Introduction
One of the basic concepts in semiotics has to do with the sign as an instrument of communication. The sign, it is argued, is composed of two parts: meaning (content) and form (expression). They co-exist. They form the basis for human communication. If one has a meaning and no form, that meaning is ineffable. It cannot be shared without a form. Similarly, if one has a form with no meaning, that form lies beyond human comprehension.
This linking of meaning and form has been traditionally assumed to co-exist within a language form. In this framework, they occupy the same mental space but exist on different planes. The signified (meaning) was located on the content plane and the signified (form) was found on the expression plane (Saussure, 1974).
The first major problem with the concept of the sign is that it is located within the same mental space. Louis Hjelmslev (1969) was well aware of this problem and he argued that they should be relegated to different planes. He argued that the signified (meaning) was located on the content plane and the signified (form) was found on the expression plane. Such a dyadic definition of the sign places it totally within the realms of meaning (epistemology) and form (ontology). Ferdinand de Saussure, it should be noted, treated the sign as a mental object. He allowed forms to exist within the mind but not as physical objects. In this regard, he has omitted the realm of ontology from his model. His forms were mental objects.
Such a model of semiotics limits sign systems only to epistemology and does not account for ontological signs. In such a model, symbols are grounded as mental objects and not as physical objects. These assumptions merit re-investigation. The meaning, it is argued in this reanalysis, should belong to the realm of epistemology and the form should belong to the realm of ontology. This was the rationale behind glossematics (Hjelmslev, 1969). The relationship between epistemology and ontology can also be found in a reformulation in the triadic concept of the sign proposed by Peirce (1992). More will be said about this later. What was implicit in the writings of Hjelmslev was the claim that the concept of the sign needed to be reformulated. This shift involves moving from linguistic planes to philosophical realms.
THE REALMS OF MEANING AND FORM
By moving away from the sign as a semiological unit, one moves into the sign as a philosophical concept. Content is no longer situated in the plane of content, but it is now part of an epistemological system. Form is no longer located on the semiological plane but is now part of the study of all human forms (ontology). Hence, the sign needs to be reformulated with in this new context. If one were to leave the reformulation of the sign as merely the connection of form and meaning, it would not explain other aspects of semiotics that needs to be discussed, viz., the concept of the interpretant (Peirce, 1955). The best way of introducing this is by considering a far more interesting model of social semiotics, the model of Berger and Luckmann (1966) on their theory of the social construction of reality.
This dichotomy is inherent in the work on reality construction. It is the assumption behind the social construction of culture (Berger and Luckmann, 1966).
The Social Construction of Reality
The social construction of reality by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann (1966) characterizes a sociological concept that was slowly emerging among European scholars. However, it was Berger and Luckmann who not only articulated the new paradigm but coined the terms that are characteristically associated with this movement. One of the major premises of this new school of thought is that knowledge is socially constructed. They argued, for example, that what one considers to be real in one culture may not be so in another. What is real to an American businessman may not be seen as real, for example, to a Buddhist monk. Each of these individuals has constructed different social realities. They went on to went on to demonstrate that these social values were constructed through several concomitant sociological processes (externalization, reification, and internalization).
They noted that ideas, thoughts, and feelings cannot be shared with others unless they are first externalized through language. A thought without a form is ineffable. Meanings must have a form or pattern of existence in order to be shared with others. Once ideas, thoughts, and feelings are encoded into a language, they become objectified or reified. They exist as objects or things outside of the speakers who produced them. It is interesting to note that most linguists only study this aspect of language, viz., dictionary meanings and grammatical rules. Finally, linguistic codes exist in a social context among members of a speech community and these coded forms influence them. Once this happens, the social and cultural language patterns are internalized.
Berger and Luckmann created this model of simultaneous processes because they noted that the leading linguistic models only focused on linguistic codes. What is important about their model is that it establishes a relationship between meaning and form and it implies a resolution of the dichotomy between epistemology (knowledge structures) and ontology (world of things). This model also accounts for the traidic sign proposed by Peirce (1992) in which an the content of a sign is split into two parts: one is connected to an object in the real world (ontology) and the other is connect to the effect of the sign in the mind of a potential interpreter (Noth, 1995).
The dynamic interaction between the externalizing of epistemological markers of feeling, ideas, and concepts and the internalization of ontological markers (indices, icons, emerge as socio-cultural practices. They constitute reality-loops in that they form bonds between epistemic signs that are externalized as ontological forms and vice versa. Something that is socially constructed and participates in reality-loops is considered to be experientially real. In the philosophy of structural communication meanings are externalized and expressed as ontological forms. These same forms are also interpreted and internalized as epistemic signs. What is important about these reality-loops is that they involve both form and content. One cannot exist without the other. Ontological signs are created during the process of semiosis (sign-making). During the process of structural hermeneutics (sign-interpretation), already existing signs are provided meaning when they are integrated into an established epistemological system. The former is characteristically associated with the creation of ontological signs and the latter with epistemological signs. Hence, there are two kinds of social and cultural relations associated with signs. One is associated with the structure of meaning (epistemology) and the other can be found as the expression of ideas as forms (ontology).
The process of taking meanings and making them into tangible and visible forms (language, art, architecture, music, dance, and social behavior) is called Structural Semiosis. Once a form has been externalized, it exsists as an ontological marker (index, icon, or symbol), At this stage, it is objectified and is treated as an object. The reverse process of taking objects and assigning meaning to them is known as structural hermeneutics. These patterns of externalization and internalization form reality-loops. Together, they constitute the social construction of reality (St. Clair, 2006). There are a myriad of such reality-loops that make up the culture of the mind (epistemolgoy) and the culture of material form (ontology). It is this dynamic interaction between the two realms (epistemology and ontology) that was the focus of activity theory (Leontiev, 1979). It was the connection of the ego pole of the self to the object pole of reality that was the focus of the phenomenology of Husserl (1980). Reality-loops affirm cognitive interaction with the human environment. They create ontological markers through the externalization of concepts and develop knowledge frameworks in the process of internalizing them. This activity creates a bond between the subjective realm of epistemology and the objective realm of ontology. However, the interpretant in this model differs from that of Peirce in that an interpretant is required in structural semiosis (from meanings to objects) and another interpretant is involved in the process of structural hermeneutics (from object to meaning).
The Duality of Sign Functions
As noted above, there are two functions associated with signs that have been overlooked in sign theory. One has to do with the creation of signs from meanings (Structural Semiosis). The other has to do with the assignment of meanings to forms (structural hermeneutics). Both of these are signs. They are not structurally the same. They do not have the same properties nor do they have the same function.
| Structural Semiosis | Structural Hermeneutics | |
| Function | to take meaning and provide it with an ontological form. |
To take an ontological form and provide it with meaning |
| Property | semiosis | interpretation |
| Transition | from meaning to form | from form to meaning |
| Mapping | from the epistemological realm to the ontological realm | from the ontological realm to the epistemological realm |
One can best understand how these systems operate by considering the difference between two sociological theories: symbolic interactionism (Blumer, 1969; Adler and Adler, 1980) and ethnomethodology (Garfinkel, 1967; Mehan and Wood, 1975). When Blumer (1969) coined the term "symbolic interactionism" he used it to demonstrate how people act toward things based on the meaning those things have for them. He also noted that these meanings are derived from social interaction and modified through interpretation. What is important about this concept is for the purpose of renovating sign theory is that it is housed within the realm of epistemology. Symbolic interactionism has to do with meanings and meaning systems. Wheter one is creating forms from meaning or interpreting forms in order to assign them meaning, the focus is, nevertheless, on meaning. Ethnomethodology, on the other hand, is concerned with the procedures by which that social order is produced, and shared. It has to do with the meaningful, patterned, and orderly character of everyday life. Itis is something that one must work to achieve and this means that one has a method for doing so. Hence, ethnomethodology belongs to the realm of ontology.
| Symbolic Interactionism | Ethnomethodology | |
| Realm | Epistemological | Ontological |
| System | Meaning | Social Practices tied to ontological markers |
| Function | How meanings function within an epistemological system | How practices within the sociology of everyday life function within an ontological system |
What is important about this dichotomy between meaning systems and social practices is that the study of culture exists within and across these two realms. One cannot describe a culture only from an epistemological perspective. It must include the objects, things, behaviors, and social patterns created by that culture.
A system of meanings based on signs is the original meaning of the dyadic sign of Saussure (1974). With the addition of the ontological realm, one can map an epistemological system into objects in the ontological realm. This is the rationale behind material cultures. Hence, one can describe a culture in terms of its system of meanings as well of its system of social practices, cultural artifacts, and social scripts. The problem with such a systemic analysis, however, takes on a very different concept of system when signs function not as exosemiotic processes but as endosemiotic processes (Gudwin, 1996). What one finds in endosemiotic processes are closed systems in which communication takes place between the compontents of the system through a system of signs. This system could be a mathematical system (Gudwin, 2002), a computational system (Gudwin, 1996), an organizational system (Van Heusen and Jorna, 2002), or a biosemiological system (Barbieri, 2003). Endosemiotic systems differ substantially from exosemiotic systems in their mapping functions.
It is now time to consider how the concept of self form reality-loops. It is by means of reality-loops that the two realms are integrated as sign systems.
Reality-Loops
As noted earlier, the concept of reality-loops is characteristically associated with a structural philosophy of communication. The processes of Externalization and Internalization espoused by Berger and Luckmann (1966) have been revised and recodified. The process of taking meanings and externalizing them into tangible and visible forms (language, art, architecture, music, dance, and social behavior) begins with Structural Semiosis. Once a form has been externalized, it exsists as an ontological sign. It is objectified and becomes associated with ontology as an entity within a system of entities. The reverse process of taking objects and internalizing them by assigning meaning to them begins as structural hermeneutics. Hence, both structural semiosis and structural hermeneutics are part of an internal system of signs referred to as the structural philosophy of communication. These patterns of externalization and internalization are established as bonds of practical consciuousness, they form reality-loops. Together, they constitute the social construction of reality. This is what was implied in the concept of significant symbols by George Herbert Mead. Some of the major differences between his concept and that of reality-loops is that his model was based on a positivist treatment of language and they were not fully articulated within a system of communication as being espoused in this essay. What is socially or culturally real is that which has been socially constructed to interface with the onological realm and the navigation and the negotiation of meanings in that realm is profundly related to the epistemological realm. There are a myriad of such reality-loops that make up the culture of the mind (epistemolgoy) and the culture of material form (ontology).
THE STRUCTURE OF CULTURAL CHANGE
Reality-Loops change over time. How they change and where they change is the focus of this essay on the structural philosophy of communication. The major components of change occur over time and within a cultural space. These are always theoretically linked because space grows and develops in time. In the model of linear time, this linkage is based on the linear movement of time over space (St. Clair, 2006). What is missing from this temporal linear model is how cultural space changes over time. A resolution to this problem can be found in the insightful theories in the work of Foucault. In the Archeology of Knowledge (Foucault, 1969), he presents cultural space as the sedimentation of layers historical space over time. A modification of this metaphor can be found in the sedimentation theory of time in space which envisions time as the accumulation of social practices layered in cultural space. In other words, it differs from the linear model of time in that it argues that time is embedded in space: the present is embedded in the cultural past and the future is embedded in the cultural present. What is important about this framework of the sedimentation of time is that it accounts for many contemporary cultural constructs such as globalization and modernization. This investigation explains how cultural functions within several of the contexts space: colonialism, cultural habitus (Bourdeiu, 1977, 1990), global expansions, modernization, social scripts (St. Clair, Thomé-Williams, and Su, 2005), social structuration (Giddens, 1984) and mass media culture as the new-social-reality (Mehan and Wood, 1975). In essence, it claims that cultural change involves the retaining of some cultural practices along with the modification, revision, and re-invention of events in the co-present. Just as the present is embedded in the past, the future is embedded in the present.
Linear Time |
Sedimentary Time |
Time is based on movement over space |
Time is embedded into strata of previous time. The present is embedded in the past; the future is embedded in the present |
Space does not change; only time changes. The present is separated from the past and the future. |
Both space and time change and are evidenced as vertical strata. The present emerges from the reconstruction of the past. |
There are four possible models of linear time. In two of them, time moves in space (the future approaches the present); in the others people move in space and time remains immobile (one approaches the future). The direction of time is horizontal and linear |
Space is the container of time. The present is embedded in the past; the future is embedded in the present. The direction of time is vertical. |
THE SEDIMENTATION OF CULTURAL SPACE
Defining culture is a difficult task because it brings into play so many different perspectives and one of the greatest dynamics has to do with change, a parameter that is the motivating force behind the Stratificational theory of time and space. There are many models of change, but one of the most influential models of change can be found in the work of Thomas Kuhn (1964; 1971). In this work, he argued that theoretical models of physics undergo structural changes from normal science to revolutionary science. Although this model of change accounts for the motivation of change in the natural sciences, viz., problem solving, it does not meet provide much insight into other aspects of the phenomena of change, especially cultural change.
It is in the context of this model, that the concept of cultural emergence is investigated and discussed. It is argued that the present is constantly being socially constructed to make sense of a plethora of daily routines that constitutive the sociology of everyday life. These routines are integrated into the sociology of everyday life by individuals and this integration results in a sense of being centered and connected to the world. Many daily routines, however, are not integrated and left unresolved.
It is argued that in the context of the emerging-present (co-present), new levels of consciousness are raised and this leads to the creation of new perspectives and new forms of knowledge. This information is integrated into the emerging-present of those who share in these new experiences. When they are integrated into the daily experiences of individuals, they are also socially enforced by maintenance rituals and centered through meaning social interactions involving symbolic maintenance.
THE CO-PRESENT
When the present is emerging into a new level of consciousness, the co-present, it may come into conflict with many of the more established patterns of the past. These conflicts must be resolved. They are usually accommodated by redefining the past in order for it to make sense in the cultural present. The redefinition of the past is part of Kuhn’s theory of scientific revolutions. After the new revolutionary science develops as the new reigning paradigm for a scientific community, the old patterns of thought are redefined in the context of this new framework. The past is re-presented into a new model of the present. It is taken out of its old context and placed into a new one. The result is a structured form of historical anachronism, a historical discontinuity.
Why is the study of cultural emergence important? It is important because cultural change is a constantly occurring phenomenon. The study of culture is not an established pronouncement of what happened in the past. It is not a body of knowledge that has been defined by cultural experts as a super-organic entity. Culture is dynamic. It has to do with sets of practices that change and redefines itself from one generation to the next. It creates a new-present and the new-future while redefining its past (old-present). This new future is a directional marker. It merely identifies the new forces that are taking place in the present and that assumed to continue to take place in the future. In order to make a transition into this new-future, the old past has to be redefined. It must be broken down and reorganized so that it can be understood in the cultural present. It must be made to fit into the new configuration of the present.
In order to explain the nature of the cultural dynamics outlined above, there are several concepts that need to be introduced and developed within the context of cultural emergence. These concepts include the archeology of knowledge, the concept of re-presentation, the structure of scientific revolutions, zones of proximal development, structuration, structuration, and the process of re-writing the past in order to make sense of the present.
EXPLAINING THE DYNAMICS OF CULTURAL CHANGE
The traditional way of explaining change can be found in linguistic structuralism. It is assumed within that framework that change occurs when one steady-state of knowledge is replaced by a new steady-state. Examples of this approach can be found in historical linguistics where a steady-state of the later past, Old English, developed into a steady-state of the more recent past, Middle English. This is followed by the steady-state of the present, Modern English. How does the movement from one state to the other take place? The answer to this question is described ex post facto by describing the sound changes that took place within the transition from one steady-state to the other. These laws are presented as the reason for the changes that occurred. The problem with this account is that it omits a discussion of the many epistemic ruptures (Foucault, 1969) that motivated those changes.
As noted earlier, Kuhn (1974) developed a theory of scientific revolutions within the natural sciences. Once again, his model of change is based on paradigm shifts from one steady-state (normal science) to another (revolutionary science) Kuhn argues that problem solving is the rationale for scientific change. When certain anomalies occur within a scientific discipline, this prompts the scientific community to engage in a quest to resolve those problems. There is a period of open discussion and debate (a period of crises) followed by the discovery of a workable solution in which a new paradigm emerges (period of scientific revolution). Within the historiography of the discipline, these transitions are seen as scientific events and are treated as historical discontinuities. Foucault (1969) considered these periods of events to be distortions of the historical record.
Within the humanities, models of structural change are not met with favor. There are several reasons for this. Although scientific paradigms may go unchanged for decades, events within modern culture are undergoing rapid change. The cultural present is immersed in a wide range of social, economic, and technical changes. The old method of defining a culture by containing it within the borders of a nation-state no longer holds. Modern technology has enabled cultural events to readily transcend national boarders. Many modern cultures are involved in the process of global exchange and this has resulted in complex patterns of cultural hybridity (Nederveen Pieterse, 2004). Not only are cultural patterns and belief systems exchanged, borrowed, or incorporated within each nation-state, but large masses of individuals have entered into an economic diaspora where they live and work in other countries as expatriates. Hence, culture can no longer be envisioned as a steady-state phenomenon defined over time. It is far more dynamic. It is constantly being redefined by a plethora of social and cultural forces within a cultural space and this space is no longer clearly defined by the borders of a nation-state. The forces of modernization have transcended local borders (Wallterstein, 2005). All countries are either engaged in or influenced by a Capitalist World-economic system (Wallerstein, 1977; 1980; 1989).
Model of Change |
Re-presentation of Change |
The parameters of Space |
Structural Concept of Change |
A system of ideas changes over time. The model is static. It accounts for changes from one period of homeostasis to another. |
Concepts occur over time. Cultural space is not accounted for. |
Archeological Concept of Change |
Human practices are documented over time within the same geographical space |
Modern space is superimposed over older layers of space over time |
Sedimentation Concept of Change |
The layers of the past are not separated from the layers of the present. They are connected within the collective consciousness of those living in the co-present. |
Many layers of the past remain in the present. The past never dies. It is redefined, modified, or reinvented to fit the contexts of the co-present. |
NEWLY EMERGENT-REALITIES
How do newly emergent-realties emerge from within a steady-state model? For example, how did these emergent structures arise from normal science within a scientific discipline? These mechanisms of change occur within the period of crises. What is important about the transition from normal science to revolutionary science is the fact that new structures emerge from the process of one paradigm shift to another. These structures are either a recombination of old structures or a re-presentation of old structures. This means that the past never dies. It can and does undergo one of several changes; while undergoing these changes, the past embedded within a new context where it is restructured, re-presented, or reinvented. This means that after the new paradigm of revolutionary science is established, the older form of normal science was re-written from the perspective of the new paradigm. This is not a radical phenomenon. Scientific textbooks also revise history and present information from the perspective of the new paradigm (Kuhn, 1962). The old structures undergo a transformation. They are elements of an embedded past that are reconstructed into a new component within the newer paradigm. Once these redefined units are introduced into the realm of revolutionary science, they come to designate a different level of consciousness within the present. They become part of the new-present.
The past and the present interact in the co-present. The past never dies. It is either accepted within the new structural configuration of the present (the new-past) or it is modified or redefined within the contexts of the present (the new-present). Ideas, concepts, beliefs, and practices may also be reinvented as newly emergent-realities. These provide the epistemological framework for the structuration of the future. The past remains as an active epistemological force that constitutes the present. The present is embedded in the past. It is redefined, modified in the co-present. Those aspects of the co-present that have been reinvented constitute the future, a newly emergent-reality. Hence, the present is embedded in the past; the future is embedded in the present.
The co-present contains the habitus of the past and the “newly emergent-realities” of the future. The co-present is where the phenomenon of change takes place. It is where the older structures are re-presented into new entities, the new-past and the new-present. Why does the past need to be restructured into different entities? It is because the contexts characteristically associated with the past have changed. When the present is embedded within the past, it brings into play new connotations and new associations that have to do with the co-present. The past has been re-contextualized. These re-presentations are important when they have been connected in a different way with the newly deposited layer of the co-present. In this case they are associated the context of a new level of consciousness. In the process of creating a co-present reality of structures within a paradigmatic shift, these re-presentations of the past may undergo further change. They are either brought into the co-present as an unmodified structure (the past) and remain within the habitus of the co-present realm or they are endowed with a heightened level of change that its presence demands that the past be redefined (the new-past).
The past |
This is the past that belongs to an older paradigm. It is the past that is associated with what happened before it was brought into contact with the co-present. It is also the past associated with the unconsciousness |
The old-past |
The past is taken out of one context and placed into another. The new context is the co-present. It is where the past is re-evaluated in terms of the present. |
The new-present |
When the old-past is restructured, redefined, or reinvented, it becomes a part of the new present. Sometimes new vocabularies are created to reflect these changes, but often they are not. The old worlds are used with the new meanings resulting in polysemy. |
The co-present |
This is where change takes place within the consciousness of the presence of everyday life. This is where the events of the past and the present collide. The retaining of old events in the present is the old-past. The revision of the past (restructuring, redefining, or reinventing) results in the new-present |
The newly emergent-reality |
Within sedimentation theory, a new layer of practices may develop into a newer stratum of cultural space over the older strata. This new layer provides the basis for replacing older concepts, objects, and events with newer ones. They become the new-originals. The painting of Mona Lisa is the original; the replica or simulacrum of the painting in popular culture becomes the newly emergent-reality. It is called the emergent-reality because the newer generation within the co-present is not aware of the historiography of that object n the past and the new-past. |
The fact that the past is always undergoing redefinition raises an important question for scientific research. What is the past? This is the question that Foucault (1969) sought to address. Why are such vagrant examples of historical anachronism allowed within a scientific enterprise? Why are historical discontinuities created in the historiography of a discipline? Can historical accounts of the past really be trusted? Do they have authenticity? Are primary sources just reconstructions of other allegedly primary sources? These are the kinds of questions being asked by postmodernists. With regard to culture, the co-present may contain a wide variety of cultural artifacts. Some of these exist within the realm of consciousness for experts and specialists as domains of knowledge, but how are they understood by others? Outside of the cultural sciences are non-specialists really aware of cultural theory? Can they articulate what constitutes culture? Is culture defined by what they do? Are nonverbal social scripts also a part of culture? If culture is to have permanence, is has to be a part of the past? The problem is whose version of the past? Whose version of the co-present defines the past? For many, the past is associated with new-originals. The co-present is where the past is ending and the future is beginning. It is a place of transition. It is world in flux. However, the flux is not based on continua but of intercalating digitized information.
CONSTRUCTING A SEDIMENTATION THEORY OF CULTURE
There are several viable concepts that come together to constitute a model of cultural change. One of them is the concept of re-presentation that Foucault (1966) introduced in The Order of Things. He noted that the Middle Ages went through a time when the old idea of imitating nature was replaced by one in which the events of the present were re-presented and this meant that they were cast in a different code and possessed different social and cultural values. The way in which people think changed during this period of time. Instead of seeing are as copies of an original, the originals were re-presented and made into new entities. In this sedimentation theory, these new entities are called the new-originals. These developments occur within the co-present in the framework of a “contextualized emergence” in which some elements of the past are retained while others are modified or replaced with newer concepts. In terms of Foucault’s sedimentation model of time, the layer of the present is placed onto the previous layer of the past. Hence, the present is embedded into the past. Those aspects of the past that undergo change come to represent the newest layer of sedimentation, the new-present or the makings of the future.
The implications of this investigation is that language is used to re-present the social construction of reality and in doing so it redefines the past in terms of the relevancy of the present. As Kuhn (1964) noted in his model of the Structure of Scientific Revolutions, the past is rewritten to reflect the new paradigm. This phenomenon is not limited to the natural sciences but is endemic in daily social interaction involving language. The idea that scientific revolutions lead to new paradigms and new models of normal science is what Foucault (1969) sees as historical discontinuities. These models of the emergence of new knowledge frameworks is the by product of a process that begins with the anomies discovered in normal science, the attempts to correct them during the period of crisis, and the successful implementation of a new scientific paradigm during the period of scientific revolution. This is how natural and social scientists argue for a model of change. What they are revising and reconstructing is a system of thought, an old paradigm is replaced with a new one.
TOWARDS A THEORY OF CULTURAL CHANGE
Within the theory of the sedimentation of cultural time and space, it is agued that cultural consciousness plays an important role in the co-present, the place where the present is embedded in the past. It is in the co-present where the new-past is establish and where traditions are redefined and given attributes that concur with its new contextual frame. It can be argued that the meaning of the present comes from the past. Old traditions provide road signs to the present. Old patterns of behavior provide social structures that legitimate the present. These patterns may not be obvious to the individuals functioning within the co-present. In such a case, the past becomes the new-past. However, where individuals are conscious of these transformations, the past becomes the new-present. They represent the newest layer of cultural space that is placed upon the co-present. This new layer will eventually form the old past for future generations of people inhabiting that cultural space.
Old-Past |
New Past |
New-Past |
New-Past |
Newly Emergent |
The Co-Present |
||||
The Past |
||||
It is also in the co-present where the new-present is created. This is because the future is embedded in the present. It is the place where human projections are created and where hopes and desires are developed and contextualized. Changes in the new-present are most obvious across generations within a social setting. A clear case of this can be found in the generation gap that has occurred among baby boomers from 1946-1964. Jones (1981), a demographer, studied this period in American culture and documented how the social construction of reality of the children of this generation differed substantially from those of their parents. There were several factors that led to this difference. It was during this time that people moved from the inner city to live in the suburbs. The automobile became a dominant means of transportation, and television the dominant means of entertainment. A plethora of new patterns of socialization led to the creation of a new mind set, a new cultural consciousness. The new-present of the children of this era differed significantly from the new-present of their parents. What the parents called the new-present, their children viewed the same phenomena as the new-originals.
MAKING THE PRESENT COHERENT THROUGH HABITUS
Living in the co-present means that one inhabits a world that is in a state of flux. However, individuals who live in the co-present do not experience the sociology of everyday life as an unstructured and constantly changing world. Why is that? The answer can be found in the concept of Habitus (Bourdieu, 1977, 1984; Bourdieu and Wacquaint, 1992). The structures that underlie everyday life are the routines, habits, beliefs, and patterns of behavior that one acquires by living within a cultural complex known as one’s social and cultural habitus. Life is embedded in this habitus. Without this habitus, life would undergo constant scrutiny. One would ask some very basic questions about the daily routines in life. What must one do when entering a restaurant? How does one go about ordering a meal? Life is full of these nonverbal social scripts. They are learned by living and participating in a cultural complex. Life makes sense because these routines provide daily activities and actions with a semblance of order. When others share the same social scripts, the result is a sense of social order. Primary and secondary socialization formed the training ground for the creation of this social order. Television programs also provide information on what is available for purchase in the common market. These programs also contain examples of social behavior in the form of soap operas, movies, and documentaries. Much of what constitutes culture exists in the form of tacit knowledge. It can be found in the cultural habitus of daily living. Language, in particular, is full of grammatical and lexical devices that link the old-past with the new-past.
RE-INVENTING THE CULTURAL PAST
There are many ways of knowing. Language as a medium of reality construction plays a large role in the Western tradition (Berger and Luckman, 1996). It is through language that the citizenry of a nation-state learns how to define the past, understand the present, and dwell on the future. Language is, after all, the medium of the public sphere (Habermas, 1989). As noted earlier, it is through language that the old-past is linked to the new-past. More will be said about language as a socializing medium and how it operates within a cultural space. At this point, it is important to note that language is not the only form of knowing. In the context of modernity, many social and cultural changes have taken place. Many of these are related to the emergence of mass media as an instrument of socialization where new forms of social reality are promoted by means of visual images (Debord, 1995). Many of these new images are not referenced to the old-past but function in the form of the new-present (Baudrillard, 1995). Many of the images found in contemporary mass media are not referenced to the old-past. They are new digital images which introduces a new world of virtual reality. In this context, the new-present is accepted and used to establish the new-past. In a world of simulations and simulacra (Baudrfillard, 1995), images have lost their authenticity (Sturken and Cartwright, 2001). The first evidence of this reinventing of the cultural past came about with the advent of the generation gap (Jones, 1981). Since then, many advanced modern societies have moved from print cultures to visual cultures and from linear reasoning to visual thinking (Mirzoeff, 1998).
Globalization is the new label that has replaced the concept of cultural diversity. Within the context of the archeology of knowledge metaphor, globalization is similar to a great flood that deposits new sediment that is deposited by the flood waters all over the land. After the flood is over, some portions of the land will remain unchanged as the water recedes and the high marks of the flood zone leave tell-tale signs and marks on city buildings and residential areas. Not all evidence of such a flood is washed away. Many areas remain inundated and the muddy waters hide or destroy the old-past. Some areas have new deposits of silt that have been integrated into the new landscape creating a new-present out of the old past. These metaphors provide insight into how the past is remembered (Connerton, 1989). With regards to sedimentation theory, globalization becomes a new layer in the terra firma of a cultural space. It is overlaid with new earth. The mores of other cultures and ways of life invade the cultural spaces of the past. Hence, the co-present is a mixture of not only new and old cultures, but also disparate cultures. There is another reason why globalization has been a more significant concept in modern times and this has to do with large movements of human beings going across international boundaries to resettle in a new land. The old concept of culture was defined by nation-states. It is what is within the political entity of a nation-state constituted its cultural framework. Once an individual leaves his country or nation-state, he enters into a new culture. With globalization such a definition of multiculturalism no longer holds. People are transported en masse in new cultures where they become hybrid citizens. In the old country, the present was embedded in the past. In the new host country, however, the cultural past is different. This means that their cultural identity has been compromised. They want to be participants in the new culture and yet remain favorable to their cultural past. This problem is resolved by transporting components of the cultural past and relocating it in the new home land. Those who reside outside of this phenomenon have labeled such communities as a ghetto, a little Tokyo, a barrio, or China towns. The reality is that has more to do with the making of a hybrid culture. It constitutes a new cultural space. Within the Foucault model of the archeology of knowledge, earth from the old country is brought into the new country and mixed with its new cultural space.
For those who are being bombarded with modernization in the form of new forms of architecture, new products, new languages, and new ways of thinking, the opposite is true. Their culture past has been placed into a new matrix, a new configuration, in which new forms of earth is being placed on it terra firma. These processes also constitutes a hybrid culture but of a different kind.
EMERGENT-REALITIES AND THE CULTURAL CONSTRUCTION
As noted earlier, one aspect of socialization that has not been fully addressed so far comes from the uses of mass media. This use of media comes in many forms and is directed to cultural niches. What one sees on television becomes a part of the conscious co-present. Those who share the same media use it as a way of reaffirming their social construction of reality. The soap operas, movies, and situation comedies that they watch are comparable to other forms of socialization except that the participation is passive and the messages may are tacit. Years after a certain event took place on television, individuals may invoke them in conversations and role playing. These invents are part of their virtual memory and form a part of their virtual culture. They function, in part, as a collective memory that has been distributed individually to individuals and these persons invoke the same memory at the same time in a public setting. They have become the new-originals. One can ascertain after a short conversation, for example, if another person subscribes to cable and what programs he or she watches on television. These forms of virtual memory become social markers of group coherence with regard to one event. It is as if there are niche cultures that can be invoked and used to unite disparate individuals by means of one event.
Sociologists do not want to deal with the concept of collective memory. They find it too mystical. This concept, it should be noted, was introduced by Durkheim (1951), one of the founders of sociology. Durkheim (1984, 1951) argued that individuals are bound together in society in two ways. They share their lives with others in a communal setting or they are bound together by institutions, laws, and regulations. Those who see life as a community share the same religion, the same hope, fears, and aspirations. Those who are bound by rules and regulations belong to a group but they do not feel bonded to the group. With the advent of television and the creation of the consumer culture, the kinds of bonding that occur in mass society has many of the elements associated with the primal communities that Durkheim discussed. Virtual cultures share virtual memories. They are bonded by virtual events. They have the same kind of deep emotional connection over events that earlier societal types encounter. If there ever was a time when a case could be made for the existence of fragments of a virtual memory distributed over a wide range of niche cultures, it is in the co-present world of television, the internet, blogospheres, and other forms of mediated communication.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The concept of the sign is not a static relationship between meaning and form. Instead, it is a dynamic relationship between two realms and both of these realms are bound together by means of reality-loops. On the one hand, there is the realm epistemology has to do with the organization of knowledge. On the other hand, there is the realm of ontology in which ontological markers exist as objectified forms. The process of changing meaning into form is called structural epistemology and the process of changing form and giving it meaning is called structural hermeneutics. Both epistemology and ontology are bound together by means of reality-loops.
Within the realm of epistemology, individuals reside and act as agents in the process of creating and sustaining reality-loops. This process of reality maintenance has been often discussed within the study of ethnomethodology (Mehand and Wood, 1975). Individuals, however, have to deal with their concepts of self. One is the psychological self associated with the ego and the other is the social self which has often been described within the context of the Chicago School of Sociology. There is a disparity between these two senses of self. The ego functions within the context of structural epistemology and the social self functions within the context of structural hermeneutics. They do different things. One takes meaning and creates ontological markers from them and the other takes the social and cultural patterns that have been reified and creates meaning for them.
What all of this amounts to is the fact that the traditional sign as a static conflation of meaning and form needs to be redefined. Meanings and form belong to different realms; they interact with each other through reality-loops; and they Human beings act as agent in creating the reality-loops through the process of structural epistemology and they are influenced by loops created by others through the process of structural hermeneutics. When these bonds are strenghtened, they constitute the social construction of reality.