Ethics is the type of philosophy we are doing when we try to figure out what is right and wrong. Put succinctly, Ethics is figuring out how to act, and why. The semiotic endeavor wherein we seek to understand what we mean when we talk about doing the right thing is known as semioethics. To paraphrase the words of Petrelli, semioethics lies at the intersection of semiotics, ethics, and pragmatism. My work in developing a practical theory of semioethics has turned into something I call Applied Semiotics. The reason why I consider what I am proposing here to be a method of semioethics is because it is intended to be not just an aid in contemplation, but to be a process that sets us up for effective action, or at least allows us a space to evaluate our past actions. In other words, it is meant to be a practical and accessible application of semiotic thinking.
In doing a brief internet search, I have found others who do something or another they call "Applied Semiotics," but none of them seem to be exactly the same as what I am doing here, and I have not based this approach on any of these other things those people have been doing.
Some of these writers apply semiotics to "branding" and business applications, which could not be farther from what I am doing. Some journals are literally applying Semiotics across academic disciplines, and for that reason could be a bit inaccessible to those not disposed to academic discourse. These journals seem to present respectable bodies of work in themselves, but don't appear to be relevant to what I'm doing here in any explicit way. Distinct from these other writers, what I am doing in the system of Applied Semiotics I propose is attempting to apply semiotic thinking to experiences we undergo in our day-to-day lives, both on a personal basis and a basis of social interactions. I have experimented with this in my own day-to-day conversations and reflecting, and what I provide here is a general outline to help guide myself and others, particularly in a workshop setting. It is not a strict method to be followed verbatim, but rather a general guideline which welcomes deviations and ingenuity. I may revise this in the future, but I can say at this time that it is now in a state that I am comfortable publishing.
The only prerequisites that any person needs to be able to engage in this method are sincerity, patience, and a willingness to participate.
I am going to test this approach in my next few workshops and see how it works out. This outline is intended to be easily exercised by anyone in any conversation or personal contemplation, and the goal of this method is twofold:
A) So we can enrich our experience of meaning and thus understand ourselves and one another to our utmost capacity, allowing us to think and act more effectively.
B) So we can resolve conflict in a manner that does not just leave one winner and one loser, but rather in a way that leads us to a more complete understanding, where we come to a resolution that benefits everyone by stimulating us to become more conscious and thus more connected, by which means we evolve together.
The Method
I have outlined this method in four steps. I stopped at four because I found that to be the minimum amount of distinct steps to completely cover what I hope for us to be able to accomplish, while being a small enough number to stay simple and easy to remember:
1. Signs - What is the literal meaning? What is the meaning intended by the speaker? (Typically these will be words, as this takes place as a conversation. However we can consider other forms of signification as well.)
- Domain: Internal/Personal - Understanding
- Aided by: Etymology, denotation, current accepted usage, personal meanings to the speaker.
- Domain: External/Mutual - Understanding
- Aided by: Considering other's perspective, asking questions to learn of other's experience, imagining seeing through the other's eyes.
- Domain: Internal/Personal - Assessing Implications
- Aided by: Listing consequences, considering implications, reviewing motives.
- Domain: External/Mutual - Assessing Implications
- Aided by: Elaborating and sharing visions/ideals, creativity and building solutions, identifying where our ethics and motives intersect.
I didn't initially intend to categorize the steps in this kind of diagram, but as I was evaluating them, I noticed that they ended up fitting into this format quite naturally. 1 and 3 I consider internal because they are oriented towards individual reflection. They don't need to be exclusively personal, but they can be easily conducted without the aid of a conversation partner. On the other hand, 2 and 4 I call external because they are oriented towards a conversation with one or more people, even though it is not impossible to do them by oneself. While these do break down nicely into quadrants, I keep the numbering in this diagram because this method is intended to be followed step-by-step, with step 4 being the ideal situation we can arrive at, as it is the point at which we shift to a creative mindset where everyone is engaged. That collaborative fourth step serves as a springboard for us to begin taking action.
In individual self-reflection and mental health, 1 has the most bearing because the thinker is reflecting on their words and what they mean to themselves. Are meanings being used in the way they are most commonly used, or do words take on a new and unique meaning based on specific associations and experiences?
In one-on-one relationships, 2 has the most bearing because we strive to understand one another so that we may better relate. It is amazing what happens when we simply intend to understand each other before intending to do anything else.
When planning on an individual basis, 3 has the most bearing because we seek to consider the way we are affecting the world through what we are attempting. It is always worth taking a pause and asking ourselves if we have the complete picture, or only part of a bigger picture.
In social applications, 4 has the most bearing, because a social context is always about what we do together. 4 is the point at which, having come to our fullest understanding through the previous three steps, we can bring things back together. It is, in essence, synergy, conducted in a semiotic mindset.
Regardless of the situation where one may apply this method, it is possible to engage in all four steps. When I first came up with this outline, I was envisioning how I might conduct a workshop that is interactive for a sizeable group of people. I think this method is really intended for use in a conversation between at least two people. That being said, any one person might find some usefulness in conducting a cognitive exercise where they imagine a discourse with someone who has totally different views—though in doing so, one may be limited by one's own imagination.
Breaking it Down
Even if we cannot come to agree on the exact same values, (nor should we necessarily aim to do so, as our individual perspectives each offer something unique and valuable to this shared experience), we can, through some careful listening and directed effort, get a good sense of where our values can intersect. I think a good analogy for this method would be singing in a choir, or playing in a band. I'll stick with the choir analogy because a conversation involves people's voices: A choir is not comprised of everyone singing in unison, singing the exact same notes at the exact same tempo—if it were, it would be rather dull and uninteresting. What makes a good chorus so beautiful is the way that people sing various different parts, different notes, and different tempos, all harmoniously intersecting in a way that makes the whole even more beautiful than each individual part. Some people may indeed be singing the same part, so unison is not entirely out of the question for some period of time, but even for these parts, each singer sings it with their individual voice, style, and volume. In a choir, we tune ourselves and pay attention to if we are singing more or less quietly or loudly, each of us making concessions to not sing at our loudest and proudest, instead carefully listening to each other with an ear to the overarching beauty of the whole.
When we carefully listen to each other and come to be conscious of how we each interpret our experiences, the possibilities expand substantially. New solutions can come to mind that nobody would have been able to think of on their own. Rather than striving for a groupthink or herd mentality, this approach allows each person to hold to their individual values and needs, making it a fitting template for a discourse that acknowledges (and perhaps even thrives on) intersectionality.
Resolve (as a verb) is a word that means "settle or find a solution to." If we look at the etymology of the word, we see it comes from the Latin word "resolvere," which meant "to loosen, loose, unyoke,", "to set free," "to relax," and in some contexts "to dispel." (Looking at it in terms of semiotics, one might say we unyoke the yoking our concepts have imposed upon us. One might also say we dispel the spells our words have cast over us.) The sense of "to loosen" and "to cut apart" can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European root "*leu-". Interestingly, our modern word "analysis" can also be traced back to this ancient linguistic root.
To use another analogy, consider a context to be a tapestry, i.e. an assembly of threads, with the threads being the meaningful aspects or signs that comprise the whole meaningfulness of a situation, which would be the tapestry. (I did not come up with this myself, as the etymology of the word "context" shows us that it originally came from roots "con-" and "*teks" which literally say "to weave together."). When we seek a resolution to a problematic situation, we are all coming into the conversation with our own contexts, and the situation as a whole has its context. Resolving that situation is like unwinding a beautiful and intricate textile so that we can see the individual threads that comprise it. When we can see the colors and textures of each of the threads, and get a sense of how they got into the shape they were in before we unwound them, we can do so much more than if we were just trying to sew these already-wound tapestries together. Instead of being tightly bound up, we relax and see each other for who we really are.
This may be an imperfect analogy, but the point is that we often come into situations of conflict, both internal and external, with a lot of wound up meanings and implications, and we don't always give ourselves a chance to communicate these meanings and implications to one another. Often, an individual may not fully understand the meanings that came together to make the experience one finds oneself in. If this method does anything, it sets us in a frame of mind where we take the time to sit down together and come to understand ourselves, each other and the full situation to the utmost of our abilities, and thus increase our capability to create a better situation—one that takes into account each person's perspective and circumstance.
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