Theoretical Advances in Critical Visual Analysis: Perception, Ideology, Mythologies and Social Semiotics

Abstract

This article discusses how social semiotics is contributing to advancing the field of critical visual analysis. First, the article introduces social semiotics as a discipline, by outlining its theoretical foundations, methodological principles and scholarly agenda. Second, it discusses how established paradigms such as semiotics, iconography and cultural studies have approached notions such as meaning and ideology in relation to visual signification. Third, it discusses the distinctive nature of the social semiotic approach to ideology in visual analysis. The article finally argues that the critical ends of social semiotics can benefit greatly from a closer - critical and political - reading of Barthes’' "Mythologies" (1970/1990) as well as an increased concern with the role of perception in visual signification.

Keywords: social semiotics, semiotics, iconography, cultural studies, ideology, visual perception, signification, mythologies