prime Symbol. But this semiotic model of culture is not confined to the so-called 'great civilizations'; it is applicable to every culture. In seeking a typology of Prime Symbols (and hence, a semiotic typology of cultures), we show that that the Peircean Categories Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness (including the 'degenerate' Categories Firstness of Secondness, Firstness of Thirdness, and Secondness of Thirdness) are exemplified in the great range of cultural semiotic types, and that, because of their universality and generality, these Categories are the best semiotic lens through which cultural Prime Symbols can be understood.
ISSN: 
00371998
DOI: 
10.1515/sem-2015-0038
Language: 
English