Prolegomena to a study on the concept of figura in cognitive semiotics

Many times cognitive semiotics have drawn inspiration for their theoretical conceptualization from different extra- or inter-disciplinary fields. One recent promising case is the use of the term figuration to account particularly for perception as an act of semiosis, which, according to Claudio Paolucci, is an imaginative morphological activity based on Gestalt laws. However, I contend that it is possible to delve more into the concept of “figura” from which the term “figuration” is derived in order to expand the scope and the results of the theory. First, I will provide a survey of the cultural background of the concept, claiming that it can be traced back to XX century; then, I will discuss its early uses in literary criticism and aesthetics; last, I will tackle its definition and study in semiotics. It will result that by such a notion one can account for the interactions between present percept, as figured by Gestalt laws, and previous knowledge as a store of priors figuring it further in terms of sense: in particular, the idea of figuration can be applied to the contribution that a prior, as a virtual diagrammatic analogue of a percept, plays in bringing forth the overall meaning of perception to the extent to which a relationship of conformity is established in which the former carries out an après-coup in the forms of the latter. Thus, figuration proves to be a good expression to cope with the complex manifold of aspects of perception.