DOI: 10.4231/5rzg-2526
title: Cinema: On the Classification of Signs and Time: Lecture 5, 14 December 1982

description: &lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;The Deleuze Seminars&lt;/em&gt; is a collection of audio recordings, transcriptions, and English translations of, and supplemental materials from, the lectures French philosopher Gilles Deleuze gave during his career at the University of Paris 8.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&ldquo;Cinema: On the Classification of Signs and Time&rdquo; was a 23-lecture seminar given from November 1982 to June 1983. This seminar revisits many of the main themes from the previous year&rsquo;s seminar (&quot;Cinema 1: The Movement-Image&quot;), and Deleuze commences the year by explaining that whereas he usually changes topics from one year to the next, he feels compelled to continue with the current topic and, in fact, to undertake a process of &ldquo;philosophy in the manner of cows, rumination&hellip; I want entirely and truly to repeat myself, to start over by repeating myself.&rdquo; Hence, the 1982-83 Seminar consists in once again taking up Bergson&rsquo;s theses on perception, but now with greater emphasis on the aspects of classification of images and signs drawn from C.S. Peirce. This allows Deleuze to continue the shift from considering the movement-image, that dominated early 20th century cinema, toward a greater understanding of the post-World War II emphasis on the time-image.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Continuing with Peirce&rsquo;s categories of Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness, Deleuze for each the &ldquo;modality&rdquo;, the &ldquo;quantity&rdquo;, and the &ldquo;act of mind&rdquo;, especially for the different aspects of Thirdness. After engaging in some parenthetical discussions (e.g., on the problem of the relation and the derivation of a logic of relations from the Empiricists, as well as on processes of the mind, with reference to Bergson&rsquo;s &lt;em&gt;Mind-Energy&lt;/em&gt; and &lt;em&gt;Matter and Memory&lt;/em&gt;), Deleuze links these perspectives to conical theory (also derived from Bergson) and then reconnects these perspectives to Peirce&rsquo;s categories, particularly to the characteristics of Thirdness. These theoretical intersections provide the basis for &ldquo;practical exercises&rdquo; with cinematographic examples linked to Peirce&rsquo;s categories, on one hand, with burlesque or slapstick, on the other hand, with types of actors and styles.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This dataset includes an aggregate version of the audio recordings into a single mp3, the complete French transcription and English translation in Open Document (odt) format, and the original Paris 8 French transcript.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;-&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;Les S&eacute;minaires de Deleuze&lt;/em&gt; sont une collection d&#39;enregistrements audio, de transcriptions et de traductions en anglais et de documents compl&eacute;mentaires des conf&eacute;rences que le philosophe fran&ccedil;ais Gilles Deleuze a donn&eacute; lors de sa carri&egrave;re &agrave; l&#39;Universit&eacute; de Paris 8.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&laquo; Cin&eacute;ma: de la classification des signes et le temps &raquo; a &eacute;t&eacute; un s&eacute;minaire de 23 conf&eacute;rences donn&eacute; de novembre 1982 &agrave; juin 1983. Ce s&eacute;minaire a repris certains des th&egrave;mes principaux du s&eacute;minaire de l&#39;ann&eacute;e pr&eacute;c&eacute;dente (&laquo; L&rsquo;image-mouvement, Leҫons bergsoniennes sur le cin&eacute;ma &raquo;), et en offre d&#39;autres consid&eacute;rations. Dans ces conf&eacute;rences, Deleuze examine le cin&eacute;ma et la philosophie bergsonienne vis-&agrave;-vis d&#39;une gamme de philosophes, des modernes aux existentialistes. Deleuze discute &eacute;galement de nombreux artistes et &eacute;crivains qui apparaissent dans les autres s&eacute;minaires sue le cin&eacute;ma.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Poursuivant avec les cat&eacute;gories de Peirce de Prim&eacute;it&eacute;, Second&eacute;it&eacute; et Tierc&eacute;it&eacute;, Deleuze aborde pour chacune d&rsquo;elles la &laquo; modalit&eacute; &raquo;, la &laquo; quantit&eacute; &raquo; et l&rsquo;&laquo; acte de l&rsquo;esprit &raquo;, en particulier pour les diff&eacute;rents aspects de la Tierc&eacute;it&eacute;. Apr&egrave;s avoir engag&eacute; quelques discussions entre parenth&egrave;ses (par exemple sur le probl&egrave;me de la relation et de la d&eacute;rivation d&rsquo;une logique des relations des empiristes, ainsi que sur les processus de l&rsquo;esprit, en r&eacute;f&eacute;rence &agrave; &lt;em&gt;L&rsquo;&Eacute;nergie spirituelle&lt;/em&gt; et &lt;em&gt;Mati&egrave;re et M&eacute;moire&lt;/em&gt; de Bergson), Deleuze relie ces perspectives &agrave; la th&eacute;orie conique (&eacute;galement d&eacute;riv&eacute;e de Bergson) et relie ensuite ces perspectives aux cat&eacute;gories de Peirce, en particulier aux caract&eacute;ristiques de la Tierc&eacute;it&eacute;. Ces intersections th&eacute;oriques fournissent la base d&rsquo;&laquo; exercices pratiques &raquo; avec des exemples cin&eacute;matographiques li&eacute;s aux cat&eacute;gories de Peirce : d&rsquo;une part, au burlesque ou au slapstick, et d&rsquo;autre part, aux types d&rsquo;acteurs et aux styles.&lt;/p&gt;
description: Lecture given by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze at the University of Paris 8, 14 December 1982. This is lecture 5 of a 23-lecture seminar Deleuze taught between November 1982 and June 1983.