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Both adults’ habits-of-thought and their understanding of children’s stories shape how adults interpret children’s participation in conversations. In the light of the requests on children’s rights that follow from the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) this paper stresses the relevance of authorities having semiotically informed knowledge on children’s meaning-making within conversations with adults. In Article 12, the CRC stipulates the right of children to participate in and to be heard about decisions that affect their everyday lives. According to the same Article, however, these rights can be restrained, based on the authority’s judgements of the child’s age and maturity. Sociological studies have highlighted the importance of adopting the child’s perspective in judging matters that concern her. The present paper further suggests that narrow conceptualization of the sign can help one to observe different levels of meaning in adults’ and children’s conversations better. Although Paul Ricoeur did not investigate children’s narratives per se, his theory of narratives and narrativity offers a phenomenological approach to development that allows for better theoretical discriminations of narrative as a semiotic resource, and can thus assist adults in truly listening to children.

Att utforska med flera sinnen är ett naturligt sätt att närma sig sin omvärld och små barn som är förspråkliga uttrycker sig gärna via estetiska symboler. Estetik, människans utforskande av sinnliga och konstnärliga erfarenheter, marginaliseras ofta när det snarare är en central del i ett barns uppväxt. Att åter skapa utrymme för att lyfta estetikens många möjligheter kräver kunskap. Författarnas förhoppning är att pedagoger inom olika områden kommer att bli motiverade att på olika sätt lyfta fram det så berikande konstnärliga utforskandet; genom bild, form, dans och musik. Det handlar om att skapa möjligheter för alla att hitta och använda sina egna estetiska röster. Boken belyser estetikens många möjligheter, men även begränsningar inom utbildning och undervisning. Genom författarnas samlade erfarenheter inom estetisk, teoretiskt såväl som praktiskt, får läsaren ta del av en bred kunskap. Estetiska ämnen har befriande få begränsningar, som i ett exempel ur denna bok där dinosauriedans blir en spännande arena för nya kunskaper., Kapitel i antologi, Den Stökiga Estetiken, Red. Elisabeth MalmströmI kapitlet fokuseras bildens "hur". Den fysiska bildens betydelse bör inte reduceras till igenkänning av ett avbildat föremål. Förutom att bilder kan ge rika visuella beskrivningar av kända objekt eller sammanhang, kan de också frammana nya visioner för hur objekt kan förstås. Bilder har -liksom andra tecken - en "frihet" till sina objekt, och därför kan de också gestalta oväntade visioner utan att konkret påverka de avildade objekten. Detta kapitel tar sin utgångspunkt i att bilder uppvisar visuell likhet med ett avbildat objekt - men att denna likhet kan vara avvikande på många sätt medan bilden ändå uppfattas som lik., Den stökiga estetiken

This paper discusses visual metaphors and aspects of similarity in relation to metaphors. The concept of metaphor should here be understood as a semiotic unit that is also a sign (cf. Ricœur, P. 1986. The Rule of Metaphor: Multi-Disciplinary Studies of the Creation of Meaning in Language. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.). This implies that not all semiotic units are signs, but also that not all signs are typical metaphors. The metaphor is a particular kind of sign because of its making use of the openness present in similarity relations. Metaphorical meaning making is related to a quality of vagueness in iconic sign relations. Furthermore, a notion of iconic attitude is proposed as a designation of subjective and intersubjective perspectives that might be taken on meanings founded on similarity. The iconic attitude mirrors the flexibility of thought and responds to the potentiality of vagueness in iconic sign relations; but, at the same time, the iconic attitude works as a stabilizing factor for meaning. Moreover, this attitude is crucial for the specification of the similarity relation in an actual sign experience with an iconic ground.

Understanding what others mean in a communicative situation, and to be self-understood, are key factors to be able to participate in and have influence on decisions that concern oneself. This is especially important in contexts where the person who is actually affected by a decision does not have the decisive power. Such a decision situation is many times relevant in relation to decisions concerning children, children's health, education and living conditions. According to Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) children have the right to be heard in connection with decisions concerning them. The article also expresses a reservation for this right due to age and maturity of the child.In this presentation, children’s right to be heard in connection with decisions concerning them is noted. It is claimed that knowledge of children's semiotics (cf. children’s meaning making and understanding of meanings) is required in order for such rights to be met in, for example, children's conversations with adults. A starting point for the discussions is that stories and narrative descriptions are semiotic recourses which meanings partly depend on the interpreter’s perception and habit of what “story telling” is in the first place. This condition applies to both those who tell and to those who listen to someone's story.Interestingly, even if a story is perceived by both a child and an adult in a conversational situation (and thus can be expected to be effective in a communication), such beliefs - from the point of view of the adult - can also be a barrier to the fact that the adult actually understands the conversation and the situation from the child's point of view (James & Prout 1997). The adult's habit and understanding of the narrative affect his or her interpretation in the conversation. Research on children's semiotic interactions has shown that even though children from early years participate in adult communication with pictures or stories, it ta

Pictures and other visio-spatial signs with iconicity diverge in expression, and in how they operate on meaning. Like all signs, pictures are polysemous (Groupe µ 1992) and have several layers of meaning - such as being perceptual objects and signs, having pragmatic and contextual meanings etc. (Medin et al 1993; Tversky 1977). Pictures also rely on iconic meaning (Sonesson 1989). Similarity is a predominant feature in iconic signs – however similarity is not a single kind of relationship. The relevance of similarities differs. Sometimes, but not always, perception of similarities is tightly coupled to the conception of a sign relation. Important in this presentation, is the point that via the sign relation one may gain insight into structurally different organizations of similarity relations. A concept of Iconic Attitude (Lenninger 2019) is presented and discussed as a Phenomenal outlook that responds to the qualities in the iconic ground and thus may “manifest” a visual generalization in a specific sign perception. Goodman, N. 1972. Seven strictures on similarity. In Problems and projects, 437–446. Indianapolis/New York: Bobbs-Merrill. Groupe µ (1992). Traité du signe visuel. Pour une rhétorique de l'image. Paris: Seuil. Medin, D. L, Goldstone, R. L., & Gentner, D. (1993). Respects for Similarity. Psychological Review, 100(2), 254-278. Lenninger, S. (2019). The metaphor and the iconic attitude. Cognitive Semiotics, 12(1). Sonesson, G. (1989). Pictorial Concepts: inquiries into the semiotic heritage and its relevance to the interpretation of the visual world. Lund University Press: Lund. Tversky. A. (1977). Features of similarity. Psychological Review, 84(4), 327-352.

Studies in children’s understanding of visual metaphor. A literature review from a cognitive semiotic perspective Sara Lenninger, Kristianstad University The use of metaphor is pervasive in human communication (Stites & Özçaliskan, 2012). However, in the literature there are many ways to define metaphors (e.g. Black 1954; Kirby 1997; Gibbs 2008). In this paper, the metaphor will be considered to be a sign, and in addition, as an instance of iconic sign use. This means, firstly, that metaphor is studied as a meaning construction based in a sign relation. In this context, a sign relation consists of something perceived as an expression for something else, which also is conceived as its corresponding meaning or “content” (Sonesson 2008). As a consequence, a sign relation always involves an interpreting subject. Secondly, it means that iconic relations are crucial to the definition of what the metaphor is. Consequently, the concept of iconic signs has to be explored. This is why developmental studies on metaphor use (and understanding) link to cognitive theories on metaphor thinking (Billow, 1975; Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Kogan et al., 1980) and to semiotic theories of meaning relations and sign use. Children’s understanding of pictorial metaphor is a field of research which has received less study than, notably, verbal metaphors. Nevertheless, the present paper will review studies on children’s development of metaphor use departing from different approaches on what metaphor is, and with particular attention to pictorial metaphors. Black, M. (1954). Metaphor. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, New Series.55 (1954-1955), 273-294. Billow, R. (1975). A Cognitive Developmental Study of Metaphor Comprehension. Developmental psychology, 11(4), 415-423. Gibbs, R. W. (red.) (2008). The Cambridge handbook of metaphor and thought. New York: Cambridge University Press Kirby, J. (1997). Aristotle on Metaphor. The American Journal of Philology, 118(4), 517-554. Kogan

In preschool, and at home, pictures and movie are often used to communicate with children about states in the lived world. They are all media with perceptual similarity in relation to their references. In this presentation it is suggested, however, that indexicality, in the sense of a contiguity connecting visual events so as to form meaningful sequences in time and space, is the important factor rather than variations of iconicity, for the younger children's understanding of visually communicated information as information about the actual world.

On the 14th of January in 2004, Reem Raiyshi killed herself and four Israeli soldiers in a terrorist attack at a border crossing between Israel and Gaza. Soon after the deed, pictures on Reem and her young son were sent to media agencies in Europe - and to circulate on the Internet. Although the picture of Reem is her picture, it is not unique but forms part of a subculture: the ceremonial of the suicide bombers seemed, at that time, to require the pictorial rendering of the perpetrator/victim in his or her declaration of the action before completing the act. Published on Internet, and circulating in mass media, the picture addresses not only the Ego culture of the perpetrator /victim, but also that of the attacked culture. To come into speaking terms with the external culture - or to alter between being "alien" or to be "one of ones own” for teh other – one must submit to a meaning already known by the other culture (Lotman 2009). To insert “alien” elements, integrated with the meaning taken for granted, can be understood as a strategy in pictorial rhetoric in order to evade norm grounded predictability and invert cultural hierarchies.This case study adds to the complication of when the same picture confirming both to the status of Ego culture and as the “threat” of an intruding other-culture in the dynamics of regulating the perception of “us and them”.

Pictures have not evolved as isolated phenomena in human culture, but occupy their place and contribute to changes in the complex and intricate processes we in this book designate as cultural evolution. In this chapter, pictures are discussed as semiotic resources from a perspective of human cultural evolution. The material picture (the picture-thing) is examined both as a perceptual object, and as a communicative resource. An assumption in this chapter is that the discrimination of the picture as a communicative resource had (and may still have) a vital, but also distinct, role in the human endeavour to explore sign relationships. Its distinctiveness does not consist in being the original or the prior semiotic resource in relation to other semiotic resources developed in human communication. Rather, its specific role derives from the combination of visual and communicative meanings employed in pictures, having recourse to the inherent qualities of “natural meaning”, but at the same time not being mere “natural experience”.

Special sections in Cognitive Development: Semiotic and cognitive development in human evolution

In a study on young infants’ susceptibility to synchronic behaviours in dyadic interactions with others the children’s responses indicated tolerance in their interpretation of the situation. When 6 months old infants encountered a communicative other who did not match to the infants’ communicative behaviours the young infants nevertheless remained focused on the interaction. Moreover, the infants made efforts to intervene and take action in the communicative event. An increasing number of studies support the assumption that dyadic, dynamic and mutual interactions can be traced in communicative and affective relations between caregivers and infants from early infancy (Beebe et al 1985, Bråthen 2009, Stern 1985, Rochat 2009, Trevarthen & Murray 1985). According to Murray and Trevarthen (1985) already 6 -12 weeks old infants detect and respond to structural features in the caretaker’s behaviour in such a way that the caretaker, in its turn, is evoked to respond with a matching behaviour. When the infants are between 2-4 months old stable sequences characterize parent-infant face-to-face dyads (Levelli & Fogel 2002). Together, the studies indicate that at the age of 6 months children can be expected to have expectations on the behaviour of the other in communication games. Further, these expectations influence the child’s participation and understanding of the event. When studying semiotic development in young children not only developmental aspects of growing children should be examined but also the means by which children encounter meaning and communication. In my presentation, the dyadic interaction in our study will be analysed in respect of the dynamic potentialities that are framed in communication games with young infants., Ytterligare finansiär: Lunds Universitet

Contagious yawning has been reported for humans, dogs and several non-human primate species, and associated with empathy in humans and other primates. Still, the function, development and underlying mechanisms of contagious yawning remain unclear. Humans and dogs show a developmental increase in susceptibility to yawn contagion, with children showing an increase around the age of four, when also empathy-related behaviours and accurate identification of others' emotions begin to clearly evince. Explicit tests of yawn contagion in non-human apes have only involved adult individuals and examined the existence of conspecific yawn contagion. Here we report the first study of heterospecific contagious yawning in primates, and the ontogeny of susceptibility thereto in chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes verus. We examined whether emotional closeness, defined as attachment history with the yawning model, affected the strength of contagion, and compared the contagiousness of yawning to nose-wiping. Thirty-three orphaned chimpanzees observed an unfamiliar and familiar human (their surrogate human mother) yawn, gape and nose-wipe. Yawning, but not nose-wiping, was contagious for juvenile chimpanzees, while infants were immune to contagion. Like humans and dogs, chimpanzees are subject to a developmental trend in susceptibility to contagious yawning, and respond to heterospecific yawn stimuli. Emotional closeness with the model did not affect contagion. The familiarity-biased social modulatory effect on yawn contagion previously found among some adult primates, seem to only emerge later in development, or be limited to interactions with conspecifics. The influence of the 'chameleon effect', targeted vs. generalised empathy, perspective-taking and visual attention on contagious yawning is discussed.

The general goal of this thesis is to elucidate children’s early understandings of pictorial meanings, and how one can know anything about them. My central aim is to explore how picture comprehension develops during children’s first 3 years of life, through semiotic-theory-derived analyses of meaning relations. In so doing, I hope to contribute to the study of both semiotic theory’s psychological basis and the role of semiotic processes in cognitive development: specifically, in children’s experiences of pictorial meanings. In an experimental object retrieval test, including pictures, I show the importance of studying concrete instances of children’s experiences. Among its key results is that, for a group of children who are close to the threshold of being able to use the picture to solve the retrieval task, indexical cuing assists their understanding. One central claims is that the picture sign reflects a dual semiotic process: on the one hand, picture understanding relies on recognition of perceptual similarities; on the other, it draws on communicative processes that are intrinsic to all sign constructions. This duality is particularly interesting when it comes to looking at children’s development of picture understanding. Through similarity relations, children perceive accurate – but initially private, and semiotically premature – understanding of pictures. At the same time though, children are alert to communicative meanings from the start., Språk, gester och bilder i ett semiotiskt utvecklingsperspektiv, Centrum för kognitiv semiotik

The general goal of this thesis is to elucidate children’s early understandings of pictorial meanings, and how one can know anything about them. My central aim is to explore how picture comprehension develops during children’s first 3 years of life, through semiotic-theory-derived analyses of meaning relations. In so doing, I hope to contribute to the study of both semiotic theory’s psychological basis and the role of semiotic processes in cognitive development: specifically, in children’s experiences of pictorial meanings. In an experimental object retrieval test, including pictures, I show the importance of studying concrete instances of children’s experiences. Among its key results is that, for a group of children who are close to the threshold of being able to use the picture to solve the retrieval task, indexical cuing assists their understanding. One central claims is that the picture sign reflects a dual semiotic process: on the one hand, picture understanding relies on recognition of perceptual similarities; on the other, it draws on communicative processes that are intrinsic to all sign constructions. This duality is particularly interesting when it comes to looking at children’s development of picture understanding. Through similarity relations, children perceive accurate – but initially private and incomplete – understanding of pictures. At the same time though, children are alert to communicative meanings from the start.