SEMIOTIC GEOFFREY BROADBENT: Architectral Design/78/77 474 A Plain Man’s Guide tothe Theory of Signs in Architecture GEOFFREY BROADBENT offers considered discussion of architeetoral Semioti, in which he demystiie this jergon ridden and complex discourse and presents a succinct argument for architects once again intentionally ‘esigning meaning into thee buildings. Its ton year now since Googe Bad vote the Bt ale in Fash on he Theory of Sins as appli to hectare! Ite met nih far “mount of hostlity fom peops tke Reyne Banham.” who fet hat in Sgerting ta bullings cay” ‘nea Bad Wassily ado ag sex, list monument Tie the rn of us, Da ets, had een broaahe up to bin 2 functional” azchitectze, doin ‘with machined precision around a Paaticulr brie, end sealed tee Aiimensonlly according to the latest salable technology in ts ame, oneete fame, oF ~ Bankr’ pre ference atthe imo some king of fnfatbie. Hoth arses were Inter tepintd inthe fet book in Eagish ‘onthe subject ~ Meany Arh tecture edited by Baad sod Chaos Senses? That too met witha fat amount of hostility when it was pub- ished in 1968, ‘Dut times have chenged. Its per fectly posi now for people ke the Ventas. Charles Moore, [Bront Brot,’ Charles Jencks® and many others fo suggest that srchite- ‘are deigned with deliberate mean- in i faking over from functionalism fd to be taken seviously in saying So. There area eat three new books ‘coming at onthe subjaet ~ by Bonta’ by Broadbent, Jencks and Bonta'* and by Broadbeat and rorens! 9 obviously is some- ‘thing of a growth industry. OF ‘oure, there had been conscious attempts to give meaning to buildings fn the past, The clearest probably Wore the gat 18th century pictures: ‘20° landscape gardens such as Stowe Tea in Wit, (1), whch, wid splendid serangement of fenples, srottocs and bridges, peering trough ‘ho tres around. la, actully "els 4 story, or rather two teparats stories ‘Senultancously. The individual build ings symbolise certain incidents in the lie of Heary Hoare ~ who made the garden ~together with certain ‘events in Homer's ad, Hoare was ‘rawing parallels between the vicsltudes of his own life and those of Aeneas:* ‘But the functionalist ethic has ‘been with us for so fon that most people sill have a sneaking foting that it was morally “ight. Architects such at le Corbuses,” Gropins" and Mics! not to megtion histg- fians such as Giedion.” Porsnes”™ fd Richards,” had told us most orlbly that architecture shoulin"t bea matter of mere spesficia styling appli commetically to the ‘outside of buildings. Actually the ‘Word ‘Tunetional became attached specifically to stl and concrete ‘Hara bulidngs, siaple and sectams falar in form and lad in white acco, grey concrete, or sass, (2). The curious thing is that When one analyses them nozording to any sone ible concept of Tunction” (the bert fone T know i il Bi ilies? {that buildings enclose space in ways hich may facilitate or inhibit a pattculr range of activites, ter ‘ut the exterml environment, com fame resources and act as eultoral symbols, whether one ike it ot not. ‘See my stil in Dennis Sharp's new" book on The Rationlist?”) they prove to bo some of the worst build {ngs in istry in tens of fitness for ‘parpoes, sola overheating, heat loss, hofse penetration, cos in use, and soon. Ito happens that hardy any fof the pioneering, “Tunctonalst Dulldings of the 20s actually remain fn thee orginal state. Those which do remain have mostly beon altered to it them for continued habitation, and whilst Le Coxbusier’s Maison la Roche and his Villa Savoye at Poissy have boon ritored to approximatsly thee orginal states, i 50 they ‘could be used as museurs! ‘Yet whatever they ack in tecms of practical functioning, these bull Ings certainly ate magniicent symbols ofthe 1920e In other ‘Words, they are the very thing they ‘Were not supposed to be, whichis hardly supaising because, like it oF not, a buildings symbolise, oF at least ‘cary’ meaning, Even Peviner ‘admits this now ~ on the last page of his A History of Building Types" be ‘wees: every building creates asso- ‘dation in tho mind of the beholder, Whether the architect wanted it or fot. He cal this evocation’, whilst Insling stl that the International Modern convoye™atity, precision, technological dating and stotSEMIOTIC Atchison Dei 7-877 415 |. | deni otancetuty’ there iso | heard of words tc at ca! an com | Seuingsese Bom chats hates | Memo word such x xt an o {| Gatnedatcaice meanines so does | eazng’ Rev andineer Noted | | tiememese paren sted Thatienty | {now about contations wicker, | | the Rinconse? dean of a ‘otto mention Lethon re (OX); | | imicinetive ad meiner ert | but cera would to, bosasc {secure neecwas anything more tha | of te funn won (od ee "eum Wore abst 30 mors) dam fhe allboitngs inortaby cary | hot eid of busing sen ke sneaning, then We shoud do wellto | jlevant because ould no! be j | eehow ey doit At the very tart, | Gothred to lear ts sent {iat wil hp us to understand all” | Yorns What «plete proesion buildings etter And our buildings | ours has bacon iit dons ads ate going to syntoie anyay ~ de | lke erie bec atte te Ditcourbertorwors) intentions | taminolony wea there her {hen understanding ofhow they | wheeaone cou not suive on & So o™may help ur sgn thor to do_| bude ste without saya ant itbettr, the mow promising way of | half cine Fongun Dietary Tooking at those things seams to be | yocabulaty ott inetion te the Theory of Sens which has boon | Ure more robun vem) ono developing trom the work of Ferd” | Gon work is semblic wis some eine sand de Seusure,aSwis pion | bade trms Gragmarte symaca Sopher howe lectars athe Onier-| romantic ssiior sof ande- Sty of Geneve in 1906-1911 were” | ferent ont aes and bo), One |_| ltercoeted by nisstadentsani’” | Sgn becca posal Cacao | | pubtaned ath Cour tn Goneret | tnemer 30 or, wit oo coe Linguistics," and Charles Senders | venture into the most sophisticated {| Poitelts Ameria mroyorviose | Yeans of tetoric ts tans Yolamigoss collected papen seo: | Soweu ome | | 1908)" cmount already’ to eight massive volumes. ‘Base divisions of the fd Peirce and Saussure both wanted | The fist set of terms comes not from toot up general theory of sgnit- | Pees or Saussure, but from one of | | sation: how one thing anything ~ | the former's disciples, Charles Mores word, apleture,adiigam, rain | who, ike his marter, Was the most [| GnRsvote ofa boty | Ragont coin of on pce 4} | ‘stands for, reminds us or another, | base division of semtotic" into the |. | theory which they called respect [| vely,Somiorc ees), and Serio. | 1a,f The 18h century landscape [| loarseussue). (fost people these | dexter set our deliberately 10 days seem to preter Pesce's term.) | design architecture with meaning, Unfortunately, the profusion and | Henry fYoure developed Seourhead in ‘conflict of terminology within this | Wilshire between 1744 and 1772, {eld has psobably proved tho greatest | Individual buildings ~ morty designed stumbling bloc, certainly inthe An-_| by Honzy Ftoroft— wore grouped lo-Saxon world, tothe acceptance of | to look like a Claude Lorine pin the whole field felt as being worthy | tng and placed along a et route of study. Many people indecd have | eround the rift lke. Bech ‘made the point tat the word building represented an incident in ‘semiotic reminds them of ~ isitselt | Hoare’ own life, for which he saw aig for ~ otc pratelsn lara itereture, and ‘And so they have been put off, | especially u Homer's Mad” The ‘which ia pity now that the basic’ | bulge were therefore designed to ‘quurrying has been done, from Peirce | ‘cw7y" liberate meonings. {swell as om Saussue: And the "ange of teams one uses need not be | Je Approach to Stourheud, represent- Ail that formbable. Mario Pee ing Lake Nem wire Aencos entered Glostary of Linguistic Terminology | the underworld. contains somo 1800 enti, most of ‘Which are conoerned spocifcally with | 12 Plan showing he route one must {te mechanisas of language ~ they | follow ¢o ‘ead’ the story properly are lzglyirelovant to verniotic asa whole. Indood, Pec’ most impor- | Te Temple of Flora marking the fant terms are missing, langly source ofthe river. because until reeently ~ dv to lack | of transtations ~ they had made lite | 1d Grottorepresenting the cave near | apact in Continental Ungsstic ‘which Aeneas landed in north fies rees. But even ifthe whole of Pei | om hs igh from Try. wore relovant — which ite not — that | would sil form s favourable con- | Te Pantheon ~ similar fn siting and in ‘east, say, with bulling, The Penguin | form toa temple in Claude Lorraine's vionary of Bulding™* contains | “Aeneas at Delos 5400 plus entes, mast of which round 90 percent) wil be famine | Ly Temple of Apolo the Sun God, to.nyone who has sent some time | derived rom Robert Wood's ‘Ruine in architectural practle. Uhad never ~ | oy Babee. 24,8 The Fagus Factory office build. lng designed by Gropius end Meyer in 1911, and selected by historians such 15 Gledion and Peontor a the proto ‘ype of ll steatandglisr, 200% century, ‘functional’ bilan, Yer ‘he columns are hefty brick pier, dmost 1 metre wide, and his ploncer ‘ng building presented problems of solar overheating ~ indicated by the sunbtinds,corefully positioned to ‘shade (only) the owner's office. 3 Every building stirlatere wide ‘range of senses simultaneously, and ‘ach of these channels cares’ a Dart of ts meaning. (Flin Wiley and Sons)SEMIOTIC Ahice levels, pragmatic semantic and symtactie, (2 mos Useful for OME PUT owes. He sure Pragmatic ‘doal with the origins, 08 {Gy those wha actually make them) and tho effects of signs (on those who interpret them) within the (Cota range of behaviour in Which they oceur Semante “deals withthe signification ‘of sien inal odes of senting’ that, with the wayein which they scully ‘enry” meanings Spnzactie deals withthe combina: tom of signs (such a the waysin ‘which words are put tozether to form seatencos) without regard 1 thelr specific ignifications (gneanings) ox thei relations to ‘the behaviour in which they ‘coat thus ignosing the effects {rose meanings have on those ‘who interpret them, Moni envisages these thre levels as ‘nesting within each other. Thus ‘the Dose study of signs wil be a preg matic matter, the study of meaning (emantis) vl be pat of this and the study of sya (the aetal ‘sue te’ of sign systems) will in tum be part of semantics. So et us Look at ach of those in turn with particular fefercace to architecture. Praxmatcs Archtectual pragmatics obviously fonsst of looking at ll the ways in ‘hich architecture, as sgn systom, actualy affects those who wse bulkings. Af this pragmatic level, architectire probably i the most {Interesting and complex signet of all. Words act on one sense at time “either we listen to thom being spoken or we read them off the printed page. Music obviously affects the sense of heasing more than aay fof the others; buc architecture, ini lubly afects wide range of sonsee ‘Simaftaneousy: seeing hearing, me ‘heat and cold (through the skin, not to mention sch exoteric senses as ‘equilibrium and those of position and siovement in our muscles and Joints (inaestetic). tied in Design ln Architecture to preset all his in diagrammatic form, 3). Sone rchitecturl semiotics fend to ead” architecture asa enticely visual matter, ignoring al the other ‘ways in which arohitectare ‘arries™ seaning for us, and thus, in my view, ‘hey tvalise Even Raskin admitted in The Seven Lamps of Archttccrure™ that he ‘aways tonne it imposible to work inthe cokt fnteriors of our eathedralé and went ‘on to ascribe certain deficiencies of his own (aesthetic) judgment to that ‘state of weakened felt” 0 which ‘the chill of Salibury had reduced him. ‘So, if architecture ‘means some thing o each of te sense, how do the messages get through? One ofthe ‘ost useful devices for explaining {his was developed by Clade Shannon”* for analysing the ways in ‘which messages are transmitted alone {alephcme lines, He elle ithe infor- tnation channel, ov which GK. Koenis considered the implications in anesay ” and Taso developed for Design in architecture, (4). Any thing which conveys information physically a telephone line, a ook, 8 raving, ora budding ~ ean infor ‘mation channel. Any building i con- Standly sending ont ‘ossiges — ieual, aoousti, thermal ai 30 on = Which ean be received by one of the tenes and ‘doondedxoconting tothe observer's personal experience. I's 2 perooptal matter, Which x why we Ail attach different levels of impor” tance tothe levels at which the df= ferent senses are stimulated in people {how half suffocated o half trozen ina typical iesian’ building can still ind it vsualy beautiful, whilst ‘others may find its appearance too redolent of filing cabinets, match boxes or whatever to offer them any Visual detght, 1 that i what happens generally, how ean we setually aay ech tecture prasmatically ~ chat iin terms ofthe effets wi have on people? Physiolopsts, paycholopists find physflsts obviously can work through all the sensor and plot the ‘effects which things have on them. They have indeed done this, sugest ing certain noms for human comfort in torms of fighting, temperature, noise and other lees. They have Shown thet most of us willbe sats fied at certain levels, comfortable at ‘others and delighted even at others again. Already we could use this Knowledge to gencratoa now Kind of architecture, based on known re ‘duitements for envizcamental control, by desiening bulging speci ‘cally as environmental ters. The psycboloats ala have moved to Wards a more conventional analysis ‘of what things mesa’ to people ‘moving in fat, towards semantics, ‘This work ha akon a aumbor of forms! {Attempts to measure dizeetly ‘what people sy about cts, Ind ‘vidual bulings oe rooms ~ thet, {hel verbal responses 2 Attempt fo measure the attitudes underlying what people actually say. ‘Xigeat deal of work in these areas ‘hat been published in vaous Journals ‘and conference proceedings, ant there ia vast iteratsze inthe subject by now, of which the most accessible summaties probably ate those by Proshansky Ittlson and Rivin.** (Cra, Altman,” Canter," and tee ‘Such work covers the whole range of people's physiological. psycholo- ‘eal and social reactions to bailing; some of it naturally is concerned ‘with what buildings mean to people ~ or, at east with what they sy they mean. A range of techniques bas been used inthis researc such 5 Osgood’s Semantic Different, ‘hich enablos one to plot with soins accuracy the meanings which people attach to certain concepts in a tee Simengonal ‘semantic space’ Hors berger" tried to establish a basi set ‘of seals for sch work for use in cavirongpental esearch, whist ‘Acking? and Honikamtn’™ cevkea ‘sch scales and put them to different uses. Acking projected photographic slies of interior to his subjects and ‘asked them to-mazk each room ‘gains his concept scales. He then ‘analysed thes tales ano measured feelings of comfort and secarty, ‘estimations of social status, phyatcal Appearance, degree of originality and $0 on, Homikan also ated his > jects to Took at pistes of rooms and fe rate them agains seal: bad/goad, ‘inty/lean, dankilight, and so 0n,(5). (One problem with Semantic Di ferential, as many experimenters see Tt Is that the seus use aze setup by the experimenter. This raiser the jbvious problems of any socal su ‘ey! thatthe seals themselves a Sugeest things to people which other- Wise they might never have thought ff Atte same te, they may ask people to think of things (including bulings in ways which they find ‘quite mpossibe, It was to answer such objections that George Keley Aleveloped his Roportory Grid tech- nique — originally for the invest ston of what people thought about ‘ther people. He asked each subject to write onto cards the names of contain vecy familia people: father, mother, ster, brother, favourite teachor, most hated teacher, te ‘Then he worked systematically through the cards, grouping them Into threes and asking his subject 10 ‘name any quality shared by to of ‘the people which the thind one did not shat, They thought of ‘con sructs sich as felndly,hetpl, intelient, and soon, Having thus Usted the “onstracts by which his subject thought about people, Kelley then asked further questions by ‘which the subject ranked the com structs inorder of impartance for ‘him — is move important to be “feenaly than ntlligen, 3 0 ‘adapted thls tochique to establish ‘he constructs against which poople “construe the built environment oF in this ca, photographs of rooms. But thee isa fundamental proo- tein in applying the results of such re- search. Suppose we could establish — Tora partielar population ~ that 2 particular room type, house form, ot ‘whatever actualy ar overwhel ‘ingly more popular than another, should we than boll oaly that Atchitootural Desiga78/77 476 type? OF course not, if we id that it Would become so boring that people no longer preferred it. Yet Semantic Difterentiat and repectory ‘i techniques may be useful for ‘Quite diferent purposes, in estab ishing the degree to which architect and cient, student and teacher, or fen architect and prychologi, agree or disagree on fundarnentalisues ‘conceing achitecture. Chris ‘Abel? fas done a corian amount ‘of work in this area already wit schitectral stents and teachers, attempting to relate students" arch fectural constcts tothe designs they actually produce and the tutor's constructs to the waysin which they riick thove desens. Syntax Syntax, of cours, is concomed with the siniciure of slm-sys 1, such as the waysin which words are grouped together to form sontonces. Saussize actualy draws an atchiectora, ‘analogy to show how the symtectic he uses the adjective ‘ytagmatie) and te ssmantic (he calls it aso ative) dimensions intereate From the associative and syntag- atic point of view a linguistic nits ikea fixed part of # build fn, e@:a column. On tho one and the coluann has» certain = lation tothe aechitzave thet it ‘ippors: the aangement of the {820 units in space sugges the syntagmatic relation. On the other hand, ifthe column is Doric. it suggests a mental com prison ofthis style with others onic, Corinthiaa, ete although rnono ofthese elenient ts present in space; the relation is associ Most of us st through tedious lessons at school, parsing ielevant sentences to mei Various part nouns, ad- {eetives, verbs ~ and some linguists Such as Pele™ have developed such studies of syntax into the most tor= {uous kinds of excrete in symbole logic. But the whol subject received 4 tremendous boost inthe 19508, after Naom Chomsky had fist publ Shed his Syntace Souewures.* Chomsky suggested that cach of us possess an innate capacity for Benerating sntonces. Wo posts co: {ain understandings of the word, ‘hich te calls 'deop srvcturs' ‘hich underlie ovary sentence tis possible to utter." They are zised to form the ‘siface structure” by which we express out ideas by means ‘of certain generative rules. These ive usa bade ventence form, such ‘The boy sees the xl Bat before we actually utter it we «anal apply certain transforma: tonal rls wick as: teansfomma.SEMIOTIC (The sic was seen by the hoy) transformation int the negative: (The boy didnot soe the it) Intorrogative: (Did the boy se the ais) affirmative: (The boy did see the sit) Predictive: The boy will see the sa) and 30 on. ike other syntacticins before him, Chomsky analyses his sentences into forms such a¢ noun (N), verb ), Noun Phrase (NE) — Noun Phase: The + Noun: Verb Phrase (VP): Verb + NP, and soon. His basic sentence thetefoze can be analysed ‘follows: He never quite desribes what he ‘means by ‘deep stectare' whichis ‘unfortunate because one really needs to know just how deep these structures might bo. Otherr have ‘made thelr own ° simple, Dut perfectly adequate one was presented by the Englth lin ‘Blt CT Onions as fone ago as, 1904." He suggested that al! our ‘elationships with the wood out tide outsetves could be expeesved im one ofthe following forms: He waite (eis morely here, in the environment) No isa Frenchman (he has octain Aescribable characteristics) He eats ortlans (he has a diroct, physical effect on othe things ia the environment) ves me some (he engages in 4 transaction with me) Ho pleases me (his actions have an ‘emotional effet on me). Sut ihe fas in this particular ‘eypect, Chomsky cannot be aceused ‘Sf neglecting to desribe the work: {gr of his generative and tran ation rules He deseribes them in form of algorithms ~ that is fxed iis of rues ofa kind familias to concept of nfarmation channel developed by telephone engineers he analyst of efficency in telee systems, but the principles oany medium ~ radio, tle- ‘any such chinncls, ceuing ously on one's pereal lence, tarts, predlle "one, re. Wiley and Sons) 5h Semantic Differential one's idecs ‘out concepts — inhaling buildings = are plotted aginst carefully choten seven poin scaler. Averaged ut in {s10Up5 of three, fe or more, one’s Evaluationoftheteconceptst plotted ‘on @ seule which meaturet, sey, good baal one's attitude to their otensy is checked agent scales witeh messure, sey, Srongmeak; and ‘heir Activity Us gzuged on scales of, say, active paste. Various buildings ‘mentioned in the txt have Been ‘measured agent: « (simplified) Dersion of Semantic Differential and plotted into a threedimensional Semantic space. The fllowtng shows ‘haw the (Aahens} Perthenon was laced, and you cen find where you locate the various bung in some te space by plotting them all against the same seater: 4 wit be noted that many of these ‘scales can only be applled metaphor ‘cally architecture, and thats thet strength, They help get past the Opinions we thought we had. In each ‘ate, of courte, the avenge assessment for cach group of calets plotted {nto the appropriate dimention of the semanite space. © Repertory Grid ~ Hontkman's plot. {ing of pertonal constructs concerning Ting roome, Jab Btsenman developed his House 11 design according to 4908 of yn ‘oti rule. He divided the base ‘cube’ of space by a 3x 3 gd which ‘oul be ‘built sh columns or ral! wall. He deetded to use both ‘ystems, meeting aginst «diagonal division of his cube. He then looked At the ‘negive!speces thus formed ‘and allocated them to rartous func sions of Using. But the resale looks like ¢ Le Corbuster vila. {Five Arhivects} 8 Luryens visualised space iu terms of 2 glass cube, made up of smaller ‘bes formed by dividing it by ines (of cleange’ in three cimensionat ‘armature of planes, But having de signed basic forms in this wey, Lutyens then applied rdimentary classical detaing. (Seren Victorian Arehiects) Architectural Deign/78/77SEMIOTIC Sonne architects, naturally, have tried to work in thi way. Petor Eisenman, fr instance, has drawn ‘rectly on Chomsky to dasebe the ‘way in whic he has personally d= veloped a complex of roles for the generation (and transformation) of Sreitectunal forme Ina typical cas (Gouse I) Eisman started witha tube of space, (7). He then sub= divided it witha 3x 3 ged to give a total of 9 ‘compartments’ on each Foor. This motional grid could then bo reatied physically by rows of ‘columns a system of parallel walls, ‘or both, Eieaman therefore decided ‘ona further, diagonal divion of his abe with a wall system uaning ‘wards i from one ide and colurin “ystem’ fom the other. He then Yooked atthe “nopatlv” spaces lft ‘between his walls and gradually de- veloped an extraordinarily complex ‘system of interlocking paces each of ‘Which then could be dediested to 2 certain ving activity. Eisenman’ primary concer, in other words, ‘with the abstract perfection of his "stem. Once the frm had been de {ecrmined, then the functions might (openly) folow. He has continued this ruthless pursuit of abstraction to such an extent that in House IX, for instance, the "rysien’ demanded an ‘oblong sit along the centre of the master bedroom The (single) beds, ff cours, have to be aeranget on ‘ither side, suggesting that those who tse them are expected to Tead sacl Aliscipined lives that thoy naver wil risk ie and limb) by trying,in pulsivey, to cross the pap. Curiously enough, Fissaman i by ‘no meuns the fst stchitect to deal in sch complex syntax. No less an srehitect than Sit Edwin Lutyens was ‘Working towards the end of his lie ‘on an Armature of Planes” which bis son Robert desecbes as follows, (8) building is made up of solids Sad voids. which» are ge0- ‘metrically tclated «fo state this relationship itis fst of all neces. sary fo visualise space as divi ‘ded along three panes, mutually at right angles, into a number of Cubical cells, One series of planes is horizontal tho two ‘ther soe. «are vertical, at ‘ight angles fo one another. ‘This visualisation ofa space ‘ividd in all czections becomes fan armature of planes, or foun- dation of throedimensional - Iationships. It should be thought of not as aid or frame of three Tntersecting sts of fines -- Dut ss almost invisible “ines of elo ‘ages the whote being ike a glass ube made up of smaller glass cubes, And a Venezuelan architect, Domingo Alvarez, demonstrated this uite independently: what it would be like to be in Lutyen’s lass cube’. Avaer found i difieat to describe {to his students jst what he meant Dy “space” so he made stall miro Tinod boner to domonsteat tis. ‘Once these had proved successful, be Dull a series of Snetre intemnally mirrored, walkin cubes, (9) In one fuse, the ines af cleavage” are made by eiching aazo% sirps of trans cent glass over the surface of three ‘of the mors ~ one horizontal (the failing) and to vertical — at ight ingles to one another. These strips tte then luminated fzom behing ‘with coloured light: red, seen and blac, The experonce of being inside Alvascz’s cube certainly Brings one noaror to Inkabiting a pure spatal syntax than any othe kind of built realty ever could ‘Yet even this by no means ex haute the fascination which spatial syntax seems to exercise for some peopl. March and Steadman for in- tance, emonirato a whole range of ‘posbiities for deserfbing architec {ure in such sytactie tems, Lin thet Geometry of Ensironment,?> and most of those concerned uth ‘Somputeraided design find then selves, sooner or later, desing in ‘ds lattices, and with systems of ‘ovotdinats for Locating points io pace, Some, tach as Hier and Lea ‘an, bellove thatthe whole of, Acchitocture can be explained in terms of the les by which ind

govt a thir,** following Ogden and Riehards: that any pulling, at any ‘me, can be senile, seified ore: ferent ~ orall thre simultaneously in thei troe-part scheme. The Parthenon exists obviously, ata ‘referent, an object, st standing on the Acropolis in Athens but italso eins as a soiled — by photo- fraphs, diagrams and words ~in say ‘ook which deveribes such buildings. ‘And for many people sil itis also a ‘siguifer ofall tha was bast in ane cent Greek democracy. We ought to sake sure in discussing it whether the Parthenon asa signified actually fs that arrangement of stones ~ the partial yeconstruction which exists currently onthe Acropols;or the | building in its former, more ruined | stato ~ familar fom photographs of