Cultural semiotics is a holistic approach to understanding how culture generates new meanings. It views culture as a complex system of interconnected meanings called a "semiosphere" by Yuri Lotman. The semiosphere facilitates the exchange of meanings across space and time within a permeable boundary. Lotman saw the semiosphere both as the space where meaning occurs and as a participant in an ongoing dialogue that establishes shared meanings and generates new meanings for culture over time through cultural memory.