Architecture & Linguistics

The 20th century is intituled as"linguistics's century". As other genres of art, the theories of Architectural Language are also widely spread. With the development of culture and conceptions, the conception of Architectural Language and its application are always changing. This paper sums up and analyse the theories of Architectural Semiology and Space Syntax which are most influential now and ever, while using the relationship between architecture and linguistics as a clue.Semiology is a new subject arised from the 20th century which has consanguineous relationship with the development of linguistics and structuralism. The Architectural Semiology arised after the 1960s effectively resolved the problem of"Meaning Crisis"that modernism was faced with, and became the theoretical foundation stone of Post Modernism. At the same time, it provided the theoretical sustentation for Deconstruction. The paper concisely and by the numbers sums up some conceptions of Semiology and system info of Architectural Semiology. Combining with the trend of contemporary Western Architecture and the viewpoint of Semiotic Aesthetics, the paper extends the system info of modern Semiology, discusses Architectural Semiology on the level of Semiotic structure, semiotic signification and semiotic application, and introduces the basic theories(Gestalt Psycology and Prototype Theory), in order to obtain the relatively integrated system info of Architectural Semiology.As a rearch in architectural space, Space Syntax was invented by Bill Hillier, Julienne Hanson and some others from Bartlett, School of Architecture, University College of London. During the 20 year's development, the theory of Space Syntax has been included in the research of Architecture and city special essence and function, and becoming more and more perfect. A series of software was exploited, which could be used in the special analysis in any Built Environment, and was widely used in Architecture and city design. This paper uses the Configuration of Space Syntax as a clue to introduce some conceptions and methods of Space Syntax. In the end, it introduce the appliancation of Space Syntax in analyzing various scale space.