Self-description
Self-description

Summary/Abstract: Self-description is an autocommunicative process which takes place on different levels of the semiosphere. Self-description provides rigid and hierarchical organization to semisospherical units. Self-description is one of the key-concepts of cultural semiotics and is essential in the context of understanding the frameworks of semiosphere and culture and explosion. Lotman sees the need for self-description as an important universal which can be treated as a basis of the typologization of culture. Following article outlines how the concept is used in the field of cultural semiotics and also briefly points out how it is understood in closely related disciplines. The main emphasis is put on introducing how Juri Lotman has elaborated different aspects of self-description. I predominantly concentrate on 3 focuses: 1) the importance of self-description in core-periphery relations; 2) what kind of self models can be the result of the process of self-description; and 3) how self-descriptions can be used as a basis of cultural typologies. I also outline some contemporary usages and further developments of the concept in Estonian cultural semiotics.

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