Qualia and Ontology: Language, Semiotics, and Materiality; an Introduction
Lily Chumley
Signs and Society 2017 DOI: 10.1086/690190 (opens in new tab)
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AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that attention to qualia, as sensory and somatic experiences mediated by cultural qualisigns of value, provides a useful analytic approach to the dialectics of matter and nonmatter. The authors contend that qualia and qualisigns play a crucial role in "ontological politics" and that the issue's articles show how modes of being and becoming are organized by discourses on qualia. |
Abstract
Abstract: Qualia—sensory experiences of abstract qualities such as heat, texture, color, sound, stink, hardness, and so on—focus attention on prototypically “material” entities. But how is the ontological category of materiality constituted by conventional qualities, or qualisigns ? For instance, how does the sound made by knuckles knocking on a table come to be an exemplary experience of, and a conventional sign for, “materiality”? What ontologies might undermine the seeming naturalness of this category, and to what effect? This issue contributes to the growing literature on semiotic approaches to materiality by arguing that attention to qualia , as sensorial and somatic experiences mediated by cultural qualisigns of value (Munn 1986), offers a useful analytic approach to the dialectics of matter (substrate, affordance) and nonmatter (idea, concept, category). The articles in this issue describe how modes of being and becoming are represented in and organized by discourses on qualia and demonstrate the crucial role of qualia and qualisigns in “ontological politics” (Mol 1999).