The Signs’ Behavior in Autistic Children: Semiosis of an Unspoken Language

Abstract

The present paper aims to elaborate on some of the communicational deficits in children
with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Treating autism semiotically entails in itself a multitude
of semiotic processes. We may evidence these with: the process of intermediation in communicating
abilities, a special sort of reaction, as well as inter-subjective feedback within frames of the
communication with the other, and/or significant other. In my view, besides, an autistic child
conceptualizes his/her social reality through sensory-deficits which look unusual to the rest of
the world. Owing to his/her pre-existential signs, which belong to the organic nature of the
problematics, such children transform such sorts of communication into passionate tantrums
and/or meltdowns, through their repetitive and stereotyped behavior. This thus makes the
problematics semiotically relevant. The semiotics of passions, as well as existential semiotics, deduces a
semantic taxonomy aimed at a process of semiosis of an unspoken language, thus making visible the
similarities and/or differences between a typical and/or atypical sort of behavior (or: between autistic
and non-autistic “worlds”). In conclusion, the “signs in action” transform themselves into meaningful
semantic units in frames of the “physiologically” conceptualized actions by autistic children.