Floating signifier - Wikipedia
In semiotics and discourse analysis, floating signifiers (also referred to as empty signifiers, [1] although these terms have been made distinct [2]) are signifiers without a referent.
Floating signifier - Oxford Reference
6 days ago · A signifier without a specific signified (see sign). Also known as an ‘empty signifier’, it is a signifier that absorbs rather than emits meaning.
Empty signifier - Oxford Reference
(semiotics) Variously defined as a signifier with a vague, highly variable, unspecifiable, or non-existent signified. Such signifiers mean different things to different people: they may stand for many or even any signifieds; they may mean whatever their interpreters want them to mean.
Empty signifiers - Laclau and Mouffe’s Discourse Theory
As stated, empty signifiers (the emptying entirely of particularity from the signifier) are a theoretical possibility only, as a signifier cannot be entirely emptied of particularity (Laclau, 1994: 167).
empty signifier - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
empty signifier (plural empty signifiers) (sociology, philosophy) A signifier—that is, a linguistic sign, a label or slogan—with no fixed and delimited meaning, which can therefore be interpreted in many ways and represent a range of different beliefs and aspirations. Near-synonyms: floating signifier, master signifier
How ‘empty’ is the signifier ‘the people’? Impasses of the ...
Jun 30, 2023 · This article looks at the ‘empty signifier’, a central but nonetheless elusive concept for understanding the logic that underpins the political construction of ‘the people’ as it was theorized in On Populist Reason. It begins by examining its epistemological foundations, which revisit the principles of Saussurean modern linguistics, and ...
a guide to analyze how absence relates to hegemony by way of empty signifiers. Second, the chapter provides a methodological contribution in exploring the challenges of identifying the empty signifier as distinct from the floating and the fixed signifier. So far, linguistic aspects of Laclau Conspicuous by Presence: The Empty Signifier…