or more people have understood the same code they would therefore be able to
connect the same meanings to the same sounds or graphic patterns, and be able to
understand each other. In such theories of sign, the semiotic system is simply ‘there’.
It can be used but it can not be changed in any way. The starting point for social
semiotics is meaning. Signs are viewed as the product of a social process of sign
making in which the signifier and signified are independent of each other, rather than
understanding the sign as a pre-existing conjunction of a signifier and signified, an
element in a code, to be understood and used. The sign maker brings signifier and
signified together to make a sign. Sign makers have a meaning (the signified) which
they want to express and they express it through the most apt semiotic resources
available to them at that moment (the signifier).
The concept of semiotic resource and the process of sign making can be exemplified
by an instance drawn from two students designing a computer game (discussed in
Chapter Five). In the design of their game the students use the semiotic potentials of
visual difference, size, and movement to visually signify the weakness of one
character in relation to another. The students’ sign making is a matter of selecting the
Signifiers that they consider most apt to express the vulnerability of the character. In
the initial design stage of their game the students talk of a ‘little figure’ that will be
caught by an alien. The resources of the computer application (Toontalk) that they
use to build the game provide the students with different options or semiotic
potentials for representing the little figure and the other elements of the game. The
students select an image of an alien from the Toontalk notebook (the notebook is a
collection of multimodal resources, images, sounds, animated movements, and so
on), and an image of Jupiter for game background. They now need to find a form for
the little figure. They select a small flying dog with a rocket on its back. The choice
of a dog, a familiar pet, as opposed to a small alien serves to mark the figure’s
difference to the alien and the planet. This signifies the outsider status and potential
weakness of the little figure. Size is a semiotic resource that is easy to change in
Toontalk suggesting that the students kept the dog small to signify its vulnerability.
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