Semiotics as a general intellectual movement has often lacked a specific focus that would enable an outsider to see where the plethora of proposed methods and claimed insights are coming from. This text aims to resolve this problem by showing that semiotics in general is a particular development of the action of signs in one specific region of life, namely, that occupied by the human species. By exploring in detail the requirements for such sign usage, Deely provides a semiotic framework for the human sciences in general and anthropology in particular. He sheds new light on the requirements of epistemology, including the question of the origin of language.