Photo courtesy of JH-A
What makes a semiotician tick? SEMIOVOX’s Josh Glenn has invited his fellow practitioners in the field of commercial semiotics, from around the world, to answer a few revealing questions.
Rouen…
SEMIOVOX
When you were a child/teen, how did your future fascination with symbols, cultural patterns, interpreting “texts,” and getting beneath the surface of daily life manifest itself?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
I wasn’t aware of my future fascination at the time, but I did always love to chat through a story from lots of different angles! This habit of wanting to think about an idea or object from multiple perspectives is a habit I’ve had since before I knew how to describe it.
SEMIOVOX
Describe your first encounter(s) with the theory and practice of semiotics.
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
I first encountered semiotics in a formal context in grad school. I completed my MA in comparative literature in Montreal. The program was heavily influenced by French traditions of literary studies and semiotics was a something everyone was trained in. I was very interested in the ability to start thinking about the back and forth of culture through thinking about it as signs, but the jargon was a bit difficult to wrap my mind around at first.
SEMIOVOX
How did you find your own way to doing semiotics?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
Semiotics became one of many methodologies I used conducting research as an academic and historian of ideas. When I aimed to move from academia to social sciences-informed consulting and market research, this practice was one from my toolbox that maintained its relevance and that I’d come to rely on with more frequency — thanks to its ability to show not only how culture works, but how we can work in turn with culture by strategically understanding signs and their meaning.
SEMIOVOX
What are the most important attributes of a good semiotician?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
An eclectic cultural background. We gain a lot of depth when we can have a broad understanding of culture because we rely on our knowledge of how cultural objets and meaning are associated with each other. I always try to emphasise, as a historian of ideas and semiotician, how cultural objects are in conversation with each other and that a big “unlock” comes when we can find and decipher that red thread that connects these signs we engage with.
SEMIOVOX
What three books about semiotics have you found the most useful and enlightening in your own work?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
It’s been a long time since I’ve sat down with a book on semiotics, since I have largely developed my practice in interdisciplinary ways, but I remember being very fond of a lot of Julia Kristeva’s work.
Much of my experience comes from a cross-over of semiotics with other disciplines, like philosophy and feminist studies. So I’ve always prefered alternative takes on what semiotics can show us about society.
SEMIOVOX
When someone asks you to describe what you do, what is your “elevator pitch”? How do you persuade a skeptical client to take a chance on using this tool?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
I often just say I’m an analyst — because at the end of the day, I’m trying to bring clarity to why we react intuitively to the world around us, and why we can make shared assumptions about it.
When I speak with clients, I focus on what we gain through semiotics and cultural analysis — where it takes us — instead of the method on its own terms. It’s the nuanced perspective and directionality that semiotics can give us that is beneficial.
SEMIOVOX
What specific sorts of semiotics-driven projects do you find to be the most enjoyable and rewarding?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
I appreciate blended, mixed-methods projects that need to understand a bigger picture. Being able to connect, or map ideas — across regions, eras, or cultural objects — requires a comparative way of looking. When we zero in on the tensions between objects, we can uncover ideas that we may not otherwise.
SEMIOVOX
What frustrates you about how semiotics is practiced and/or perceived, right now?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
I’d like semiotics to feel more down-to-earth. It can benefit from being discussed in simple terms. After all, it is simply the study of things we encounter all day, every day—which is to say, culture. We should make efforts to explain how semiotics is closer to our own everyday experiences as social beings than it might seem.
SEMIOVOX
Peirce or Saussure?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
Not an either/or in my case! I’m glad I studied both as a grad student because it adds depth to understand some prominent theories, but these are far from the only ones. I practice semiotics daily, but I don’t find myself staying close to either of their theories in practice.
SEMIOVOX
What advice would you give to a young person interested in this sort of work?
JESSICA HAMEL-AKRÉ
Think about semiotics as a tool that one has, as a type of methodology that can be used alongside and enhanced by other methods. Semiotics is one way, not the only way.
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Also see these global semio series: MAKING SENSE (Q&As) | SEMIOFEST SESSIONS (monthly mini-conferences) | COVID CODES | SEMIO OBJECTS | COLOR CODEX | DECODER (fictional semioticians) | CASE FILE | PHOTO OP | MEDIA DIET | TATTOO YOU (semioticians’ tattoos).