Analyzing Websites

5Social Semiotic Approach of Press Websites: Genesis of a Method

Alexandra SAEMMER¹ and Nolwenn TRÉHONDART²

¹ CEMTI, Université Paris 8 Vincennes-Saint-Denis, France

² CREM, Université de Lorraine, Metz, France

5.1. Introduction

For several years (Saemmer 2017; Saemmer and Tréhondart 2020), we have been involved in the development of a social semiotic approach of cultural and media productions (press images, television series, press websites, etc.). Our framework is rooted in pragmatic semiotics, taking an analytical method that includes, on the one hand, the material characteristics of signs, and on the other hand, the central role of the subject who perceives and interprets these characteristics. It raises a certain number of methodological difficulties when taking into account the way in which the mediating role of the subject operates, which plays the role of an “instance of junction between sign and sign” (Fabbri 2008, p. 114) and raises a number of methodological difficulties. Some semiotics respond by assuming an immanentist based on the constraints related to the reception text, which the analyst has circumscribed. Other semiotics favor the juxtaposition of different points of view gathered on the field. But the expert’s outlook is often a kind of overhead view, as it pretends to reveal the material characteristics of the object that are not spotted by average viewers. In both cases, the way in which points of view are constructed in a semiotic situation is not central ...