ABSTRACT
We will here use the term image in a tightly restricted sense. Visuals in general
are often referred to as “images,” but we intend the term, in its technical sense,
to designate visuals reflecting the actual physical appearance of objects. Images
may be largely decorative, but they also inherently evoke certain indicative
properties, in that, in Peircean terms, they are one step down, in the direction of
indicative purpose as shown in Figure 2 and Figure 4 in the Introduction. Each
image tends to provoke viewers to actively reference some specific object or
kind of object in the domain of discourse. This passage by Sedlack, Shwom, and
Keller (2006) denotes image (here, a picture) as one type of specifically decor-
ative visual that references kinds of objects (in this case, healthy people) rather
than specific individuals:
Because contemporary usage of the term image covers a wide range of visuals,
we need to be specific about what images will refer to in the Peircean typology.
Taking the various dictionary definitions of image (e.g., the first seven entries
from Dictionary.com), we specify that definitions 1, 2, 4, and 6 below follow
our technical definition, but definitions 3, 5, and 7 (boldface next page) are not
sufficiently precise.
