Virtual issue on honor of Jesper Hoffmeyer

Biosemiotics has published a virtual issue in honor of Jesper Hoffmeyer. The virtual issue consists of the editorial "Jesper Hoffmeyer´s biosemiotic legacy" and all his Springer Nature publications (6 articles and 8 book chapters), which are freely accessible online for a period of 8 weeks.

Biosemiotics on Twitter and Facebook

Our journal Biosemiotics is now officially on Twitter and Facebook:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Biosemiotics1

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Biosemiotics

Do follow us there to stay up to date, interact and share biosemiotic publications!

2nd CFP: Special issue "Semiotic aspects of the extended synthesis"

***Extended Deadline for Abstracts to May 1st 2017***

CALL FOR PAPERS
For a Special Issue of the journal Biosemiotics: Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis.

The journal Biosemiotics (Springer) is preparing a special issue on “Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis” guest-edited by Andrew M. Winters. While the field of biosemiotics is concerned with the origin and development of natural semiotic systems, much of the discussion has been framed in terms of Darwinian frameworks, including the Modern Synthesis. Non-Darwinian views were held by Uexküll and, more recently, Darwinian views have been supplemented in important ways by Kull, Hoffmeyer, and Barbieri. Many biological phenomena, such as transgenerational epigenetic inheritance, have yet to be explained in terms of these evolutionary theories. In the 1980s, biologists aimed to develop an Extended Synthesis to build upon and replace parts of the Modern Synthesis to better accommodate and explain these observed phenomenon. Given recent discussions of the Extended Synthesis, this Special Issue aims to understand the extent to which biosemiotics is commensurate with burgeoning developments in contemporary biology by exploring how core features of biosemiotics are either consistent or at odds with those accommodated by the Extended Synthesis.
 

The Special Issue of “Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis” welcomes papers that analyze specific semiotic processes within the Extended Synthesis, assess the general tenability of understanding biosemiotics in terms of the Extended Synthesis, or explore the relationship between biosemiotics and the Extended Synthesis. Papers in the form of theoretical works, empirical findings, or metatheoretical considerations are welcome.

Some potential questions to be explored in this Special Issue include:• How does the extended synthesis differ from Darwinian evolution and the modern synthesis in its impact on biosemiotics?• Does niche construction involve the construction of signs?• How does semiotics contribute to evolutionary-developmental biology?• Do signs further enhance plasticity and accommodation?• Are signs replicable?• Do signs and semiotic systems evolve?• Are signs capable of emerging and contributing to multilevel selection?• To what extent are candidate signs (e.g., genes) involved in genomic evolution? 

Technical Details and Timeline:• Paper Proposals (Title and Abstract) Due May 1st, 2017• Notification of Acceptance May 31st, 2017• Paper Submissions Due September 30th, 2017• Final Drafts Due January 31st, 2018• Electronic Publication February 2018• Print Version Issue #2 August 2018• Papers should be no more than 7,000 words (minus abstract and references)
• Instructions for authors can be found at:http://www.springer.com/life+sciences/evolutionary+%26+developmental+biolog
y/journal/12304• Submit abstracts and contact the editor at andrew.winters@sru.edu

CFP for special issue on the Extended Synthesis

CALL FOR PAPERS

For a Special Issue of the journal Biosemiotics: Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis

The journal Biosemiotics (Springer) is preparing a special issue on “Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis” guest-edited by Andrew M. Winters. While the field of biosemiotics is concerned with the origin and development of natural semiotic systems, much of the discussion has been framed in terms of Darwinian frameworks, including the Modern Synthesis. Non-Darwinian views were held by Uexküll and, more recently, Darwinian views have been supplemented in important ways by Kull, Hoffmeyer, and Barbieri. Many biological phenomena, such as transgenerational epigenetic inheritance, have yet to be explained in terms of these evolutionary theories. In the 1980s, biologists aimed to develop an Extended Synthesis to build upon and replace parts of the Modern Synthesis to better accommodate and explain these observed phenomenon. Given recent discussions of the Extended Synthesis, this Special Issue aims to understand the extent to which biosemiotics is commensurate with burgeoning developments in contemporary biology by exploring how core features of biosemiotics are either consistent or at odds with those accommodated by the Extended Synthesis.  

The Special Issue of “Semiotic Aspects of the Extended Synthesis” welcomes papers that analyze specific semiotic processes within the Extended Synthesis, assess the general tenability of understanding biosemiotics in terms of the Extended Synthesis, or explore the relationship between biosemiotics and the Extended Synthesis. Papers in the form of theoretical works, empirical findings, or metatheoretical considerations are welcome.  

Some potential questions to be explored in this Special Issue include: 

• How does the extended synthesis differ from Darwinian evolution and the modern synthesis in its impact on biosemiotics? 

• Does niche construction involve the construction of signs? 

• How does semiotics contribute to evolutionary-developmental biology? 

• Do signs further enhance plasticity and accommodation? 

• Are signs replicable? 

• Do signs and semiotic systems evolve? 

• Are signs capable of emerging and contributing to multilevel selection? 

• To what extent are candidate signs (e.g., genes) involved in genomic evolution? 

Technical Details and Timeline:

• Paper Proposals (Title and Abstract) Due January 31st, 2017

• Notification of Acceptance February 28th, 2017 

• Paper Submissions Due September 30th, 2017

• Final Drafts Due January 31st, 2018

• Electronic Publication February 2018

• Print Version Issue #2 August 2018

• Papers should be no more than 7,000 words (minus abstract and references)

• Instructions for authors can be found here

• Submit abstracts and contact the editor at andrew.winters@sru.edu

CFP: Session "Biosemiotics in dialogue" at 13th World Congress of Semiotics

CFP for the session “Biosemiotics in dialogue”

IASS/AIS 13th World Congress of Semiotics “Cross-Inter-Multi-Trans” (Kaunas, Lithuania, 26-30 June 2017)

Conceptually, biosemiotics is the semiotic study of living systems. In essence, biosemiotics is already more-than-semiotic as well as more-than-biological – it is interdisciplinary in nature, and builds on synthesis between ideas and theories from various fields. In this session, we will look at the history as well as future of biosemiotics in its relating to various fields.

More specifically, we look for answers to the following questions: What are the historical, methodological and conceptual ties between biosemiotics and neighboring disciplines? How can fruitful theoretical synthesis in form of biosemiotics best be achieved? How can biosemiotics draw on ideas and perspectives from neighboring fields of endeavor? What can other fields in semiotics and beyond learn from biosemiotics? How can biosemiotics in the best way take part in solving essential scientific problems of our time?

For participating, please register to the World Congress with indication of participation in the session “Biosemiotics in dialogue” and send your abstract also to timo.maran [@] ut.ee. Please note that the registration deadline is November 30, 2016.

With kind regards,

Kalevi Kull,

Morten Tønnessen,

Timo Maran

CFP: Special Issue of Biosemiotics: Constructive biosemiotics

Call for Papers

Special Issue of Biosemiotics (Springer): Constructive biosemiotics.

The journal Biosemiotics (Springer) is preparing a special issue on “Constructive biosemiotics” guest-edited by Tommi Vehkavaara and Alexei Sharov. By the epithet “constructive“ we are referring to a naturalized approach to agency, normativity, and knowledge that emphasizes the primacy of activity and real construction of the cognitive agents themselves as opposed to the view to agents as mainly passively or mechanically reacting. The aim of the Special Issue is to integrate such constructive approach with biosemiotics so that organisms and perhaps other types of living systems are considered as agents that construct their “knowledge”, i.e. their habits of interpreting signs, their own functional structure, and their environment (that typically includes other agents) they are interacting with. Such constructive perspective is present to some extent in the works of theoretical classics of biosemiotics, especially of Jakob von Uexküll (concepts of functional circle and Umwelt), Gregory Bateson (cybernetics and information), and C.S. Peirce (meaning of sign as constructed by its interpreter). In this special issue we welcome also other constructive starting points – not so often employed in biosemiotics – like Jean Piaget’s constructivism, Richard Lewontin’s emphasis on construction over adaptationism, autopoietic approaches, cybernetics, General systems theory (Ludwig von Bertalanffy), evolutionary epistemology, and interactivism (Mark Bickhard) as far as they are somehow applied to biosemiotic problematics.

Independently on the chosen semiotic terminology (e.g., sign, representation, meaning, or information), constructive biosemiotics understands the referents of these terms as being constructed by biosemiotic agents. Either these referents are materially constructed (composed) by the agent, or some already existing and available material items are identified and taken into service by the agent so that only their semiotic roles are constructed. In both cases, material items are merely vehicles of their semiotic functioning that are picked up for use according to the actual needs of the agent. That would mean to take the organism or agent point of view in its interaction with the world. The activity of agents is controlled by their subsystems that are goal-directed or embodying some normative functional criteria, which in some cases enables the agent to judge and detect the success of its semiotic operations. Although the developmental or short-term time scale is more natural in constructive view, we suggest that constructive biosemiotics should expand to the evolutionary dynamics, evolvability and (re)construction of receptor and effector subsystems of agents, and the whole evo-devo problematic. E.g. what is the role of agential constructions in longer term time scales (e.g. Baldwin effect) and whether or in which sense there can be said to be evolutionary agents (lineages, populations, etc.) capable of learning (evolutionary epistemology, vertical biosemiosis).

The special issue of Constructive biosemiotics welcomes papers that emphasize the constructive perspective in biosemiotic processes at functional and evolutionary time scales. The central question is how biosemiotic agents or systems are constructed and are constructing their semiotic behaviors like 

1. cognitive interactions (meaning formation and communication),

2. navigation in the environment (functional or intentional movements),

3. functional reconstruction of the environment (e.g. niche construction, moulding the other agents),

4. self-maintenance, self-modification, and (recursive) self-production of (semiotically) functional structures or scaffoldings (e.g., constructive development of full-scale competence), and

5. self-identification and -determination (e.g. the normative functioning of immune systems).

A further question concerns the criteria of agency. While organisms are usually understood as the prototype of biosemiotic agents, it can also be considered whether (or in which sense) it would be reasonable to consider also some other kind of biological unities – individual cells, organs, or populations, species, lineages, etc. – as agents capable of these behaviors. The special issue welcomes theoretical works, empirical findings, and metatheoretical considerations that employ constructive perspective biosemiotically relevant way.

Timetable and technical requirements:

- Deadline for submitting tentative titles and abstracts: January 2016

- Deadline for paper submission: September 2016

- Electronic publication ahead of print: January-February 2017

- Paper version, Issue #2, August 2017.

- Recommended length 7,000 words. Figures and tables are welcome (if possible).

- Instructions for Authors

- Contact with editors by e-mail: tommi.vehkavaara@uta.fi or sharoval@mail.nih.gov

2nd CFP, extended abstract deadline March 15th: "Animals in the Anthropocene - human-animal relations in a changing semiosphere"

The Second Call For Papers for the conference "Animals in the Anthropocene: Human-animal relations in a changing semiosphere" (Stavanger, Norway, September 17-19th 2015) has appeared (see conference webpage and 2nd CFP).

Extended deadline for submission of abstracts (oral presentations): March 15th 2015. Please submit your abstract to anthropoceneanimals@uis.no.

Keynote speakers: Almo Farina (Italy), Gisela Kaplan (Australia), Dominique Lestel (France), David Rothenberg (USA), Bronislaw Szerszynski (UK) and Louise Westling (USA).

The conference will feature 7 theme sessions:

– “Animals mediating the real and the imaginary in the past” (chairs: Siv Kristoffersen & Kristin Armstrong Oma, Museum of Archaeology, University of Stavanger, Norway)

– "Animal representations in popular culture and new media" (chairs: Kjersti Vik & Lene Bøe, University of Stavanger, Norway)

– “Animals, semiotics, and Actor-Network-Theory” (chairs: Silver Rattasepp & Timo Maran, University of Tartu, Estonia)

– “Global species” (chair: Morten Tønnessen, University of Stavanger, Norway)

– “Humans and other animals, between anthropology and phenomenologies” (chair: Annabelle Dufourcq, Charles University, Czech Republic)

– “Understanding the meaning of animals“ (chairs: Forrest Clingerman, Ohio Northern University, USA & Martin Drenthen, Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands)

– “Wild animals in the era of humankind” (chair: Morten Tønnessen, University of Stavanger, Norway)

Submitted abstracts will be considered for a planned book to be published in Lexington Books´ series "Ecocritical Theory and Practice".

Biosemiotics symposium June 2012

Nordic Semiotic Paradigms – NASS 25 years

Where do Cognitive, Bio- and Existential Semiotics Meet?

A symposium at the 27th International Summer School for Semiotic and Structural Studies (Imatra, Finland – June 8-12, 2012)

Within the days June 8-12, 2012, the symposium “Nordic Semiotic Paradigms – NASS 25 years: Where do Cognitive, Bio- and Existential Semiotics Meet?” will be arranged in Imatra, Finland, as part of the 27th International Summer School for Semiotic and Structural Studies. NASS’ president Luis Emilio Bruni will chair the anniversary symposium, which will take place at Hotel Valtionhotelli.

The Imatra ISI symposium marks the 25 year anniversary of the Nordic Association for Semiotic Studies (NASS). The venue of the anniversary symposium, Imatra, is appropriate given that it was at a meeting in this Finnish town that NASS was founded in the summer of 1987. The first Executive Committee of NASS counted representatives from Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. The current board, elected at the Seventh Conference of the Nordic Association for Semiotic Studies in Lund in May 2011, involves Ordinary Representatives and Supplementary Representatives from these five countries and further Estonia.

The theme of the NASS anniversary symposium draws on the work of several notable Nordic scholars in the fields of cognitive semiotics, biosemiotics and existential semiotics. These are all promising, novel, dynamic subfields in contemporary semiotics. Neither of them are but regionalparadigms – rather, Nordic researchers have been instrumental in establishing and consolidating them at an international level, with a sphere of influence which by far exceeds the Nordic region. How has Nordic semiotics come to be so influential? And, as the title of the symposium asks: Where do these fields meet? A number of scholars are involved in both cognitive semiotics and biosemiotics, and there is clearly a thematic overlap in-between the two. And what of existential semiotics – on what points does it overlap with biosemiotics, and with cognitive semiotics? Furthermore, how can these various Nordic paradigms acquire informative inspiration from each other, and find common ground to cultivate further? Despite differing inclinations and academic taste, such a project should not be unattainable, given that cognitive semiotics, biosemiotics and existential semiotics are all concerned with the semiotics of life.

The symposium/research seminar will consist of papers presented by both invited lecturers and participants. The aim of the summer school is to offer the participants both up-to-date research and an opportunity to discuss their projects with leading specialists in various fields. The duration of presentations will be 30 minutes, and the working languages of the seminars are English, French and German. Active participants – i.e., participants presenting papers, must register by April 15th. Passive participants can register until April 30th. Active participants must send a short Curriculum Vitae and a one-page abstract of his/her paper toinfo@isisemiotics.fi and submit the registration form online. Passive participants must submit theregistration form online by April 30, 2011. Participation fee for the whole summer school is 200 EUR (this covers lunch and two coffees a day June 9–12 and an elegant evening reception and buffet on June 9th). For payment instructions and information about accommodation, see the pages of The International Semiotics Institute (ISI).

Bio-/zoosemiotic proposals for ASLE-UK conference welcome

There is a call for papers for the 2011 postgraduate conference of the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment UK (London Sept 9-10), entitled "Emergent critical environments: Where next for ecology and the humanities?". "Biosemiotics and zoosemiotics" is mentioned in the list of "possible paper topics". Deadline is March 31st - also for panel or roundtable proposals.

I quote:

Individual papers should be no longer than 20 minutes. Please send a 250 word abstract and a brief biography (maximum 150 words) to Sam Solnick, Deborah Lilley and Kate Parry – emergentenvironments [at] gmail.com by 31 March 2011. Proposals for panels (3 speakers) and roundtables are also welcome: please send a 200 word summary of the rationale for the panel or roundtable, in addition to individual abstracts. Please send further enquiries to the above email address.

Call for papers: Special issue of Hortus Semioticus

See our call for papers below (plus here). Note that graduate students and young scholars are particularly encouraged to submit. As my fellow guest editor Riin Magnus writes in an email, we hope seniors in the field can help by spreading the cfp to potentially interested students and young professionals. We would like to express...

...that we would thereby also like to form and strengthen the network of graduate students working in the semiotics of nature or similar fields.

(MT)

CALL FOR PAPERS: SPECIAL ISSUE ON THE SEMIOTICS OF NATURE
Hortus Semioticus
Guest editors: Riin Magnus, Nelly Mäekivi and Morten Tønnessen

Hortus Semioticus is an online academic journal of semiotics - the study of signs and sign processes. In Tartu, Estonia, where the student journal is based, nature has long accompanied culture as a topic for semiotic inquiry (cf. the fields known as biosemiotics, ecosemiotics, and zoosemiotics). The driving force behind the journal is curiosity and the joy of inquiry. Around the summer of 2010 the journal will publish a special issue on the semiotics of nature (meaning living nature, rather than physical nature). We are inviting papers on the topics of meaning, value, communication, signification, representation, and cognition in and of nature (ranging from the cellular level to the global scene). We encourage originality within a scientific framework which emphazises the semiotic aspects of the life processes alluded to above. Not least, we strongly welcome submissions from other fields (besides, beyond or beneath semiotics). Graduate students and young scholars are particularly encouraged to submit. Contributions (5-20 pages) should be written in English or Estonian and sent to the guest editors by May 1st, 2010. Prior to that we're expecting an abstract (100-200 words) plus 3-5 keywords by April 1 2010. Please find further instructions here. Email addresses of the guest editors: riin.magnus@gmail.com (Riin Magnus), nellymaekivi@gmail.com (Nelly Mäekivi) and mortentoennessen@gmail.com (Morten Tønnessen)