ABSTRACT
Signs take the form of words, images, sounds, odours, flavours, actions, events, objects, but these have no intrinsic meaning and become signs only when we invest them with meaning. References to the 'meaning' of something have two very different senses which are important for any understanding of signs. These two dimensions of meaning are conceptual meaning ('sense' or designation) and referential meaning ('reference' or denotation). Language is a symbolic sign system and it is widely seen as the pre-eminent symbolic form. Traditionally, in the theory of signs, the term 'arbitrary' refers to sign–object relations, where it is conventionally contrasted with 'natural' relations. Roman Jakobson's model represents an attempt at a synthesis of the Saussurean and Peircean models. Whereas Saussure had insisted that language is a non-material form and not a material substance, Hjelmslev's model allows us to analyse texts according to their various dimensions and to grant to each of these the potential for signification.
