NP Re: Semiotics (why a text can just be anything you want it to be)

[jbor at bigpond.com]

On 18/12/2005, at 11:15 AM, Sean Mannion wrote:

> You're right in this sense, of course -- strictly speaking the author 
> (who I would take here to be whatever governing party applies) has no 
> control over the behaviour of the reader, but we cannot be in any 
> doubt that the reader understands either the intentions of the author 
> or of the meaning of the sign, and I'd argue that this is a 
> significant degree of control over the way that a reader responds to a 
> sign.
>
> I'm illustrating this to the point to the degree that the above 
> example was presented.

I don't think it's always (or ever) quite so straightforward as 
intention = reception; then again, I'm not wholly sure of the full 
context of the original quote either, and whether it was talking about 
control over decoding or control over response, which are different, 
though connected, facets of the reading process. But I would definitely 
argue that a reader can take a text to mean anything they want it to 
mean -- it doesn't make that interpretation "right" or binding over 
anyone else, but more power to them if they do.

But I do agree that positing all the dictionary definitions (or 
homonyms, homophones, anagrams etc) of the word "smoking" to imply that 
spontaneous combustion, for example, is a relevant meaning of the word 
or phrase in the context of a "No Smoking" sign is nonsense. It's that 
sort of misprision and/or abuse of Critical Theory which most people, 
quite rightly, react strongly against. But setting up that type of 
idiocy as the standard and main purport of Critical Theory is creating 
a straw man.

best