The purpose of this research is to study the polarized discourse as encoded in the ideological structures of reports by the two Iranian and American news websites: CNN and Press TV. The researcher analyzes online news texts on the US sanctions against Iran from the randomly selected news during a specific period of time. The study of these news reports is implemented in the framework of Critical Discourse Analysis. The ideological characteristics of the polarization are found in the quotation patterns and labeling. Therefore, this research draws an inference at how the two news websites represent a distinction between ‘us' versus ‘them' by emphasizing the in-groups and de-emphasizing the out-groups. Moreover, it is proved that the news texts of each website devalue statements by the ‘other' who is not present and, in this regard, direct quotations are avoided.

The present study seeks to analyze cultural semiotics of carpet and furniture place, as significant objects rooted in Iranian culture for centuries, and in the process of paradigmatic and syntagmatic, they examine the functional, anthropological, semantic and value differences in Iranian cultural discourse. Thus, the main question is “what has been the influence of carpet and furniture as the main household objects in Iranian lifestyles during the contemporary era, and what elements and concepts of our identity and culture have transformed in this interaction?”. According to the findings of this research, it can be argued that carpet, together with many of its meanings in the contemporary era, has lost its central position, become smaller and found an auxiliary function alongside other furniture. Its practical value has diminished, and sometimes has an amusing aspect, while the furniture has enjoyed many signs meanings and has not only changed Iran's lifestyle in the contemporary era, but it also caused a greater distinction and formality of communications. It also acts as a sign of power and distinctive relations. As a result, it is understood how the objects are measured and valued based on social class and tastes in the contemporary lifestyle.

Thanks to the globalisation, it has become so easy for people to communicate with each other and variety of means have been developed to facilitate this process. International languages have played an important role in the development of globalisation. It can be argued that communicating in international languages has become the very first step in getting involved in this process. The main goal of learning a language is to develop one's proficiency in communicating effectively with others and understand the differences that may rise either linguistically or culturally in different contexts. To achieve it, language learners' cultural competence is required to be developed and this would also enable them to develop new perceptions towards their own culture as well as others'. This article aims at addressing the issue of cultural competence as one of the most vital aspects of language teaching as well as its development as time passes by.

Artworks that have traditionally been placed inside museums are now being transformed by and understood within the digital space of Instagram – a dominant visually oriented social media platform. The current essay presents an ontological reasoning, attempting to explicate the changing conditions of art, and further, the transformation of its aura, remediated by new social media. Drawing on seminal theoretical works by Walter Benjamin (1969), and Bolter and Grusin (2000), the altered ways of consuming and experiencing art in the contemporary world are critically discussed. The understanding of the hyper-mediated art experiences of Instagram users, who are characterized as postmodern digital ‘tourists,' is followed by an attempt to reinterpret the concept of aura, which is inevitably influenced by the highly interactive, visually oriented new social media. It is suggested as a conclusion that the reflections on the changing modes of art consumption in the designated space of museums versus in the digital space of Instagram lead to a problematization of the museums' role in the current social media age, and further, of the social media's approach to the digital sharing of artworks.

This article focuses on singularities, that is, rare, abnormal, exceptional, or unusual things throughout the history of Philosophy, science, or arts. Considered in the light of the principle according to which, there is no science of the particular, the singularities, however at the source of many discoveries, have long been ignored or rejected on the side of the Wonders before being, rather belatedly , regarded as the origin of forms, of the very life of the universe. This article reports on this major epistemological reversal.

The aim of this paper is to analyze Prieto's reading of Éric Buyssens' seminal work on semiology, Les langages et le discours, Essai de linguistique fonctionnelle dans le cadre de la sémiologie. The analysis is made from two perspectives: a historical perspective and a theoretical perspective. The historical perspective presents the context, regarding Prieto's academic work, within which Prieto read Buyssens, for this we take into consideration the papers Prieto published in second half of the 50's and the research reports from 1962 to 1965 that are held in the Prieto archives at the Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. The theoretical perspective is mainly grounded on the hypothesis that Prieto made a “cognitive reading” of Buyssens' claims. The analysis is divided according to three thematic areas: (a) the treatment of “abstraction” in Buyssens and in Prieto, (b) the problem of the delimitation of functional units as a cognitive problem, and (c) the distinction between communication versus indication.

Based on the criteria required for reading a book, two general notions, the “text” and the “manuscript”, are defined and explained at the beginning of this article from a semiological point of view. On this basis, several editions of Ferdinand de Saussure's manuscripts are then analysed, highlighting the deficiencies, which are often due to the disorder created in archive collections by superimposing manuscripts. A better classification of a primordial manuscript and the dating of another published manuscript are thus brought to light. Finally, it is proposed that this distinction between “text” and “manuscript” must be adopted and that Saussure's texts be favored in the reading and study of Saussure's manuscripts.

The research object of linguistics is the spoken characters, or the spoken language, which follow the principle of linearity. However, Chinese is an exception, with its characters as the second language. This is why Saussure concludes that Chinese is absolutely diverse. His second conclusion, then, is that Chinese is a language for critical thinking. This paper explores the Chinese language system, starting from segmenting the acoustic chain, where the issue of segmentation comes naturally. How can we segment Chinese characters? We find that the components of characters imply the way of segmentation, as is shown in the number of Seven and Eight. Why Seven and Eight? We attempt to find the reasons through two myths about the origin of Chinese character writing: He-tu and Luo-shu. This paper also studies the structure of symbols of Chinese characters with the support of the first Chinese dictionary, Shuowen Jiezi, and confirms Saussure's assertion of Chinese. The exploration of the segmentation approach also verifies Saussure's conclusion that linguistic symbols are a pure value system, and that the critical nature of Chinese is fully realized in the exploration of value systems. The Chinese language system and Saussure's theory fit each other well.

The purpose of this article is to shed a philosophical light on the nature of the living, and to do so on the nature of the various vital operations, the symbolic and sensory embodiments of which will be studied. That phenomenology will be firstly done from a general point of view: what is life? what is a vital act, a vital operation? But that general definition being an abstraction made from the diversity of reality, we will also consider that diversity, i.e. acts such as development, sensible knowledge, intellectual knowledge, inclination and transmission. That approach is part of a general context in which many reflections are carried out about what a “living machine” could be. Furthermore, a context in which emerging hypotheses make connections between vital characteristics on the one hand, and confidence and attachment to objects on the other hand. That invites us to question the nature and diversity of vital operations, as well as their tangible characteristics.