5. Semiological Schools of Thought

Semiotic studies extend between what Umberto Eco calls the “lower” and “upper threshold of semiotics.” The lower threshold is situated “at the point where semiotics arises from something that is not semiotics, as a connecting link between the world of signals and the world of meaning, similar to the transition in physical anthropology between the last primates and Homo sapiens”

Lower and Upper Branches of Semiotics:

The two areas that study the lower threshold of semiotics are biosemiotics and zoosemiotics.

Traditional Branches

The areas of semiotics that are considered traditional are Linguosemiotics, Abstract semiotics, Artsemiotics, Narrative semiotics, and Ethnosemiotics.

New Semiotic Branches

The modern semiotic branches are Kinesics (kinematics), Proxemics, Semiotics of the Mass Media, Visual Semiotics (Semiotics of the Image), Sociosemiotics, Computer Semiotics, and Syncretic Semiotics.