week3:Semiotics

Semiotics in Propaganda posters of China Cultural Revolution

Semiotics is a widely used in different mediums because it is a very good way for the text to be interpreted and understood. According to Robert Scholes(1982:15), “As a text, however, a piece of writing must be understood as the product of a person or persons, at a given point in human history, in a given form of discourse, taking its meanings from the interpretive gestures of individual readers using the grammatical, sematic, and cultural codes available to them.” Likewise, semiotics can be employed in images as well. Roland Barthes (cited in Stokes, Janes, 2003:73) states 7 stages in a semiotics analysis, which I find it is very useful. The stages are “Define your object of analysis, gather the texts, describe the texts, interpret the texts, draw out the culture codes, make generalizations and make conclusion. Following this process, we can conduct a semiotic analysis logically.

There was a cultural revolution in China in 1970s. At that time, the society is overwhelmed with Maoism. It could be reflected in propaganda posters.

Figure 1

Figure 1 is the object I’m going to analyze. It is a propaganda posters at that time.

Signs: Chairman Mao,people who come from different countries and the sun.

Denotation: At sunrise, People who come from different countries gather together. They are holding the Red Book happily and Chairman Mao is smiling to them.

The syntax of this ad is very interesting. Chairman is placed in the middle and a huge sun is behind him, which makes him outstanding in the whole image. As you can also notice, the size of Chairman Mao’s figure is 10 times bigger that the figures of civilians. Therefore, the position of and the size of the sign in this image connotes that Chairman Mao is respectable and his leadership cannot be replaced by anyone else. The sign of the rising sun connotes that the leadership of Chairman Mao may bring us a bright future. What’s more, the slogan “毛主席是世界革命人民心中最红最红的太阳”(meaning: Chairman Mao is the reddest sun in people’s heart.) accompanying the image makes this propaganda ad more expressive.

However, if you don’t understand the cultural codes at that time, you may no know what I’m talking about. Chairman Mao is a very respectable leader in China. He made great contribution to China’s independence. People who suffered a lot before independence were all grateful to him. Maoism had become the mainstream ideology at that time and people were even crazy about it. They believed everything what Chairman Mao said and do everything Chairman Mao suggested to do. That’s why in this ad, the figure in this ad is much larger than others and is placed in the centre. This kind of political propaganda posters is a good tool for Chairman Mao to propagandize Maoism among civilians and enhance his leadership in China at that time.

References:

1.      Robert S.(1982).Semiotics and Interpretation. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.pp.15

2.      Stokes,J.(2003).Semiotics.How to do media and culture studies. London:Publications.pp.70-73