Introduction
All living organisms have the instinctive capacity to produce and understand signs through a process known as semiosis. The term semiotics (etymologically semeion “mark, sign”), which means the science of signs, is first used by Hippocrates (460?–377? BCE) in studying the observable patterns of physiological symptoms induced by particular diseases. Galen of Pergamum (130?–200? AD) used the term semiosis for diagnosis, whereas Aristotle (384–322 BCE) employed it for the “reference system” of a sign itself (Sebeok 1974). Language, a reference system, is a semiotic object (neither psychological nor biological object), which simultaneously exists in human consciousness and also as an independent object of him. Language, a socially shared and individually represented system of meaning making, gets its unique ontological status being a part of the semiotic world.
In religious studies, St. Augustine (354–430 AD) highlighted the inbuilt interpretive component to whole process of...
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Dwivedi, A.V. (2017). Semiotics. In: Leeming, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Psychology and Religion. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27771-9_200145-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27771-9_200145-1
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