Transitional Perspective

           Discussing  the  post-modernity issues of design nowadays need to have a deep exclusions to the old terminologies and approaches. Further more, the main dilemma of the post-modernist architects was the content of  the modernist architects in the designing process. The post-modernist  tried to redefine the problem behind the reason of the modernist architects failure. The solution for this problem was through Semiology and Semiotics which is: the study of signs. They were appeared with two foundations:

1-First, appeared by the Swiss theorist Ferdinand de Saussure's Course of General Linguistics in aposthumous publication at 1916. He made his own rule by dividing the meaning into two main terms:

A.    Language

B.      Speech

Ferdinand defined them as a circle that is operating through conventional signs and meanings. Ferdinand de Saussure's named his rule as a Semiology the study of signs.

2-Second, appeared by the American philosopher Charles Sanders Pierce around the turn of the twentieth century, he postulate a logical study of language then he named it Semiotics.

3-Third, Charles W. Morris a professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago was against Ferdinand de Saussure's rule coordination and organization, then Morris proposed in his foundation of the theory of signs in 1938, a threefold term of  linguistic analysis by classifying the field into the domain of the threefold terms:

A.    Syntactics

B.      Semantics

C.    Pragmatics

Then Morris made a definition for each area:

A.    Syntactics : Relations of signs to one another

B. Semantics : Relations of signs to their meanings (as an architectural interest area, which will be concentrate later on the meaning of forms)

C.    Pragmatics : Relations of  signs to their interpreters

The question is how they are related to architectural meaning ?

The answer will be through Morris Semantics area,  by making an extension that will be later on related to the architectural circles by dividing Semantics into three categories:

A.    Indices

B.      Icons

C.    Symbols

Then Morris made a definition for each categories:

A.     Indices : Indication point to their meaning ,such as street signs for example

B.      Icons : Exhibit properties of the content to which they refer

C.  Symbols : Arbitrary or culturally established signs such as using the Doric columns on a bank to designate the strength and security of the financial institution for example.

Moreover, how it is connected to architecture by the relation and the connection of the famous movement which is the "New Bauhaus"movement in Chicago which was found in 1937 by the Chicago Association of Arts and Industries,  Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, recent refugee to the united states.  Then semantics Morris theory was rapidly bandied at 1960's in the architectural field. After that, they found the linguistic theory which is included Structuralism, post-structuralism and deconstruction. A movements which presents the new era of the post-modern architecture through the Semiotics language which were a new sign system with a dimension of structure (syntactic) and one of meaning (semantic). Structural relationships bind the signs and their components (signifier/signified ) together.
How can we understand architecture through meaning is by (form/content):

A.    Type

B.      Function

C.    Tectonics

That terms can be connected and related  the Master of the Architects whom is Vitruvian points of a utopian architecture:

A.    Delight (beauty or ideal form)

B.      Commodity (utility or accommodation)

C.    firmness (durability)

       Finally, through the semantic study of environment, we can discover the means of the discoursing in our building. Then, language becomes the key factor that have the power to construct our structure perfectly.

Vs

World Trade Center PATH Station by Calatrava

Mishal Al Musaileekh

Nesbitt, Kate (ED) (1996). Chapter II, Theorizing a new Agenda for architecture: An anathology of architectural theory;Princton Architectural Press, NY.