The act of naming

Here is a story on naming from the first book of the Bible, Genesis:

Peterson explains the act of naming by the Man as the making of intimate relationships with animals and birds as well as a human fellow while using language (Peterson Reference Peterson2014, 79–81). However, the attitude of the Man appears to be different with respect to objects that are named. That is, to animals and birds, the Man gives a name directly, while for “Woman” the Man describes the name with an expressive mode as if they were in a dialogic relation. In addition, for animals and birds, the Man is like a museologist, defining things in the world, whereas for “Woman” he is like a poet who expresses feelings toward the world and the Woman, which then reflects himself.

There are many stories on naming in the Scriptures, and they appear to show two kinds of naming. One is “name-giving” with designation and the other is “name-describing” with symbolization. As in the story of the Man, the story of Hagar shows the two kinds of naming. Hagar, maid of Sarai, who is Abraham’s wife, runs away from her mistress; at a spring in the desert, she hears from an angel of God that her unborn child will be given the name Ishmael. Out of joy she describes God as “You’re the God who sees me” and the spring in the desert as “God-Alive-Sees-Me-Spring” (Genesis 16:7–16, cited in Peterson Reference Peterson2003, 20–21).

The two kinds of naming, that is, giving and describing/narrating, are intriguing with the use of language from the semiotic perspective. The act of naming involves the name, the object (the thing named), the namer, and the hearer. In terms of knowing an object by naming, the act of naming concerns designation/signification and symbolization by means of sign and symbol (Percy Reference Percy2019, 50–60).Footnote ¹ The distinction between sign and symbol lies in how they model a namer differently. A sign directs a namer to the object, while a symbol leads a namer to enter into a dialogic relation with the hearer through object symbolization. Hence, for a sign, iconic and indexical elements are dominant in a namer responding through causality, emotionally and physically, while for a symbol, a symbolic element is dominant in a namer asserting or representing object. As a result, symbolization allows a namer to name him/herself in self-appellation, leading into self-interpretation through a storyworld insomuch as a symbol appeals to the mind by way of intersubjectivity and mutual recognition. In this line of thought, I shall explore these two kinds of naming, both in continuity and discontinuity: “languaging” associated with metaphoric understanding of objects, and narrating, linked to allegorical understanding of the self and others through a storyworld, analyzing the relationship between Ieodo (Ieo Island) off the south coast of Korea and Jeju Islanders living on a nearby larger island (see Figure 1). The word Ieodo is a compound noun, Ieo (이어), meaning in Korean a hidden rock in the sea, appearing and disappearing according to tidal currents, and do (도), meaning an island. The story of Ieodo has been transmitted in the form of a legend among Jeju Islanders, dwelling in their mind as an imaginary island utopia. But then, Ieodo became known to the world through a collision between an English commercial ship, the Socotra, and the rock under the sea in 1900. Later, it was named “the Socotra Rock” after the ship in 1910Footnote ² (see Figure 2).

Figure 1.

Location of Ieodo (https://namu.wiki/w/이어도).

Figure 2.

Ieodo ocean research station (https://www.khoa.go.kr/ors/station_intro1.do; https://m.cafe.daum.net/lovegando/nfdd/408).

Regarding name-giving to inanimate referents, Danesi aptly pointed out that:

The implications of Danesi’s remarks on the inanimate coming to life are relevant to this paper, drawing attention to the semiotic process of naming and narrating of a place Ieodo coupled with the narrational activity of knowing the other and the self.

In this paper, I explore the relations of relations between a name (rhematic indexical legisign), the act of naming (designating and symbolizing), and a namer (a semiotic human agent and the self), looking at two language functions, designative and constitutive, as in naming and narrating, while discussing sign and symbol based on the relationship between Ieodo and the Jeju Islanders. In the following sections, first, I shall discuss naming and languaging, dealing with the name “Ieodo” as a proper name. Second, meaning-making of the place by narrating will be discussed, dealing with the semiotics of Ieodo in dialogic and communal narrational activity, which appears in the Jeju women divers’ storyworld as “Ieodo sana”, a form of work song sung by participants in a round-like fashion. Third, uses of Ieodo as a genuine symbol for the cultural world will be discussed as an example of the making of cultures by way of meaning-making in general, focusing on the constitutive semiotic relationship between a place and a namer/narrator in the lifeworld.

Naming and languaging: “Ieodo” as a proper name

What is the purpose of name-giving? What is the significance of the act of naming? What and who is a namer? According to Sebeok, the act of naming is a cultural activity, encoding the nature and the thing by affirming between a namer and a hearer (Sebeok Reference Sebeok1986, 94; see also Percy Reference Percy2019, 194). As mentioned earlier, the act of naming is understood as a process of becoming familiar with the environmentFootnote ³ by defining things and nature. In this respect, an uncanny feeling of anxiety arises when things and nature are not yet known or not yet symbolized. Thus, we are often destined to name things and nature for survival, thereby coming to know the environment. In this context, the Jeju Islanders, who face an unpredictable natural environment, were destined to give names to things and nature for survival and to make meaning. In this section, I shall discuss the relationship between a place, a name, and a namer, focusing on languaging through the act of naming.

We infer from the legend of Ieodo, told on Jeju Island, that the place was not yet known or not yet symbolized when fishermen went to sea for fishing. They saw something from a distance and perceived it as an island; and they approached it but never returned home. A wife at home would be waiting for her husband in distress and out of despair she created an imaginary island, Ieodo, as a utopia, but this is not a place in the actual world. The legend of Ieodo was transmitted through many generations and the people of Jeju Island share this story as the name of a utopia, given specially to them. Even though the Jeju Islanders now realize that the name, Ieodo, is considered to refer to an actual rock under the sea, they still respond to the place name “Ieodo” as a utopia symbolizing hope in their harsh living environment. The fact is that the “imaginary” island has been revealed as existing in the actual world through science and technology; however, the special quality of Ieodo still remains intact for Jeju Islanders. In other words, Ieodo has the dual meaning of death in the actual world and at the same time hope for a utopia in a possible world, and in this manner is regarded as an island of curse and redemption. Jeju Islanders believe that this ideal world provides them with hope in enduring their harsh living environment, which allows them to live life with dynamism while surviving alongside nature.

Semiotically speaking, the place name “Ieodo” functions to indexically reference and offer iconic sense-meaning for the people of Jeju Island. With respect to the relationship between the name Ieodo and the namers, Jeju Islanders, this relationship encompasses the object and the hearer, so that when a namer says to fellow islanders, “That place is Ieodo,” we can observe sign actions by semiotic agents with dialogic imagination between a namer and a hearer through their joint attention to an object with historical consciousness. Thus, the act of naming entails the languaging of iconic-indexical sign use.

The word “Ieodo” has a conceptual meaning as rhematic, indexical legisign for the Jeju Islanders based on their collateral experience. In other words, for them, the word Ieodo is regarded as a proper name which designates a particular place together with some information about it. This contrasts with those who are from outside of Jeju Island, who lack the history of Ieodo; accordingly, the name Ieodo could be interpreted as a class name, either for the concept of an island or simply the designation of an individual island. But for Jeju Islanders, who share the history of the name from the legend, the proper name Ieodo allows them to have a quality of feeling which relates to the factual knowledge of the place. In this regard, the function of a proper name as a subindex (Peirce Reference Peirce1998, 286) is similar to that of reagents (Peirce Reference Peirce and W. Burks1966, 241) as with a genuine index, which contains a Firstness as information on an object (Peirce Reference Peirce1998, 274), rather than designatives (Peirce Reference Peirce and W. Burks1966, 241) as with a degenerate index.Footnote ⁴ But, of course, in this case, the functions of a proper name, Ieodo, occur in relation to the namers who can respond and thus affirm, “That is Ieodo”; otherwise, as Peirce said, a proper name without signification is a degenerate index (Peirce Reference Peirce1998, 163). In this sense, when it comes to a proper name with reference to languaging which is described as the act of naming by a namer, the subject of naming is important, entailing collateral experience of the place to produce a nickname for it.

Following a theory on nicknames (Maddalena Reference Maddalena, Marietti and Fabbrichesi2009, 30), a nickname which is a kind of proper name allows us to see the history of a name. For instance, instead of calling the place Ieodo, people can call it “Parangdo”; instead of calling a man Mr. Cook, people can call him “Bouncer,” which is related to his physical posture for walking. A proper name as a genuine index for an existing person or place contains information on an object with vagueness. While discussing a concept of a proper name in Peirce, Maddalena points out that descriptionists emphasize the symbolic form of proper name, neglecting the indexical and iconic features of sign with its actuality and possibility (Maddalena Reference Maddalena, Marietti and Fabbrichesi2009, 33). For this reason, the first time Jeju Islanders say, “That is Ieodo,” this can be interpreted in the way that a namer asserts that the place “may be” seen as Ieodo and thus connecting the place in the actual world with an idea of Ieodo in a possible world based on collateral experience, thus connecting the subject and the predicate. Then, the proper name “Ieodo” for the namer becomes an icon of that index; when followed by habits, it becomes a symbol. Peirce states this transformation in a proper name with generality and singularity:

When Maddalena posited a theory of nicknames as a kind of proper name, he drew attention to the iconic and indexical functions of proper name to connect the history of the name and the source of significance rooted in the object’s reality. Put differently, he attempted to find a trace of icon in the individuality of a proper name. More importantly, what Maddalena suggests is that the role of the namer as a semiotic agent is that of a subject, one who engages in the act of naming as languaging for knowing activity of the object which is named.

Narrating and meaning-making: Ieodo as a possible world

In this section, I shall develop the analysis of the act of naming by turning to the semiotics of narrating and collective meaning-making of the place within a storyworld, by women divers (haenyeo, 해녀) on Jeju Island and their work folk song “Ieodo sana”. In doing so, I will demonstrate that language functions as the designative and the constitutive elements that from a semiotic perspective enable continuation of narrating and meaning-making.

A proper name as a linguistic sign functions as a mediator between a place and a namer. While a class name is a symbol being a concept in the mind, a proper name is a genuine index to be connected with an object in the actual world. But in considering languaging as cognitive activity rather than a study of sign systems, it is necessary to also consider that semiotic agents who act with creative power in languaging engage in a semiotic web of complexity, including the reckoning of inclusivity and continuity. This means that we presume a preverbal or averbal phase, ranging from the episodic through the mimetic and the mythic to the theoretic stages in the development of human cognition and culture (Donald Reference Donald2001, 260).

Following Vygotsky, a dominant feature in human development is the capability to use a tool for survival based on familiarity with the environment. When using tools for survival, culture develops accidentally as a by-product of activity (Vygotsky Reference Vygotsky, Cole, John-Steiner, Scribner and Souberman1978, Chap. 1). For humans as semiotic animals (Deely Reference Deely2005, 461–481), “tools” for survival are divided into two kinds in Vygotsky: a tool which directs humans to an object in nature in the external world to change it, influence it directly, which is called a technological/physical tool; and a tool which affects humans in the internal world by way of mediation indirectly, which is called a psychological tool, in other words, a sign (Vygotsky Reference Vygotsky, Cole, John-Steiner, Scribner and Souberman1978, 55; Kozulin Reference Kozulin, Hanfmann, Vakar and Kozulin2012, 62). Vygotsky mentioned elsewhere that when a child hears the sound of a “clock,” she/he looks at the clock instead of reading the time. This can be understood as two ways of tool use: one is the physical to pay attention to the thing signified directly, and the other is the psychological to read the time mediated by the clock; they are separable but mutually linked in cognitive development.

For Vygotsky, a sign, that is, the psychological tool, is language which is characterized by self-regulation in the semiotic process of internalization. “It [the sign] is a means of internal activity aimed at mastering oneself; the sign is internally oriented” (Vygotsky Reference Vygotsky, Cole, John-Steiner, Scribner and Souberman1978, 55). According to Sebeok, the primary function of language is as a “behavioral organ” for survival with the duality of verbal code, “which makes it feasible for the human mind to model the world and then… to ‘play around’ with this model” (Sebeok Reference Sebeok1986, 164). Then language evolved into a communicative means for social relations (Sebeok Reference Sebeok1986, 91; 189–192). In this respect, language precedes speech as a mental code or mental grammar (Danesi Reference Danesi2004, 96) for understanding of semiotic processes in communication. Furthermore, the verbal capacity of grammar can appear in various forms of materiality, such as paintings, gestures, songs, and stories in continuation with preverbal modeling from sense-experience (see Cobley Reference Cobley2014, Chap. 9). A story with imagination, whether in oral or written form, can become a psychological tool leading to a change of the internal world, mainly because of its self-referential feature with narrativity for world-making. In other words, the world-making semiotic elements embedded in stories with imagination are elements that can reproduce changes of internal worlds by way of re-presenting the world. Thus, a story has latent power to affect human feeling with empathy and sympathy through narrative imagination of “seeing as,” which implies not only “saying as” but also “being as” (Kearney Reference Kearney, Kemp and Rasmussen1988, 17), rather than human reasoning, which deals with fact and knowledge.

Now, story-making is world-making (Herman Reference Herman2009, 19–21) because a semiotic agent is involved in the process with motives and desires for action in meaning-making activity. Turning to the folk narrative of a storied place, the semiotic agent as a narrator of Ieodo “presupposes” the narratee who shares the history of Ieodo as a member of the cultural community. Based on this presupposition, women divers of Jeju Island remake the story of Ieodo for world-making to survive under their harsh living conditions by creating a work folk song “Ieodo sana,” which they sing when they go out diving to catch marine life under the sea. The act of narrating embraces that of languaging; however, the two are different in terms of the degree of semiotic engagement. By way of naming a thing in nature with a proper name, denoting the story of the legend, the namer’s attention is directed to the place Ieodo with a memetic meaning of the legend in surrounding world. Following Sebeok’s remarks above, the place is interpreted as a story of a legend by Jeju Islanders of a knowing organism, with which they then come to “play around” with the model, i.e. story-making, as a psychological tool to make a possible world based on the parallelism between the surrounding world of matter and the inner world of mind (Peirce Reference Peirce, Hartshorne and Weiss1931, 119). As a result, the place Ieodo through story-making is understood as “iconic augmentation” of reality (Kearney Reference Kearney, Kemp and Rasmussen1988, 17). In this regard, giving a name to a thing turns into a mysterious relation between subject and object, in which the place is not just a thing but an object for cognition in lifeworld.

The act of naming plays with the actual world in the Jeju “haenyeo” community, transforming the legend story into a work song representing the story. In this way, the narrator and the narratee are connected by means of narration of the place through sociocultural activity in “haenyeo’s” lifeworld (“Lebenswelt”) based on collateral experience of Ieodo with a denotated meaning. Naming Ieodo as a signification in their Umwelt relates to narrating it as world-making in their “Lebenswelt.” Based on languaging and narrating in the action of sign, the minds of Jeju women divers evolve in communication through dialogic situation, sharing feeling and knowing mediated by the place Ieodo.

Let us remember the Old Testament story of Adam in Genesis: The Man could not name himself until he named his companion as Woman, declaring “Finally! Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh! Name her Woman for she was made from Man” (Genesis 2:23, cited in Peterson Reference Peterson2003, 5). The narrator and the narratee are connected by the narration or description of his companion to reveal an intimacy. This can be applied to the women divers of Jeju Island through their knowing themselves collectively and individually, enabling their naming by remaking the legend of Ieodo. That is, narrating Ieodo through remaking allows them to relate to their fellow women divers, sharing feelings in solidarity based on collateral experience on Jeju Island.

The nickname of Jeju Island is the island which has plenty of three items: women, wind, and rocks, and which is called “Samdado” (삼다도, “three” + “plenty” + “island”) in Korean.Footnote ⁵ The women of Jeju Island are known to have to work hard to make a living, “haenyeos” whose livelihood consists of diving into the sea in order to harvest marine life in harsh waters. Geographically, Jeju Island in South Korea is a remote area separated from the mainland; thus, it was also well known as a land of exile in history. It is also said that for women of Jeju Island who lost their husbands at sea while fishing, the legend of Ieodo is presumed to be a story engendering meaning of their own survival, providing them with a possible world while living a harsh life.

Using the legend of Ieodo, Jeju “haenyeo” divers make their own stories in the form of a work folk song. Not only the lyrics which convey their life story but also the rhythm, provide them with solidarity among the “haenyeo” by feeling and knowing who they are in their “Lebenswelt.” This has led to forming the “haenyeo” culture on Jeju Island, whereby meaning is dialogically co-constructed in the activity of narrating Ieodo. Ironically, the possible world of Ieodo enables them to live in the actual world of Jeju Island. In this way, the mythic way of thinking affects real life, causing transformation for revaluation. The duality of Ieodo, appearing and disappearing, death and hope, makes the life of Jeju “haenyeo” divers dynamic by way of collateral experience of the place. The work song “Ieodo sana” by “haenyeo” has been transmitted in various versions to convey each individual “haenyeo’s” life story or “haenyeo” culture in general.Footnote ⁶ One version of “Ieodo sana” is as follows:

Recently, the “haenyeo” song “Ieodo sana” has been modified in the popular music genre rap through media appearances by Four Granny Rappers, who are professional “haenyeo” on Jeju Island; they have now reached mature age in their 60s and 70s. The “haenyeo” song “Ieodo sana” in the form of rap, rather than as a folk song, is adapted to 21st century culture, making-meaning with a new value by symbolizing the place known as Ieodo. This shows narrative mediation and communication of the place, Ieodo, by way of meaning-making activity with language function of naming and narrating through sign and symbol.

Meaning-making as the making of cultures: “Ieodo” as a genuine symbol

The above paragraph is the start of a novel Ieodo by Lee Chungjoon, a Korean novelist. The writer deals with the subject matter of fiction and reality in the novel by way of the theme of the legendary and fictional island, Ieodo, and pays attention to a vital question, asking himself whether there is any meaning at all in a fictional and imaginary island, Ieodo? In the novel, there are three characters who are related to the island Ieodo, with differing degrees of involvement. The main character, a lieutenant, Hyun Sunwoo from the mainland, undertakes a search mission for Ieodo and encounters the other two characters who are Jeju Islanders: reporter Chun Namseok, who is deeply involved with the mysterious island, who joins the search mission and disappears while on the mission; and Yang Jooho, Chun Namseok’s superior in a newspaper company, who is a storyteller on the relationship between Chun Namseok and the Island. Through these three characters, the writer unfolds the story of Ieodo and poses the question of meaning-truth versus knowledge-truth regarding the reality of the mysterious island, Ieodo.

The legendary island Ieodo, which is now known to be an actual rock, is still resonant with possibilities and thus leads to meaning-making activity in life by virtue of symbolization of Ieodo. Culture as meaning-making allows us to have freedom and power to create a possible world by which we can create our moral value through the actual mind being connected in a storyworld as a possible world. For narratees, the characters in the story might be a model for living, being identified with selfhood which is derived from narrative identity. Thus, identifying selfhood is understood as the objectification of selfhood in the semiotic process of narrative, that is, refiguration of a story based on individual experience (Venema Reference Venema2000, 136–143).

Refiguration is the way to relate to another spiritually through narrative imagination by way of a semiotic human agent between “you” and “I” as cultural selves (Taylor Reference Taylor1985, Chaps. 1 and 2). More importantly, the semiotic agent as narrator plays a role of symbolizing the place, endowing a new meaning in events of narration, and imputing a new value on the place for expression. The semiotic process of the narration of Ieodo allows us, capable and willing interpretants, to see not only others but also ourselves and thus to know who we are. Consequently, we are able to culture-reflexively name ourselves with self-knowledge. This can be done with a genuine symbol with degenerate forms of an abstract symbol and a singular symbol. Thus, a genuine symbol embeds index as a singular symbol which, in turn, embeds icon as an abstract symbol in a nested structure, following Peirce’s theory of symbol (Peirce Reference Peirce1998, 274; 8-10).

According to Peirce, a symbol is “symbolon” from Greek in etymology, meaning that two things are “thrown together” to be understood as “to signify for the making of a contract or convention” (Peirce Reference Peirce1998, 9). As we observed, the place name, Ieodo, has a duality of meaning, appearing, and disappearing, as a metaphor for possibility and actuality. The two qualities direct our attention to the internal and the external world by way of icon and index, but it is a semiotic agent that connects the two so as to produce a new meaning based on collateral experience. Consequently, “Ieodo” as a proper name which is characterized by an informational index with a signified icon as quality is interpreted by the Jeju women divers’ song “Ieodo sana,” which contains a life story of “haenyeo.” However, Ieodo as a genuine symbol grows in relationship with other cultures through the semiotic process of narration, symbolizing the place with a new meaning with a new value for transmission.

Regarding this process, I shall illustrate the name Ieodo as a genuine symbol for the making of cultures in generality and continuity by way of artwork. This means that we are able to observe the proper name Ieodo, which transforms into symbolic representation in various forms of artifact as seen by people who do not belong to Jeju Island and have different perspectives. These artifacts focus on the quality of the place and the intimate relationship between place and a person, interpreting Jeju cultures and cultures in general. Narrating Ieodo as a genuine symbol, accompanied by degenerate forms in iconic signification and indexical reference, is powerful in that the act of narrating will not be restricted to the cultural boundaries of Jeju Island but will reach a wider community of cultures by means of revaluation and refiguration of the relation of place and a person. For this reason, Ieodo as a genuine symbol allows us to see symbolic reference and symbolic form, directing us to the world of text and to dialogical selfhood.

Interestingly, we can also observe intertextuality in the novel Ieodo. The novel Ieodo (1974) hinted at a poem < Ieodo > (1963–1967?) by a prominent Korean poet, Ko Un, through one of the characters in terms of the mythical island of Ieodo. Also, this novel was adapted for a film “Ieodo” (1977) by a well-known Korean director, Kim Kiyoung, delineating the duality of Ieodo through contrasting values, traditional and modern. In view of the intertextuality, the novelist, the poet, and the movie director can be regarded as narrator of Ieodo through an artifact with a different perspective. The reader and the audience of the narration of Ieodo, as narratees, are engaged in understanding the relation between the place and the people of Jeju Island who create a story of Ieodo as a utopia, rather than Ieodo alone as a separate object for thought. Thus, by virtue of narration of Ieodo as a genuine symbol, we are able to see culture as meaning-making through sign appropriations, thinking through relations between a place and a person and thus growing a relationship with others and other cultures with revaluation to transmit the story of Ieodo. In this sense, we are part of the culture as the semiotic agent for making cultures through meaning-making narrational activity, being intersubjectively related to each other as narrator and narratee.