Surprise between media, minds and world : A Peircean process semiotic approach

Abstract: The central idea of this thesis is that the relationship between cognition,media and environments is regulated by surprise. The relationship between cognition, media and environments is a foundational problem for studies of cognition, culture and/or communication. This thesis introduces a view on this relationship, based on the concept of surprise within the framework of Peircean process semiotics. This framework consists of an original interpretation and application of Peirce's semiotics oriented by premisesfrom process philosophy. Peirce's semiotics conceives of communication,cognition and one's relation to the environment in terms of triadic signaction, or semiosis. “Triadic” here expresses a skepticism of any dualism (mind/matter, subject/object, representation/represented object...). Process philosophy is a worldview and a mode of thinking based on the notion of dynamic and emergent processes. Peircean process semiotics entails two positions: semiotic processualism and active semiotic externalism. In semiotic processualism, semiosis is a dynamic and temporally distributedprocess. Semiosis interweaves present, past, and future according to ageneral and recursive temporality. In active semiotic externalism, agency in semiosis is external to the agents themselves, distributed in cognitive niches of organisms, artifacts, and environmental conditions.Semiosis depends on and responds to an underlying logical situation of surprise. Surprise underlies and regulates temporal distribution of semiosisand the externalist agency of semiosis. I illustrate these notions withexamples from Brazilian poetry. From the viewpoint of semioticprocessualism, surprises are crises in the temporal distribution of semiosis,when the recursive time of habit and anticipation is disturbed. I illustrate this view with concrete poetry, a form of avant-garde poetry. Against versified poetry, Brazilian concrete poets pursued a crisis in the time of the poem and in the historical time of poetry. From the viewpoint of activesemiotic externalism, surprises are shifts in agency, when the roles of agent and patient change within a cognitive niche. I illustrate this view with Repente, a tradition of improvisational and competitive poetic dialogues. Repente produces surprise for the poets and for the audience through thejoint dynamic action of versification procedures, guitar playing and singing.