How Meanings of Brands Are Generated and Developed: A Semiotics Analysis of Brands

Jiang Shiping Rao Guangxiang

Chinese Journal of Journalism & Communication ›› 2015, Vol. 37 ›› Issue (3) : 79-90.

How Meanings of Brands Are Generated and Developed: A Semiotics Analysis of Brands

  • Jiang Shiping, PHD candidate at the Institute of Semiotics and Media Studies, Sichuan University. Email: jshiping@gmail.com Rao Guangxiang, associate professor at the College of Literature & Journalism, Sichuan University. Email: raoguangxing@gmail.com
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Abstract

Greimas Square, a model of signification, describes successive negations of meaning generation, and can be used to delineate the process in which the meaning of brand is developed. From this perspective, this paper points out that the meaning development of brand passes through four phases. Firstly, commodities are things or objects attached with no additional values. In the second phase, brands are created, and become signs of poeticalness, to distinguish themselves from other signs used in everyday life. When a brand develops into a famous one, it will be loaded with multiple connotations, and therefore enters the third phase. In the final phase, brand of luxury as a myth is constructed when it is built as a symbol representing an ideal or sort of spirit, and a new signification process will open.

Key words

branding signification / generation mechanism / Greimas Square / negations

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Jiang Shiping Rao Guangxiang. How Meanings of Brands Are Generated and Developed: A Semiotics Analysis of Brands. Chinese Journal of Journalism & Communication. 2015, 37(3): 79-90

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Funding

This paper is a result of the major project of National Social Science “The semiotics analysis of researching and development of present Chinese culture”.

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