Abstract
Zoosemiotics is a field of inquiry introduced in 1963 by Thomas Albert Sebeok. That is the year when the term and a first definition make their first appearance, initially as a compromise between ethological and semiotic research (in the beginning, Sebeok was convinced that “zoosemiotics” had to be meant mostly as an umbrella term, gathering different scholarly approaches to animal communication). A synthetic definition of zoosemiotics, in the light of its most recent developments, can be today that of the study of semiosis within and across animal species. A spectrum of different possible definitions of the term has been attempted (in the next chapter of this book), but at the end of the day it is probably safe to trace a common ground in the way just mentioned.
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Notes
- 1.
So narrowly that several human communities would be excluded too.
- 2.
Two colleagues, one very young, one very famous – both obviously too busy in showing off their knowledge of Ancient Greek, than in actually grasping the practical side of the question – noticed that the correct shortened formulation should be Anthropozoosemiotics. The result, however, is hardly an economic improvement from Anthropological Zoosemiotics. It may still be one word instead of two, but it is so long that one may easily get lost somewhere in the middle, maybe exactly around the “po” region. This is why, possibly, the social scientists who developed the field of Anthrozoology, decided to skip that syllable too. Semioticians cannot just afford being practical, can they? (And then again, the same famous scholar takes a similar liberty by gladly using the term “Proprioception” in his writings, instead of the etymologically correct, but again impractical, “ProprioREception”. Perhaps, when it comes to Latin, he is less demanding).
- 3.
Of course, scholars in other disciplines, including natural sciences, often display a similar arrogance, in support, or celebration, of their own paradigms. However, committing a fault just because others do the same, does not really make that fault easier to excuse.
- 4.
- 5.
It was for instance Sebeok himself to dismiss once and for all the idea that only human communication can be of symbolic type.
- 6.
That is, the first edition of Deely 2009, in this companion’s bibliography.
- 7.
There is no doubt that being able to create possible worlds is a much milder form of distinction than, e.g., being “social” or “spiritual”, or “rational”, all being traits filled with countless implications at different levels of cognition and behavior.
- 8.
And this is said also as one more demonstration of the author’s esteem to Deely as a scholar, which has nothing to do with the few critical remarks advanced in this text. It must also be repeated that the “semiotic animal” is the last of the problems in this special category: the reason why it is worthwhile to discuss it is its primarily and specifically semiotic nature.
- 9.
Incidentally, in this companion the classical threshold is accepted and adopted, exactly to leave no doubt that, even at that level, non-human cognition perfectly qualifies for the “semiotic”, with a t, denomination.
- 10.
As with John Deely, also in the case of Susan Petrilli the author cannot but state his profound admiration for the work of this outstanding scholar. The reservations expressed here concern a very minimal part of Petrilli’s work, and luckily there has been an occasion to express them personally to her, so none of what is written here should come as a surprise.
- 11.
Now there is a great difference between an object and a thing, however confusedly the two notions are made to play in popular culture. For while the notion of thing is the notion of what is what it is regardless of whether it be known or not, the notion of object is hardly that. An object, to be an object, requires a relation to a knower, in and through which relation the object as apprehended exists as terminus. A sign warning of "bridge out" may be a lie, but the thing in question, even in such a case, is no less objective than in the case where the sign warns of a“ true situation“. (Deely 2000: 18).
- 12.
With the possible exception of Lacan, who never gave the impression of exactly knowing what he was doing with psychoanalysis.
- 13.
- 14.
This would also explain the fact that in both Deely 2005 and Ponzio-Petrilli 2008 the information regarding non-human semiosis are either produced by the authors themselves, or borrowed second-hand from the interpretations and re-interpretations of Sebeok, who at least took the trouble to check from direct sources.
- 15.
In fact, in the author’s opinion, the ideal world is not of the “live and let live” type, but rather based on the “I care” model. This part, however, belongs to ethical reflections discussed somewhere else in this companion.
- 16.
Of course, the present argumentation is using Prof. Bankov only as a synecdoche for more general issues. Kristian is a great scholar and a friend, for whom one can have nothing less than deep esteem.
- 17.
Most of the time, Sebeok only appears as a bibliographical reference of authors who made use of texts like Perspectives in zoosemiotics or Talking with animals: zoosemiotics explained.
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Martinelli, D. (2010). Introduction to Zoosemiotics. In: A Critical Companion to Zoosemiotics:. Biosemiotics, vol 5. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9249-6_1
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