Semioticsss!!!

First looking at Visual Language: Semiotics, i was intrigued of how the author noted that clothes can be semiotics. I suppose this is fairly obvious, but I reallly didn't even think about that, but I completely agree. The way people dress is usually the most basic way to communicate with other people. There is no need for any form of verbal communication, because peoples' attire is a great indicator or signifier of a person. This cannot always give an accurate representation of a person's personality though. I also really liked the comparison to the coin. The heads and tails work well to represent the concept and the sound image as one can't be with outh the other, though the coin only represents the inseperablilty of the two and not the concept behind the concept and sound image since you need to have both and having both heads and tails at the same time is not possible.
Then looking at Semiotics for Beginners: Codes, the intro regarding the golden record launched by NASA was very intereseting. I forgot that we had sent this record off into space and originally I thought it to be very well designed. But now, when I'm not in a science class, I can see how we could have put a recipee for split pee soup on it and if any aliens were to find it, it may still mean absolutly nothing to them if our references and contexts are invalid in their society. Though I suppose there is truly no universal (and i mean universal) way to communicate, especially if we are communicating with that which may not exist. Also, looking at the pictures and the associations we make with each is interesting. I glanced at the pictures first before reading each caption, and the captions basically narrated exactly how I recieved the images. It was frustrating to me that I was so predictable. The final thing I want to comment on is the references to the language of British upper class and non-upper class. I lived in England this past summer and not only was there a language variation between myslef and the Brits, but I noticed the internal differences too. One noted in this reading was that of "wireless" and "radio". I had an internship at a company where the boss was noticeably proper and he would refer to the radio as a wireless, but my younger coworkers called it a radio. I suppose there is also variations in language here in different regions of the states, but I think the international variations are more interesting. I went to a couple of concerts in London, but when I would ask about concert tickets, everyone would correct me so I would say "gig" instead of concert (which i do now habitually).