Relevant to the emerging field of semiotic cultural psychology theory (SCPT), the present paper considers ‘We’, ‘Us’, ‘I’ and ‘Me’ as semiotic and cultural psychology phenomena. Drawing on the semiotics of Saussure, Peirce, Jakobson, and Cousins, a semiotic dynamic ‘double-dyadic’ model of the signifier and the referent is proposed. For each ‘We’, ‘Us’, ‘I’ and ‘Me’, the COVID-19 global pandemic related cases are used to analyse and illustrate the signifier-referent model. Implications are drawn from the new model for the complex systems entailed in organizing self and culture. Finally, suggestions are made for testing the model.
BrancoA.ValsinerJ. (2010). Towards cultural psychology of affective processes: Semiotic regulation of dynamic fields. Estudios de Psicología, 31(3), 243–251. https://doi.org/10.1174/021093910793154411.
GarcíaA.OlivaresH.SimãoL. M.DominguezA. L. (2020). Socioemotional interactions in collaborative learning: An analysis from the perspective of semiotic cultural psychology. Culture & Psychology, 27(3), 208–226. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354067X20976513.
12.
GiddensA. (1984). The constitution of society. Outline of the theory of structuration. Polity.
13.
GillespieA.ZittounT. (2010). Using resources: Conceptualizing the mediation and reflective use of tools and signs. Culture & Psychology, 16(1), 37–62. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354067X09344888.
HermansH. J. M. (2001). The dialogical self: Toward a theory of personal and cultural positioning. Culture & Psychology, 7(3), 243–281. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354067X0173001.
16.
JakobsonR. (1960). Linguistics and poetics. In SebeokT. (Ed.), Style in Language (pp. 350–377). M.I.T. Press.
17.
KeatsD. M. (1997). Culture and the child: A guide for professionals in child care and development. Wiley.
18.
KokK. P.LoeberA. M.GrinJ. (2021). Politics of complexity: Conceptualizing agency, power and powering in the transitional dynamics of complex adaptive systems. Research Policy, 50(3), 104183. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2020.104183.
19.
LehmannO. V.MurakamiK.KlempeS. H. (2019). Developmentally oriented thematic analysis (DOTA): A qualitative research method to explore meaning-making processes in cultural psychology. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 20(2), . https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-20.2.3190.
20.
MärtsinM. (2019). Identity development in the lifecourse: A semiotic cultural approach to transitions in early adulthood. Springer Nature.
21.
MeadG. H. (1934). Mind, self, and society: From the standpoint of a social behaviorist. University of Chicago Press.
22.
MeadG. H. (1938). The Philosophy of the Act (edited, with an Introduction, by C.W. Morris). University of Chicago Press
PeirceC. S. (1978). In HartshorneC.WeissP. (Eds.), The collected papers of Charles Sanders Peirce, Vol. II. Elements of logic. Belknap.
25.
RutherfordG. D. (2011). A model of assimilation and accommodation in the cognitive & cultural realms. Dynamical Psychology. http://dynapsch.org.
26.
RutherfordG. D.KirkpatrickJ. B.DavisonA.. (in press). A relational model of economic organization: Relations within, between and among economic scales. Journal of Economic Issues.
27.
SalvatoreS.ValsinerJ.VeltriG. A. (2019). The Theoretical and methodological framework. semiotic cultural psychology, symbolic universes and lines of semiotic forces. In SalvatoreS.FiniV.MannariniT.ValsinerJ.VeltriG. (Eds.), Symbolic universes in time of (Post)crisis. culture in policy making: The symbolic universes of social action (pp. 25–49). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19497-0_2.
28.
SaussureF. d. (1983). Course in general linguistics (R. Harris, trans.). Duckworth
29.
TajfelH.TurnerJ. (1986). The social identity theory of inter-group behavior. In WorchelS.AustinL.W. (Eds.), Psychology of intergroup relations (pp. 7–24). Nelson Hall.
ValsinerJ. (1998). The guided mind: A sociogenetic approach to personality. Harvard University Press.
32.
ValsinerJ. (1999). I create you to control me: A glimpse into basic processes of semiotic mediation. Human Development, 42(1), 26–30. https://doi.org/10.1159/000022606.
33.
ValsinerJ. (2002). Forms of dialogical relations and semiotic autoregulation within the self. Theory & Psychology, 12(2), 251–265. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959354302012002633.
34.
ValsinerJ. (2005). Scaffolding within the structure of dialogical self: Hierarchical dynamics of semiotic mediation. New ideas in Psychology, 23(3), 197–206. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.newideapsych.2006.06.001.
35.
ValsinerJ. (2007). Semiotic autoregulation: Dynamic sign hierarchies constraining the stream of consciousness. Σημειωτκή-Sign Systems Studies, 35(1–2), 119–136. https://doi.org/10.12697/SSS.2007.35.1-2.04.
ValsinerJ. (2016). The nomothetic function of the idiographic approach: Looking from inside out. Journal for Person-Oriented Research, 2(1–2), 5–15. https://doi.org/10.17505/jpor.2016.02.
ValsinerJ. (2020). Hyper-generalization by the human mind: The role of sign hierarchies in meaning-making processes. Psychosozial Verlag.
42.
ValsinerJ.Van der VeerR. (1988). On the social nature of human cognition: An analysis of the shared intellectual roots of George Herbert Mead and Lev Vygotsky. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 18(1), 117–136. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5914.1988.tb00119.x.
43.
ValsinerJ.Van der VeerR. (2000). The social mind: Construction of the idea. Cambridge University Press
44.
Van der VeerR.ValsinerJ.CockingR.RenningerK. A. (1993). The encoding of distance: The concept of the zone of proximal development and its interpretations. In CockingR.R.RenningerK.A. (Eds.), The development and meaning of psychological distance (pp. 35–62). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
45.
WagonerB. (2009). The experimental methodology of constructive microgenesis. In ValsinerJ.MolenaarP. C. M.LyraM. C. D. P.ChaudharyN. (Eds.), Dynamic process methodology in the social and developmental sciences. (pp. 99–121). Springer Science + Business Media. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-95922-1_5.
