Cultures as Semiotic Systems: Reconceptualizing Culture in a Systemic Perspective

Abstract

This paper incorporates a broad understanding of culture into Mario Bunge’s systemist philosophy. Cultures are viewed as semiotic systems. Semiotic systems are symbolic systems along with their users. This approach makes it possible to relate immaterial symbolic systems to real material social systems via semiotic systems, which are neither purely material nor purely ideal, but combine elements of both. The goal is to sketch an ontology of culture that is consistent with emergentist materialism, and useful for the integration of culture into social science analysis.