To See (Better) the International: Semiotics of the Image and the International Politics
- Martin Švantner
, - Jakub Záhora
Abstract
This article contributes to the research program of “visual turn” in International Relations (IR). It specifically engages Ronald Bleiker's methodological proposal which is rooted in assemblage thinking and calls for a comprehensive and pluralistic understanding of the relationship between visuality and politics. In this framework, semiotics should play a prominent role in attending to the role of images in (co)constituting the international politics. However, we show that Bleiker’s conceptualization of semiotics and its concepts is rather vague. The text therefore discusses how we can approach semiotics in a more rigorous way, and how the concepts of 'symbolism' and 'symbolic signs' can be understood from a semiotic perspective inspired mostly by work of Charles S. Peirce. The text thus offers theoretically sophisticated answer to Bleiker’s call for semiotically informed visual analysis. We illustrate our arguments by discussing scholarship on the politics of jihadist videos.
Keywords
semiotics, visuality, assemblage, methodology, Peirce
Author Biography
Martin Švantner
Martin Švantner is an assistant professor at the Faculty of Humanities of the Charles University (Department of Electronic Culture and Semiotics) and a lecturer at the West Bohemian University in Pilsen (Department of Sociology). His general interest is focused on semiotics, cognitive semiotics, social semiotics, history of semiotics, history of rhet-oric, social philosophy, theory of argumentation and critical theory. He is a member of The International Association for Semiotic Studies, Semiotic Society of America and Central European Pragmatist Forum. He is also a member of the scientific committee of The International Association for Cognitive Semiotics and a member of the editorial board of The American Journal of Semiotics.
Jakub Záhora
Jakub Záhora is a researcher at the VITRI UNCE research centre at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University. In the past he held positions of visiting research-er at Hebrew University and Ben-Gurion University, Fulbright Fellow at NYU and Fritz Thyssen Postdoctoral Fellow at Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology. Záhora’s research interests cover the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, political ethnography, and critical approaches to security.