Home In the fold of the manifold: a reflection on Bloomsbury Semiotics
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

In the fold of the manifold: a reflection on Bloomsbury Semiotics

  • Ľudmila Lacková

    Ľudmila Lacková is working in the field of linguistics, communication theory and semiotics. She completed the PhD in double degree form (Bologna University and Palacký University). She is associate editor for the journal Biosemiotics, published by Springer, editor of the Springer book series Numanities-Arts and Humanities in Progress, and the editor in chief of the journal Linguistic Frontiers, published by De Gruyter Open Access. She is currently head of Department of General linguistics at Palacky University.

    EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: June 5, 2023
Become an author with De Gruyter Brill

Abstract

This is a short overview of the newly published four-volume anthology edited by Jamin Pelkey et al. titled Bloomsbury Semiotics, with a critical reflection upon the disciplinary status of general semiotics today. The paper proposes methods and principles for future semiotic research and observes the overall trajectory of semiotics during the age of the business model of university life and the marginalization of the humanities. The paper supports the major position of Bloomsbury Semiotics, which is to conceive of semiotics as the most effective platform for revitalizing the humanities in cooperation with hard science, and the reintegration of Peirce and Saussure as the theoretical bedrock of general semiotics.


Corresponding author: Ľudmila Lacková, Palacký University in Olomouc, Olomouc, Czech Republic, E-mail:

Funding source: Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports

Award Identifier / Grant number: IGA_FF_2023_044

About the author

Ľudmila Lacková

Ľudmila Lacková is working in the field of linguistics, communication theory and semiotics. She completed the PhD in double degree form (Bologna University and Palacký University). She is associate editor for the journal Biosemiotics, published by Springer, editor of the Springer book series Numanities-Arts and Humanities in Progress, and the editor in chief of the journal Linguistic Frontiers, published by De Gruyter Open Access. She is currently head of Department of General linguistics at Palacky University.

Acknowledgements

This publication was made possible thanks to targeted funding provided by the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports for specific research, granted in 2023 to Palacký University Olomouc (IGA_FF_2023_044). The author of the pictures in this paper is Mia Lévyová.

References

Bacigalupi, Joshua A. 2022. Semiogenesis: A dynamic system approach to agency and structure. Biosemiotics 15(2). 261–284. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-022-09494-8.Search in Google Scholar

Bennett, Tyler J. 2021a. Detotalization and retroactivity: Black pyramid semiotics. Tartu: University of Tartu dissertation.Search in Google Scholar

Bennett, Tyler J. 2021b. Second-generation semiology and detotalization. Linguistic Frontiers 4. 44–53. https://doi.org/10.2478/lf-2021-0010.Search in Google Scholar

Bennett, Tyler J. 2023. Kristeva as semiotician today. Sofia: University of Sofia Press, Forthcoming.Search in Google Scholar

Bisanz, Elize (ed.). 2009. The logic of interdisciplinarity. The monist-series. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.10.1524/9783050047331Search in Google Scholar

Burch, Robert W. 1992. Valental aspects of Peircean algebraic logic. Computers and Mathematics with Applications 23(6). 665–677. https://doi.org/10.1016/0898-1221(92)90128-5.Search in Google Scholar

Burch, Robert W. 1997. Peirce’s reduction thesis. In Nathan Houser, Don D. Roberts & James Van Evra (eds.), Studies in the Logic of Charles Sanders Peirce. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Chávez Barreto, Eugenio I., Oscar S. Miyamoto Gómez, Tyler J. Bennett, Ľudmila Lacková & Kalevi Kull. 2022. Funktionskreis and the biosemiotic signifieds: Towards the integration of semiotics. Sign Systems Studies 50(2–3). 433–452. https://doi.org/10.12697/SSS.2022.50.2-3.07.Search in Google Scholar

Chávez Herrera, Eduardo. 2022. ‘Oh, semiotics? Umberto Eco and stuff like that?’ Telling and constructing a discourse of marginality. Linguistic Frontiers 5(1). 35–48. https://doi.org/10.2478/lf-2022-0005.Search in Google Scholar

Chomsky, Noem. 1957. Syntactic structures. Mouton: The Hague.10.1515/9783112316009Search in Google Scholar

Cobley, Paul. 2016. Cultural implications of biosemiotics. Dordrecht: Springer.10.1007/978-94-024-0858-4Search in Google Scholar

Danesi, Marcel. 2022. Opposition and semiosis. In Jamin Pelkey (ed.), Bloomsbury Semiotics. History and semiosis, 215–240. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing.10.5040/9781350139312.ch-10Search in Google Scholar

Deacon, Terrence. 1997. The symbolic species: The co-evolution of language and the brain. New York: W. W. Norton.Search in Google Scholar

Deleuze, Gilles. 1988. The fold: Leibniz and the Baroque, Editions de Minuit. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Search in Google Scholar

Deleuze, Gilles & Félix Guattari. 1980. A thousand plateaus. Paris: Les Editions de Minuit.Search in Google Scholar

Dosoudilová, Tereza. 2023. Vybraná témata korespondence mezi C. S. Peircem a Lady Victorií, Welby: Komentovaný překlad a studie. Olomouc: Palacký University.Search in Google Scholar

Eco, Umberto. 1979 [1976]. A theory of semiotics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Eco, Umberto. 1990. I limiti dell’interpretazione. Milano: Bompiani.Search in Google Scholar

Faltýnek, Dan, Lukáš Zámečník & Ľudmila Lacková. 2020. In Ľudmila Lacková, Claudio Julio Rodríguez Higuera & Kalevi Kull (eds.), Gatherings in biosemiotics XX (Tartu semiotics library 20). Tartu: University of Tartu Press.Search in Google Scholar

Fomin, Ivan. 2021. Logonomic signs as three-phase constraints of multimodal social semiosis. Semiotica 2022(247). 33–54. https://doi.org/10.1515/sem-2021-0037.Search in Google Scholar

Fontanille, Jacques. 1992. Approche morphodynamique de l’iconicité des stemmas. In Fraçoise Madray-Lesigne & Jeannine Richard-Zappela (eds.), Lucien Tesnière aujourd’hui. Louvain-Paris: Editions Peeters.Search in Google Scholar

Gare, Arran. 2022. Against posthumanism: Posthumanism as the world vision of house-slaves. Borderless Philosophy 4. 1–56.Search in Google Scholar

Gastaldi, Juan L. 2021. Why can computers understand natural language? Philosophy and Technology 34(1). 149–214. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-020-00393-9.Search in Google Scholar

Gazzaniga, Michael S. 2018. The consciousness instinct: Unraveling the mystery of how the brain makes the mind. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.Search in Google Scholar

Harris, Roy. 2009. Rationality and the literate mind. London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203879481Search in Google Scholar

Hauser, Marc D., Noam Chomsky & William T. Fitch. 2002. The faculty of language: What is it, who has it, and how did it evolve? Science 298(5598). 1569–1579. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.298.5598.1569.Search in Google Scholar

Hjelmslev, Louis. 1928. Principes de grammaire générale. In Det Kgl. Danske Videnskabernes Selskab. Historisk-filologiske Meddelelser, vol. 16(1). Copenhagen: A. F. Host and Son.Search in Google Scholar

Hjelmslev, Louis. 1935. La catégorie des cas: étude de grammaire générale. In Acta Jutlandica, vol. 7(1). Aarhus: Universitetsforlaget i Aarhus.Search in Google Scholar

Hjelmslev, Louis. 1942. Langue et parole. Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 2. 29–44.Search in Google Scholar

Hjelmslev, Louis. 1957 [1943]. Prolegomena to a theory of language. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Search in Google Scholar

Hjelmslev, Louis. 1985. Structure générale des corrélations linguistiques. In Louis Hjelmslev & François Rastier (eds.), Nouveaux essais. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.Search in Google Scholar

Jakobson, Roman. 1971. Linguistics in relation to other sciences. In Roman Jakobson (ed.), Selected Writings Vol 2: Word and Language, 655–696. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.10.1515/9783110873269.655Search in Google Scholar

Kalaga, Wojciech. 1986. The concept of interpretant in literary semiotics. Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 22(1). 43–59.Search in Google Scholar

Ketner, Kenneth L. 1999. Rescuing science from scientism. The Intercollegiate Review 35(1). 22–27.Search in Google Scholar

Ketner, Kenneth L. 2009. Charles Sanders Peirce: Interdisciplinary scientist. In Elize Bisanz (ed.), The Logic of Interdisciplinarity. The Monist-Series, 35–57. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.10.1524/9783050047331.35Search in Google Scholar

Ketner, Kenneth L. 2011. Peirce’s nonreduction and relational completeness claims in the context of first-order predicate logic. KODIKAS/CODE: Ars Semeiotica 34. 3–14.Search in Google Scholar

Ketner, Kenneth L. 2023. A survey of semeiotic as practice of interdisciplinary reasoning. Linguistic Frontiers 6(3). https://doi.org/10.2478/lf-2023-0001.Search in Google Scholar

Kull, Kalevi. 2023. Freedom in living beings: Arbitrariness and the forms of semiotic indeterminacy. Open Semiotics 4. 79–95.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila. 2018. A linguistic approach to protein folding. Towards a semiotic description of living systems. Olomouc: Palacký University dissertation.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila. 2019. Quelques Remarques Sur l’Usage Du Terme ‘l’Arbitraire Du Signe. In Jean-Yves Beziau (ed.), The Arbitrariness of the Sign in Question, 283–294. Milton Keynes: College Publication.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila. 2020. Folding of a peptide continuum: Semiotic approach to protein folding. Semiotica 2020(233). 77–90. https://doi.org/10.1515/SEM-2018-0116.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila. 2022. Participative opposition applied. Sign Systems Studies 50(2–3). 261–285. https://doi.org/10.12697/SSS.1.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila. 2023. Structural semiology, Peirce and biolinguistics. Semiotica, Forthcoming.10.1515/sem-2022-0058Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila & Dan Faltýnek. 2021. Can quantitative approaches develop bio/semiotic theory? Biosemiotics 14(2). 237–240https://doi.org/10.1007/S12304-021-09443-X. https://doi.org/10.1007/S12304-021-09443-X.Search in Google Scholar

Lacková, Ľudmila, Vladimír Matlach & Dan Faltýnek. 2017. Arbitrariness is not enough: Towards a functional approach to the genetic code. Theory in Biosciences 136. 187–191. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12064-017-0246-1.Search in Google Scholar

Lévy-Bruhl, Lucien. 1996. L’âme primitive. Paris: Quadrige.Search in Google Scholar

Liszka, James J. 1981. Peirce and Jakobson: Towards a structuralist reconstruction of Peirce. Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 17. 41–61.10.5840/cpsem198020Search in Google Scholar

Liszka, James J. 2014. Peirce’s evolutionary thought. In Torkild Thellefsen & Bent Sørensen (eds.), Charles Sanders Peirce in His Own Words, 145–152. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.10.1515/9781614516415.145Search in Google Scholar

Markoš, Anton & Jana Švorcová. 2019. Epigenetic processes and evolution of life. Boca Raton: CRC Press.10.1201/9781351009966Search in Google Scholar

Monod, Jacques. 1972. Chance and necessity. New York: Random House.Search in Google Scholar

Nikolchina, Miglena. 2004. Matricide in language: Writing theory in Kristeva and Woolf. New York: Other Press.Search in Google Scholar

Paolucci, Claudio. 2006. Lucien Tesnière autore della logica dei relativi. Su alcune insospettate corrispondenze tra Peirce e lo strutturalismo. E/C 1. 1–16.Search in Google Scholar

Paolucci, Claudio. 2010. Strutturalismo e interpretazione. Milano: Bompiani.Search in Google Scholar

Paolucci, Claudio. 2021. Cognitive semiotics: Integrating signs, minds, meaning and cognition. Cham: Springer.10.1007/978-3-030-42986-7Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin. 2013. Analogy, automation and diagrammatic causation: The evolution of Tibeto-Burman *lak. Studies in Language 37(1). 144–195.10.1075/sl.37.1.04pelSearch in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin. 2015a. Deep congruence between linguistic and biotic growth: Evidence for semiotic foundations. In Ekaterina Velmezova, Stephen J. Cowley & Kalevi Kull (eds.), Biosemiotic Perspectives on Language and Linguistics, 97–119. Berlin: Springer.10.1007/978-3-319-20663-9_6Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin. 2015b. Peircean evolutionary linguistics: A prospectus. In Jamin Pelkey, Stéphanie Walsh Matthews & Leonard Sbrocchi (eds.), Semiotics 2014: The Semiotics of Paradox, 585–597. Ottawa: Legas.10.5840/cpsem201446Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin. 2020. Peircean semiotic for language and linguistics. In Tony Jappy (ed.), The Bloomsbury Companion to Contemporary Peircean Semiotics, 391–418. London: Bloomsbury Academic.10.5040/9781350076143.ch-14Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin (ed.). 2022. Bloomsbury Semiotics. History and semiosis. London: Bloomsbury Academic.10.5040/9781350139312Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin & Paul Cobley (eds.). 2022. Bloomsbury Semiotics. Semiotic movements. London: Bloomsbury Academic.10.5040/9781350139435Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin & Stéphanie Wals Matthews (eds.). 2022. Bloomsbury Semiotics. Semiotics in the natural and technical sciences. London: Bloomsbury Academic.10.5040/9781350139350Search in Google Scholar

Pelkey, Jamin, Susan Petrilli & Sophia Melanson Riccardione (eds.). 2022. Bloomsbury Semiotics. Semiotics in the arts and social sciences. London: Bloomsbury Academic.10.5040/9781350139398Search in Google Scholar

Sercaz, Eli E., Franco Celada, Avrion Mitchison & Tomio Tada (eds.). 2013. The Semiotics of Cellular Communication in the Immune System, Nato ASI subseries H. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer.Search in Google Scholar

Sharov, Alexei A. & Tomi Vehkavaara. 2015. Protosemiosis: Agency with reduced representation capacity. Biosemiotics 8(1). 103–123. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-014-9219-7.Search in Google Scholar

Sharov, Alexei & Morten Tønnessen. 2021. Semiotic agency, science beyond mechanism. Dordrecht: Springer.10.1007/978-3-030-89484-9Search in Google Scholar

Stjernfelt, Frederik. 2007. Diagrammatology, an investigation on the borderlines of phenomenology, ontology, and semiotics. Dordrecht: Springer.10.1007/978-1-4020-5652-9Search in Google Scholar

Stjernfelt, Frederik. 2014. Natural propositions: The actuality of Peirce’s doctrine of dicisigns. Boston: Docent Press.10.1007/s11229-014-0406-5Search in Google Scholar

Tesnière, Lucien. 2015 [1959]. Elements of structural syntax. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.10.1075/z.185Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2023-06-05

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 23.9.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/cogsem-2023-2005/html
Scroll to top button