The homogeneous nature of the theatre medium
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Eli Rozik
His research interests include theatre semiotics, nonverbal communication in theatre, performance analysis and metaphor in particular, and poetics. His recent publications include ‘Acting: the quintessence of theatricality’ (2002); ‘Framing, decoding and interpretation: On the spectator's vital role in creating theatrical meaning’ (2002); ‘Origins of theatre’ (2003); and ‘Theatrical experience as metaphor’ (2004).
Abstract
To date, traditional theatre semiotics has not succeeded in creating an intelligible and effective method of performance analysis. I believe, nonetheless, that a semiotic method that aims at revealing the mechanisms of generating theatre meaning is viable and even obligatory. I contend that the problem stems from the erroneous theoretical assumption that theatre draws upon different component codes and is, therefore, a heterogeneous medium. I suggest, rather, that the theatre medium is homogeneous; that ‘iconicity’ should be redefined in terms of imagistic thinking, in the sense of operating images imprinted on matter, and that this definition accounts for its homogeneity. I show that this definition also leads to the following conclusions: (a) iconicity transforms units ‘borrowed’ from other systems of signification and communication into descriptions of such units, thus bestowing homogeneity upon theatre performance-texts; (b) the notion of ‘iconicity,’ in the above sense, also applies to imprinted images of speech acts that combine verbal and nonverbal elements into indivisible nonverbal units; and consequently, (c) a performance-text is an iconic description of a (usually fictional) world, generated by the homogeneous theatre medium. Although reflecting criticism of traditional approaches, this study reaffirms the charter of theatre semiotics.
About the author
His research interests include theatre semiotics, nonverbal communication in theatre, performance analysis and metaphor in particular, and poetics. His recent publications include ‘Acting: the quintessence of theatricality’ (2002); ‘Framing, decoding and interpretation: On the spectator's vital role in creating theatrical meaning’ (2002); ‘Origins of theatre’ (2003); and ‘Theatrical experience as metaphor’ (2004).
© Walter de Gruyter
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- Ricœur and Saussure: On meaning and time
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Introduction Theatrical semiosphere: Toward the semiotics of theatre today
- Semiotic arts of theatre
- Prague's experimental stage: Laboratory of theatre and semiotics
- A historical outlook on theatrical ostension and its links with other terms of the semiotics of drama and theatre
- Semiotics of nonsemiotic performance
- The end of theatre semiotics? A symptom of an epistemological shift
- Intercultural theory, postcolonial theory, and semiotics: The road not (yet) taken
- Dreams and phantasms: Towards an ethnoscenological reading of the intercultural theatrical event
- The homogeneous nature of the theatre medium
- The semiotics of curtain calls
- Actor-puppet-video projection-spectator-fantasmagorie technologique: Towards a theory for a new theatre genre
- Vital signs
- Présentation
- Paul Ricœur, habitant de ce monde. Les affleurements de la conception peircienne de l'objet du signe et du pragmatisme
- Ricœur and Saussure: On meaning and time
- Discernements et malentendus
- Sémiotique et herméneutique : Le texte et l'action
- Ricœur et la sémiotique : Une rencontre « improbable » ?
- Le parcours du sens : Ricœur et Benveniste
- De la narration à l'action : Inversion du cheminement mimétique ricœurien
- La philosophie face à l'univers des signes : Positions et propositions de Paul Ricœur sur la sémiotique et la sémiologie
