ABSTRACT

In this article, I apply the notion of resemiotisation to the study of a political sign in Venezuela, to explain its salience and seemingly contradictory meanings. I focus on the sign commonly referred to as “los ojos de Chávez” (the eyes of Chávez), which was initially circulated by government officials in 2012 and has since permeated Venezuela’s landscape. Drawing on photographic data retrieved from Instagram, I track the resemiotisation trajectories of the sign, throughout time across different modalities, materials and spaces and as taken by different actors. The analysis shows that resemiotisation with its historical emphasis and comprehensive approach to language, provide a useful analytical tool for foregrounding the different historical layers of meanings present in the changing semiotic landscape of Venezuela. Yet, I argue that the understandings of materialities that the notion encompass need to be expanded to include not only the semiotic materials of which signs are made of, but also the materials on which they are inscribed.

摘要

在本文中，我将重新符号化的概念应用于委内瑞拉政治标志的研究，以解释其显着性和看似矛盾的含义。我关注通常被称为“ los ojos de Chávez”的标志”（查韦斯的眼睛），最初由政府官员于 2012 年传播，此后一直渗透到委内瑞拉的风景中。利用从 Instagram 检索到的照片数据，我追踪标志的重新符号化轨迹，贯穿不同的模式、材料和空间，并由不同的演员拍摄。分析表明，重新符号化以其历史重点和全面的语言方法，提供了一个有用的分析工具，可以突出委内瑞拉不断变化的符号学景观中存在的不同历史意义层次。然而，我认为，这个概念所包含的对物质性的理解需要扩展，不仅包括构成符号的符号材料，还包括铭刻符号的材料。