The total configuration of the signs bound up in the babad is part of Pamijahan tradition. In this regard, Teeuw (1984, 38-56) proposes that a particular genre of literature entails a horizon of expectation (see also Culler 1974). If we push this assumption a little further, then we will find that a genre is the system of meaning attached to particular works. The framework or ‘horizon of expectations’ determines the meaning of the babad. Thus, the Babad Pamijahan is a configuration of signs for the villagers because the genre, or 'ground' in Peircean terms regiments it.^[8]

However, the gap between genre and the signification process and its result is still to be disclosed. We have to describe not only signs as a ‘type’ but also describe the mode of relation between a sign and its reference, and the relation between the reference and its interpretants. In other words; the schematic approach adopted from structuralism above, as suggested by Saussure and Levi-Strauss, only reveals a linear and an internal regulation, a 'grammar' of the text. We still have to describe the relation between the grammar and its references. In this case, the Peircean perspective is important. Peirce mentions three modes of relation between representation and object and these are icon, index, and symbol. (Parmentier 1994)

References or objects do not always refer to material culture but also to mental concepts. In these terms, there are two kinds of objects. The first is the object within the sign. (Parmentier 1994) The second is the ‘object outside of the sign’. Thus, the object can be both ‘fictive’ and ‘real’ at the same time depending on how the sign ‘indicates’ or “leaves the interpreter to find out by collater experience”. (Parmentier 1994; Rochberg-Halton 1986) The most important task for us now is to discern the relation between the signs in the Babad Pamijahan and their references, as well as their intepretants. It is a question of relations. What is the relation between the signs in the Babad Pamijahan and their objects as well as to their interpretant?