TY - CHAP

T1 - Why Notational Iconicity is a Form of Operational Iconicity

AU - Krämer, Sybille

N1 - Symposium on Iconicity in Language and Literature. Tübingen, 2015.03.26-28

PY - 2017

Y1 - 2017

N2 - Something like a phonographic dogma dominates the theory of writing: writing is considered to be a fixed version of spoken language. This essay intends to overcome the speech-oriented concept of writing by conceptualizing the idea of ‘notational iconicity’. Being hybrids, written texts embody both, linguistic and iconic attributes. The decisive argument in favour of ‘notational iconicity’ is not only its visuality, but the two-dimensional spatiality and operativity of writing. This kind of operational iconicity is inherent to almost all written texts and is based on the fact that written texts materially and perceptively present themselves synoptically and simultaneously. Inscribed surfaces open up a neatly arranged and controllable space of aisthetic presentation and tactile manipulations: Every written configuration can be reconfigured; thus writing is a paper-tool, a laboratory for cognitive and aesthetic activities. At this point the connection between writing and other forms of graphical media like graphs and diagrams matters: The cultural technique of ‘flattening out’ constitutes an important strand in our media evolution, for communication as cognition, for composition as computation.

AB - Something like a phonographic dogma dominates the theory of writing: writing is considered to be a fixed version of spoken language. This essay intends to overcome the speech-oriented concept of writing by conceptualizing the idea of ‘notational iconicity’. Being hybrids, written texts embody both, linguistic and iconic attributes. The decisive argument in favour of ‘notational iconicity’ is not only its visuality, but the two-dimensional spatiality and operativity of writing. This kind of operational iconicity is inherent to almost all written texts and is based on the fact that written texts materially and perceptively present themselves synoptically and simultaneously. Inscribed surfaces open up a neatly arranged and controllable space of aisthetic presentation and tactile manipulations: Every written configuration can be reconfigured; thus writing is a paper-tool, a laboratory for cognitive and aesthetic activities. At this point the connection between writing and other forms of graphical media like graphs and diagrams matters: The cultural technique of ‘flattening out’ constitutes an important strand in our media evolution, for communication as cognition, for composition as computation.

KW - Philosophy

UR - https://benjamins.com/catalog/ill.15

UR - http://scans.hebis.de/41/94/52/41945280_toc.pdf

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85160125364&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1075/ill.15

DO - 10.1075/ill.15

M3 - Contributions to collected editions/anthologies

SN - 978-90-272-4351-5

T3 - Iconicity in language and literature

SP - 303

EP - 320

BT - Dimensions of Iconicity

A2 - Zirker, Angelika

A2 - Bauer, Matthias

A2 - Fischer, Olga

A2 - Ljungberg, Christina

PB - John Benjamins Publishing Company

CY - Amsterdam

ER -