McLuhan & Fiore (Tyler)

The first part of the reading was very interesting. To me basically the whole idea of the first essay was that there is always more than meets the eye, as in there is more to the story and more than just letterforms that generate meaning. Ferdinand de Saussure believed that language exists to represent ideas. So the sounds that come out of your mouth are just to be used as signs to talk about ideas or things. He also disliked how the arbitrariness of the linguistic sign was at fault. The text reads, “there is no resemblance between the sound ‘horse’ and the concept of a horse. No natural link binds the material, phonic aspect of the sign, to the mental concept: only a social agreement appears to hold the two elements together.” This is all quite intriguing based on the representation of the words and sounds. In conjunction with other words such as cow and pony, horse makes total sense. The essay goes on to state, “the meaning of a sign does not reside within the sign itself, but is generated from the surrounding system. The sign alone is empty.”