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Language of Cinema and Semiotic Modelling

Article in Chinese Semiotic Studies · June 2012

DOI: 10.1515/css-2012-0123

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Draft version of an article published in 2012 in Chinese Semiotic Studies, 6, 324−332.

LANGUAGE OF CINEMA AND SEMIOTIC MODELLING

Katre Pärn

The founder of semiotics of cinema, Christian Metz set as the aim of his
project to go to the bottom of the metaphor of language that had been used
widely for describing cinema in film theory, yet without taking into account
the knowledge about language that had accumulated in linguistics. Thus the
goal of early semiotics of cinema was to go beyond figural analogy and bring
together the two domains of knowledge: knowledge about cinema and
knowledge about language. However in the beginning there were difficulties
with overcoming essentialist approach characteristic to classical film theory
and using methodological approach that would model the language of cinema
on the basis of the model of language proposed by the theory of language
they use.
The development of metaphor of language of cinema into semiotic
model of language of cinema sheds light to semiotic modelling as
methodological tool. Firstly the metaphor of language of cinema itself –
either pre-theoretical or theoretical - can be seen as an attempt to make sense
of novel phenomena through analogy or approximation with something
already familiar. This stage resulted in ontological theories of language of
cinema. Refining this rough analogy into the object of study required not
only linguistic methods, but ultimately revision of epistemological
underpinnings of the project. This meant acknowledging the difference
between cinema as experienced and cinema as object of knowledge, arriving
thereby at methodological theories of cinema that use semiotic modelling as
a means for constructing the object of study.

Keywords: semiotic modelling, methodology, language of cinema, semiotics

of cinema, metaphor

It is we, given that the Mind can provide imaginary representation of impossible
worlds, who ask things to be what they are not. (Eco 1999: 56)

The issue of film language is associated with the linguistic turn in human
sciences that was fuelled by Saussure’s Cours de linguistique générale (1916) and
subsequent application of language analogy to various cultural object (Stam
2003, Casetti 2009). Yet it is often forgotten that the notion has its roots in
everyday thinking next to such ideas as the language of flowers that was very
popular in 19th century and other similar metaphorical uses of the language
(language of animals etc).
The idea of cinema as kind of a language was present already in first
attempts to theorize the nature of the new medium and has developed into
different theoretical descriptions of cinema. The initial metaphor has
expanded conceptually and given rise to new metaphors like film-syntax, film
reading, film lexica, punctuation in cinema, stilistics, poetics, rhetorics of
cinema, media literacy etc, which all share the underlying conceptual
metaphor of language.
At the same time the main assumptions of this conception are often
misunderstood, partly, as Aumont points out, due to the “imprecise nature of
the term” (Aumont et al. 1992: 126), partly due to misconceiving the new
attitude towards an object of study and the process of studying it both in
semiotics of cinema during its early years and in broader field of film studies
subsequently. Yet both of these problems can be overcome when modelling
is conceived as a methodological technique for achieving specifically
humanistic conception of object of study.
Thus the development of this conception helps to shed light on some
of the central aspects of semiotic modelling as methodological tool in
semiotics and in humanities more broadly. This concerns firstly the use of
analogy as a means for making sense of (novel) phenomena or semiotics of
modelling in general, secondly the shift from analogy to modelling by
transforming the phenomena into object of study, and finally the problem of
the status of the object of study modelled semiotically and the inevitable
plurality and complementarity of the models in semiotics.

MAKING SENSE OF THE PLATYPUS

From the point of view of semiotics of modelling, the “cinema as language”

approach can be seen as quite usual way for making sense of new phenomena
that lacks its own language of theoretical description. When confronted with
unknown phenomena, as Eco points out, we often use approximation,
analogy with what we already know, to account for it. (Eco 1999: 57) For the
thinkers of early 20th century, cinema was the platypus that seemed to have
the characteristics of many known phenomena. Vachel Lindsay’s description
of cinema in The Art of the Moving Picture is a perfect example of the attempt to
deal with this new ans strange creature: cinema as sculpture in motion, as
painting in motion, as architecture in motion, as hieroglyphics (Lindsay
1915). Lilian Gish describes it as new aesthetic Esperanto, universal
language, newspaper or textbook of the 20th century (Gish 1926). This
mechanism of familiarization of the new phenomena through the old can be
noticed already in the word cinematography itself, that contains the greek word
graphe, ‘writing’ (Stam 2003: 23).
Identifying cinema with language can thus be seen as a kind of
hypothesis about its nature as a communicative or expressive means that
became rather widespread in early writings about cinema. By the advent of
semiology of cinema in 1960s, there were numerous books dedicated to the
description of language of cinema, e.g. André Berthomieu‘s Essai de grammaire
cinematographique (1946), Robert Bataille‘s Grammaire cinematographique
(1947), Raymond Spottiswoode’s A Grammar of the Film (1950), Marcel
Martin’s Le langage cinématographique (1955) etc, not to mention theories of
André Bazin, Béla Balázs, Sergei Eisenstein, Russian Formalists and others.

ONTOLOGICAL AND METHODOLOGICAL APPROACHES

The intensity of discussions on the topic raised the problem of nature of this
analogy. Thus John M. Carroll points out the confusion between “film-as-
language” interpreted as theoretical claim or as a metaphor. First is
substantive claim asserting that language and cinema are members of the
same natural kind. Cinema is in some fundamental way a language. Second
takes the metaphor as methodological assumption. (Carroll 1980: 29)
Similarily Francesco Cassetti differentiates between ontological and
methodological theories of cinema:

In asking what cinema is, ontological theories always aim to uncover an

essence in order to define the phenomenon, to reach a global knowledge, and
to measure themselves in terms of a form of truth. [..] What is [..]
emphazised [in the methodological theories] is the need to choose a certain
point of view and to model, on this basis, both the gathering and the
presentation of the data. [..] As a result, it underscores what is pertinent
rather than what is essential. (Casetti 1999: 19)

Generally semiotics of cinema has been seen as a shift from ontological to

methodological approach in the study of cinema (Carroll 1980: 31, Odin
1990: 27, Buckland 1991: 197, Casetti 1999: 104-5), since Christian Metz set
as the aim of his project of semiotics to “go to the bottom of the metaphor of
language” (Bellour and Metz 1971: 1), criticizing the fact that the theoretical
study of language of cinema had so far ignored the achievements of
linguistics. Yet it is often pointed out that his first writings Metz still had
problems with breaking off from the normative and ontological approach. For
early semiotics of cinema, the background of the notion of language of
cinema and classical film theory in general became an ontological obsticle as
much as linguistics became a methodological obsticle. The initial application
of linguistic notions in “Cinema: language or language system” (1964) is set
to prove whether a language of cinema is a certain type of language, thus
instead of methodological approach he uses various essentialist conceptions
of cinema and language to filter out, through this “negative linguistics”
(Elsaesser 1995: 10), the true nature of language of cinema as a language-like
phenomena.
The outcome of this lack of clear-cut separation or even confusion
between the ontological and the methodological approach in Metz’s early
theory, was the famous, yet problematic statement that language of cinema is
language without language system, langage sans langue (Metz 1964), still often
viewes as a central or even the result of the semiotics of cinema, although it
was revized by Metz himself already in his Language and Cinema (1971), where
he models language of cinema as system of codes, stating later, that the
codes are the equivalent of langue in filmic discourse (Metz 1976: 583).
Although his early approach to language of cinema seemed to be
guided by explicit linguistic tools (double articulation, arbitrariness,
paradigmatics and syntagmatics etc) that could be used in modelling cinema
as semiotic phenomena, these tools were instead used as a characteristics
that define the essence of (natural) language. Thus underneath this linguistic
approach were on one hand an essentialist view of natural language and on
the other hand Bazinian/realist conception of essence of cinema that together
determine the results of the “linguistic analysis”. Latter was more about
confirming or disconfirming that cinema is language, than analysing it “as if”
it was, that is, taking the linguistic notions as models that can –with some
adjustment – be used for modelling cinema.

METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH AND MODELLING

The concept of code introduced by Umberto Eco (1967) and Emilio Garroni
(1968) as a way of conceptualising semiotic problem of cinema, had
important role in allowing Metz to move away from ontological approach to
language of cinema by providing neutral and analytical basis for
conceptualising cinema without the necessity to trace it back to the essence
of natural language. Code was not a characteristic of language but a tool for
modelling language.
But Metz had arrived at more than the notion of code. He had adopted
also new epistemological attitude that Warren Buckland describes as shift
from realist epistemology of classical film theory to relativist epistemology
brought about by linguistic turn, epistemology which avoids the Hegelian
fallacy of identifying the real object with the object of knowledge because it
realises that scientific paradigm does not discover its specific object of study,
but must construct it (Buckland 1991: 198). As Metz points out in the
beginning of Language and Cinema: “the cinema” or “the film” in itself are not
the objects of knowledge, but heterogeneous phenomena that can be studied
from different points of views. (Metz 1977: 5) That statement indicates the
rejection of ontological approach and opting methodological one, opening up
the possibility to use alternative points of views in studying cinema. Instead
of the “cinema is” perspective, the new approach was the “cinema can be
studied as”, instead of essence, attention was turned to relevancy and
suitability of the approach and/or model.
Thus semotics of cinema finally arrived at one possible way of
delimiting the class of objects it accounts for – instead of theorizing about or
studying the totality of cinema with linguistic methods, it studies only
linguistic aspects of cinema (Casetti 1999: 101). The object of studies is not
the object of immediate perception but result of semiotic modelling –
phenomena mediated through one or another semiotic model. The metaphor
of language of cinema had developed into a conceptual model for studying
cinema.
The case of modelling language of cinema as object of semiotics of
cinema brings forward also two issues of semiotic modelling in general: the
question of existence of the object thusly constructed on one hand, and
singularity or plurality of the object of study on the other.

EXISTENCE OF THE OBJECT

One of the continuing threads in film studies has been the tension between
empirical and humanistic inquiry. The film researchers aligning towards
more positivist or rational/empirical model of research often rise the issue of
the legitimacy of the language of cinema as object of scientific research. For
example David Bordwell criticises what he calls doctine-driven thinking in
humanities and film theory in particular, that dismisses empirical evidence
and allows any program to be applied to one or another phenomena
(Bordwell 2008: 2). This criticism, pointed towards ‘interpretive schools’ of
hermeneutic tradition that use various theories as a basis for modelling its
object of study, poses a questing about how theoretical language relates to
films, whether “verbal descriptions, metaphors, and interpretations of film
[are] only talk – talk that is removed from film itself”, as Edward Branigan
explains the issue (Branigan 2006: xvi). In other words: do these theoretical
concepts, models have empirical bases – or should they? If cinema is not
language, then how or why can we study it as language? How can we study
something as something else and with what purpose?
It is sometimes pointed out that this type of semiotic modelling that
does not build its models from empirical evidence but from theoretical
assumptions, can be seen as something peculiar to human sciences:

We may therefore distinguish two different kinds of scientific systems by

using as a criterion of demarcation the kinds of signs which these different
systems construct. In one system the signs must be fully realized. Within
these systems, if a representation exists, then a corresponding object must
exist. If a representation exists without a corresponding object, then the
discovery of this object becomes a valid problem for the theory. In the other
kind of system the existence of a representation does not carry with it the
necessary existence of a corresponding object. The search for such an object
is not a valid problem for the theory. The two kinds of scientific systems
which this criteria of demarcation defines correspond to the natural sciences
on the one hand and the human sciences on the other. (Gopnik 1977: 222)

Thus the hypothetical existence of the object of study – and semiotic

modelling as means of constructing this hypothetical object (one could refer
back to the issue of platypus or unicorn discussed by Eco) would be one
method how human sciences can achieve their aim of arriving at object that
is always firstly understood and interpreted, rather than simply described and
explained on the basis of purely empirical evidence. Moreover, as pointed out
by Nils Bohr abd Jöns Jacob Berzelius before him – sciences in general don’t
have so much to do with description of reality, but models and modelling of
the reality. Therefore no approach – empirical or interpretive – cannot avoid
using models when constructing their object of knowledge. Casting aside
certain conceptual models because they do not seem to be evidence-based
could result in falling to ontological fallacy that regards the particular model
of the object as its real essence.
In many ways, arriving at “certain point of view and [..] model”
(Casetti 1999: 19) was the fulfillment of the goal of going to the bottom of
the metaphor of language set by Metz (Bellour and Metz 1971: 1), since quite
often metaphors function in practice as basis for models, that bring together
disparate domains of knowledge to invent, organize or illuminate certain
theoretical constructs (Bowdle and Gentner 2005, Knudsen 2005).
Besides hypothetical metaphors are often used in sciences (e.g.
ecological footprint, genetic code, linguistic economy etc) in attempts to
make sense some new discovery. Quite often they develop into conventional
metaphors that become stable and fixed theoretical concepts with separate
conventsional sense (Knudsen 2005: 375) – a process Bowdle and Genter call
‘the career of metaphor’ (Bowdle and Gentner 2005).
SINGULARITY OF LANGUAGE OR PLURALITY OF WAYS TO MODEL IT

Language of cinema has never developed into a conventional metaphor but

has remained vague concept of multiple meanings – even despite the fact that
time and again there have been attempts to assign it more specific and
precise meaning.
There are many reasons for this. Firstly because its basis on everyday
language and conceptual interpretation has always been parallel to more
elaborate theoretical approaches to the issue. On the other hand there are
many different theoretical frameworks for modelling language that result in
different notions of language of cinema as well. Even, as briefly explained,
the initial structural approach went through considerable changes and later
the question of language was approached from various linguistic and non-
linguistic frameworks, e.g. the generative grammar, enunciation, systemic-
functional grammar etc. Thus the meaning of the metaphor of language of
cinema has not stabilised, since every framework actualizes different aspect
of cinema modelled as language (structural, communicative, rule governed,
interpretive, etc) and every framework brings to life new set of secondary
metaphors.
Noticeable part of cinema studies and semiotics has been constructed
as a battleground of different theoretical frameworks and models – approach
that seems to try to mimic the evolution of paradigms in sciences. Yet in
semiotics we should only talk about the complementarity of different models
and frameworks, since different viewpoints describe different aspects of the
object, model the object of study differently and, ultimately, offer different
understanding about the phenomena. The choice of model is not about truth
or better description of the object but of pertinence, as pointed out by Casetti
(1999: 20).
Methodological strenght of semiotics comes from understanding that
one way or another our theoretical framework always models our
understanding, therefore our object of study is alwayd partial, fragmentary
representation of the phenomena itself. This gives basis for seeing
complementarity between models and evaluating how one model improves
our understanding of an phenomena under study in comparison to other
models, allowing to developing further the body of knowledge in semiotics,
instead of rewriting and replacing the knowledge already obtained.
Every framework and every model opens up different problems and
questions. The generative approache does not replace semiological approach,
since one models language as syntactical competence the other as self-
organising system. Modelling as language is different from modelling as text
etc, modelling the interpretation of cinema on the basis of competence of the
author is different from modelling it on the basis of the competence of the
viewer .
By recognising the assumptions, premises and possible outcomes of
different theoretical frameworks and models and by integrating these partial
views into more integrated framework, we have in the end more diverse and
at the same time more coherent knowledge about the semiotic nature of
cinema.

CONCLUSIONS

Setting the semiotic modelling as a methodological tool on the background of

more broader semiotics of modelling allows us to appreciate the degree to
what any approach or attempt to understand inevitably models our
experience of the phenomena we aim to make sense of or to study. It is
exactly when this modelling capacity of our theories is taken into account
that we became to see modelling as methodological tool.
On the other realising that any model is necessarly partial
representation of the phenomena enables to see the complementarity
between different theories and models and appreciating the difficulties or
impossibility of arriving at one satisfactory model definition or explanation
for the phenomena. The development of the concept of language of cinema
from metaphorical notion into model – and ultimately models – of certain
aspects of cinema sheds light to some of the possibilities of methodological
modelling.

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