Media studies

Syntagmatic relationships are about positioning.

Paradigmatic relationships are about substitution.

Two sentences using the exact same words (syntagms), but very different meanings because the order (the syntagmatic relationship) of the words changed.

Diachronic linguistics is the study of the changes in language over time. Synchronic linguistics is the study of the linguistic elements and usage of a language at a particular moment. Diachronic analysis can be the general evolution of all languages or the evolution of a particular language or dialect. 

Discourse-discourse refers to a unit of language longer than a single sentence. Discourse studies look at the form and function of language in conversation beyond its small grammatical pieces such as phonemes and morphemes

Discursive formation-conceptually describes the regular communications (written and spoken) that produce such discourses, such as informal conversations. As a philosopher, Michel Foucault applied the discursive formation in the analyses of large bodies of knowledge, such as political economy and natural history.

Icon-The icon is the simplest since it is a pattern that physically resembles what it `stands for’.(A picture of your face is an icon of you.)

Index-Defined by some sensory feature, A, (directly visible, audible, smellable, etc) that correlates with and thus implies or `points to’ B, something of interest to an animal.(dark clouds in the west are an index of impending rain,)

Symbol-a mark or character used as a conventional representation of an object, function, or process, e.g. the letter or letters standing for a chemical element or a character in musical notation.

In Marxist theory, capitalist society consists of two parts: the base (or substructure) and superstructure. The base comprises the forces and relations of production (e.g. employer–employee work conditions, the technical division of labour, and property relations) into which people enter to produce the necessities and amenities of life. The base determines society’s other relationships and ideas to comprise its superstructure, including its culture, institutions, political power structures, roles, rituals, art family culture and state.

Hegemony: leadership or dominance by a country or social group over others.

Ideology: ideas or ideals which form the basis of economics or political theory and policy. Beliefs. The study of origin and nature. Visionary speculation. At times could be unrealistic.

The uncocious-Many, if not most, of the operations of the mind take place below the level of conscious awareness. The conscious mind contains all the thoughts, feelings, cognitions, and memories we acknowledge, while the unconscious consists of deeper mental processes that are not readily available to the conscious mind

ID-is the disorganized part of the personality structure that contains a human’s basic, instinctual drives. Id is the only component of personality that is present from birth.[7] It is the source of a person’s bodily needs, wants, desires, and impulses, particularly their sexual and aggressive drives

EGO-The ego is the component of personality that is responsible for dealing with reality. According to Freud, the ego develops from the id and ensures that the impulses of the id can be expressed in a manner acceptable in the real world

SuperEGO-The superego is the aspect of personality that holds all of our internalized moral standards and ideals that we acquire from both parents and society—our sense of right and wrong.

Paratextuality-meanings that are alluded to, above or beyond the printed text; interpretations of text.

Intertextuality-Intertextuality refers to the interdependent ways in which texts stand in relation to one another

Repetition Compulsion-is a psychological phenomenon in which a person repeats an event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event is likely to happen again. This “re-living” can also take the form of dreams in which memories and feelings of what happened are repeated, and even hallucinated.

Commodity fetishism-is the perception of the social relationships involved in production not as relationships among people, but as economic relationships among the money and commodities exchanged in market trade. As such, commodity fetishism transforms the subjective, abstract aspects of economic value into objective, real things that people believe have intrinsic value.(loving products not people, aliencation)`