Digital Textuality

Technological revolution of last several decades has changed the way humans interact significantly. Possibility to communicate with people who may be thousands of kilometers away instantaneously and possibility to share one’s life on social network platforms to wider public has contributed to qualitatively reshaping the fabric of social life. Besides personal aspect, instantaneity of it has given the opportunity to media outlets and public relations offices of businesses and political subjects, as well as all the other institutions, to get to their target audience easier and faster. So, at this point, digital world has variety of different institutions and individuals representing themselves and communicating with each other, or in other words we can say that there exists a social life within a digital world. Thus, we can see digital world as a medium for communication and it’s safe to discuss it in a broader cultural sense (Pauwels, 2011). This means that cultural analysis tools should be applied on digital world, but as much as there are similarities, there are also differences when compared to the standard research object of cultural analysis. Hence, it requires to be delimited before any further action can be taken. Since I refer to it as a world, and it certainly shows the signs of being the world of its own, Yuri Lotman’s concept of Semiosphere could be helpful to analyze its cultural properties, but at the same time, textual approach of Lotman towards culture may become a challenge in digital sense, since it incorporates different cultural elements within itself in a different manner. In this paper I will try to delimit digital world as a research object in the sense of textual approach and the possible challenges or outcomes it may lead us towards.

In order to focus on textuality in digital context, more general understanding of language and text, as well as framework for understanding the process of communication is necessary. Act of communication encapsulates in itself the act of sending the coded message from an addresser to the addressee, in a certain context, through a certain physical channel and psychological connection (Jakobson, 1985). These aspects, while constantly present during the act of communication, differ in hierarchical alignments in different cases. Certain functions may be put to the more important position, while other functions would become less important, for example, emphasis may be put on the addresser’s attitude towards his expression (e.g., speaker’s attitude towards what he’s talking about) and this will take the central position, but the message will still be communicated to the addressee in a certain context through certain physical channels and psychological connections (Jakobson, 1985).

As already mentioned, digital world must be seen in the context of culture and while it can be seen as a medium for cultural operations, digital world itself holds the signs of a culture of its own, or to be more precise, distinct signs of meaning generation. In this sense, concept of Semiosphere would probably be helpful to describe it. Juri Lotman argued that: “The semiotic universe may be regarded as the totality of individual texts and isolated languages as they relate to each other” (J. Lotman, 2005). He argued that individual acts are real as long as they’re the part of the Semiosphere, which can’t be understood through these actions but only by itself: “Just as, by sticking together individual steaks, we don’t obtain a calf, but by cutting up a calf, we may obtain steaks, — in summarizing separate semiotic acts, we don’t obtain a semiotic universe. On the contrary, only the existence of such a universe — the semiosphere — makes the specific signatory act real” (J. Lotman, 2005). From this definition alone, Lotman’s conception may look a bit deterministic, but with the introduction of the concept of boundaries he adds dialogical aspect to his theory. Lotman described boundaries as simultaneously belonging to inner space and outer space, “the sum of bilingual translatable “filters”, passing through which the text is translated into another language (or languages), situated outside the given semiosphere” (J. Lotman, 2005). Semiosphere, as “the totality of individual texts and isolated languages as they relate to each other” (Lotman 2005), in case of digital world, can be understood as a totality of all the webpages and all the content ever posted and the languages of memes, emojis, Tik-Tok videos etc. and frequent combinations of them. The fact that it’s a distinct semiotic space, participating in which requires certain knowledge can be seen while some of the older generation members seem to not participate in it altogether, or not understand the logic of it completely. Digital Semiosphere may be seen as a simulation of life, since on this level of general digital Semiosphere, it shows the same level of abstraction as the general abstract notion of Semiosphere. This might sound like a stretch, but we have to keep in mind that digital world is not only a conveyer of a text, but it is at the same time the place for interpretation.

If we take into account the television, relatively close medium to world wide web, we recognize the fact that addresser is still able to deliver a message to addressee but sending the coded message and decoding it happens in different spaces, as TV presenter sits in a studio, while addressee receives the message in the living room, through television. Also, we have to keep in mind that in pre-digital era, sharing the experience of watching same thing at the same time was limited to the number of people your living room could accommodate. This meant that cultural dialogue and cultural translations were happening at a slower pace. Most importantly, this meant that television was yet another medium for communicating texts that were specifically produced for target audience. On the other hand, on internet, while keeping the aspect of physical distance from the medium of television, communication still happens in the same space, which happens to be virtual. This creates the possibility for 2 persons, living on the opposite sides of the world to communicate in the personal manner. So, while there still is the physical distance kept, its effects are less apparent, since there is more dialogue and both sides are required to remain actively engaged in the communication, just as in the real-life situations. Digitalization also means that you can not only watch the same video with millions of people, but also share your opinion about it and see other people’s reactions as well. And finally, while produced and pre-planned content can be found on the internet (un-planned content can appear on TV as well), textually it still is the place for direct, unfiltered communication. Given this, the main difference between television and internet is the fact that the production and consumption parts are separated in television, while on internet they appear together. For example, while watching a news report on television, we’re consuming the text created by the newsroom and we hold no power to change the text directed at us. On the other hand, if we broadcast live exact same news report on YouTube or Facebook, comments on it may affect the further interpretations of given report. Digital world isn’t only used to one-sidedly communicate certain meanings, but it becomes the place for representing the identities of its participants. Non-physical aspect of it means that if desired, it can be far more anonymous than other methods of communication known to mankind, which means that faking one’s identity is easy task, which can produce difficulties in communications, but nevertheless, these representations are still part of culture, which means that they should still be studied (Pauwels, 2011).

Since digital Semiosphere encapsulates in itself the simulation of real-life communication and written, pre-planned content, on the one hand, it is the means of communicating the culture besides the digital world, but on the other hand, it creates specific texts and languages within it. For example, every musician puts their music on digital platforms and thus, when music is made popular, it always is within the digital world. In this case, internet is used as means of replacing the older structure of music distribution, which was and still is part of the non-digital culture, in general sense. At the same time, it shows the signs of forming the culture of its own. For example, there exists numbers of forums or sub-forums under more general forums that connect people all around the world who are interested in specific topics, thus, creating thematic communities that couldn’t have existed on such an international level without the internet. Given this, we may say that internet plays the role of a boundary, where the translation between different Semiospheres happen, it exists as a medium within Semiospheres and it forms a Semiosphere of its own. This means that while investigating the digital world, researcher can take 3 main paths: 1. Research the digital world in the sense of its communicative functionality. In other words, seeing it as a functional part of culture, boundary of the culture as a space of intercultural translations. In this sense, digital world is part of a bigger cultural whole. Hence, we can decode variety of cultural values and identities through examining them as presented in digital world (Pauwels, 2011) 2. Delimiting the digital world as a semiotic space. In this sense, digital world is the whole which consists of different parts and thus produces its own meanings and values. 3. Combination of the first and second approaches. In other words, researching the boundaries and points of translation between physical and digital cultures. How does the digital world penetrate the physical world and vice versa. To sum these approaches up, digital world can be seen as a text within the given cultural context, as its own semiotic space, consisting of texts or the translations between digital and non-digital languages.

Though, no matter which approach we take, we are met with the peculiarities of digital texts. To address these peculiarities, first we need to differentiate between discrete and iconic semiotic systems. Discrete text can be seen as an assembly of signs in a chain, according to rule and given the content of statement, while iconic, or pictorial text is the result of an isomorphism between object and the text, so there are no discrete signs, combination of which would communicate the message, but instead the message is communicated by the text entirely (Lotman, Pfotenhauer; 1975). The best example for this would be the difference between literature and paintings (ibid). Since the verbal (discrete) and non-verbal (iconic) languages are constructed in a completely different ways, as “one of these is a language with discrete semantic units having stable meanings and with linear sequencing in its syntagmatic organization of text, while the other is characterized by non-discrete representation and spatial (continuous) organization of elements”, exact translation from one to another is impossible, the best that can be done in that regard is more or less close representation of original text, given certain cultural context (Lotman 2019). Since both kind of texts coexist inside cultural world, constant necessity of translation between them is inevitable, thus any cognitive structure is multilingual and should include the diversity of untranslatable semiotic formations, since the new message can only be produced through an error in communication (Lotman, 2019). Considering this, Lotman suggests that human cultures are structurally dualistic, since discrete verbal languages coexist with non-verbal languages. As already mentioned, if discrete languages exist in a form of chain, non-verbal languages “exist in relations of homeomorphism, acting as mutually resembling symbols”. At a given period in history, either one of these can take the leading role but their dualistic existence never seizes to be (ibid). Given the context of cultural axis between these languages, Lotman assigns certain “consciousness” to each of them. Non-verbal language is referred as a mythological consciousness, which encapsulates within itself the cyclical approach to time and is based on the idea of resemblance of things and is semiotically manifested through action. On the other hand, discrete language is associated with historical consciousness, ideas of linearity and chronology and understood in the sense of sequences. Adult human being has usually acquired both of these as already mentioned, imperfect translation between them is responsible for generating new messages (Lotman, 2019).

In this sense, digital world is an interesting case. On the one hand it is the result of a discrete language sequence, meaning computational codes that make the functioning of digital machines possible, but on the other hand, every aspect of digital world heavily relies on spatiality. Every operating system, web page or application, no matter its contents, is spatially aligned by the designers of given product. While there still is the possibility of communicating in discrete language, non-verbal language is still dominating. It can be seen as a surrogate of physical spatial environment, but if in case of physical world, environment could be predominantly natural, in digital world it is completely intentionally made-up space and should be analyzed by its own non-verbal textual characteristics. Also, we have to keep in mind that for example blogs or Facebook pages are rarely dedicated to one specific post, they usually are the collection of different texts (verbal or non-verbal) and these pages/blogs are used as a platform, but these texts are thematically related to each other. This usually necessitates special alignment of the platform itself to match the content. Thus, these pages can be analyzed as a whole or certain elements of it could be analyzed separately. Nevertheless, first step towards analyzing such pages should be its general description (Pauwels, 2011). In other words, using spatial analysis, we may deduce certain meanings about the page, such as its goal or identity. In either way, if we want to analyze the whole page or a certain element of it, we delve into verbal textual analysis (Pauwels, 2011). Of course, if the content is pictorial, additional layer of spatial analysis will be conducted to get in depths of certain pictorial text. But, besides the importance of a design, digital world shows its mythological consciousness in the fact of almost eliminating the time. Casual conversations can resurface at any given moment in the future and every new creation exists forever, as long as it’s not terminated. Also, besides the design part, the usage of emojis and rising popularity of using memes as means of communication slowly takes over communication through discrete language, so there is no denying of its dominance in digital world. So, since it is the language and text, Semiosphere and a space for translation, it can be predominantly understood in its discreteness or its pictoriality. For example, if we understand it in the context of physical culture, it should be understood as an iconic language, since it operates through mythological consciousness and penetrates through with its non-linear nature, blurring the timeline. On the other hand, if we analyze by its own, discreteness put forward by the coding shows its face and certain linear approach can be useful. But if we follow the path of investigating the mutual relation between physical and digital cultures, both discrete and iconic textual analysis should be considered.

References

Jakobson, Roman 1985. Metalanguage As a Linguistic Problem (1956). In: Rudy, Stephen (ed.), Selected Writings, VII. Mouton, 113–121.

Lotman, Juri 2019. The Phenomenon of Culture (1978). In: Tamm, Marek (ed.), Juri Lotman — Culture, Memory and History. Palgrave Macmillan, 33–48.

Lotman, Juri 2005. On the Semiosphere. In Sign System Studies, 33 (1), 205–227.

Lotman, Juri; Pfotenhauer, Frances 1975. The Discrete Text and The Iconic Text: Remarks on The Structure of Narrative (1973). In: Cohen, Ralph (ed.), New Literary History Vol. 6, №2, On Narrative and Narratives. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 333–338. Pauwels, Luc 2011. Researching Websites as Social and Cultural Expressions: Methodological Predicaments and a Multimodal Model for Analysis. In: Margolis, Eric; Pauwels, Luc (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Visual Research Methods. Sage Publications

LEVAN ILARIANI