The history of such a field might begin with traditional modes of criticism. It would take ideas from the New Critics such as Vimsatt and Beardsley and provide a "close reading" of the text in question. Semiotics, the science of signs and sign systems, would provide a fruitful road to travel, beginning with Saussure's distinction of the signified and signifier, and continuing with Peirce's triadic object-interpretant ground. Early semiotic instructional technology would be seen as a theoretical attempt to relate a specific object with a specific meaning. Our study would segue into the philosophy of hermeneutics, the art and science of interpretation. Structuralism would provide a way to hang many of these diverse trends together, as researchers search for meaning in structure. The products of educational technology clearly provide a structural model that becomes known as the systems approach.