Deadline approaching – CfP: Sociosemiotic Critique. A Lotmanian Perspective

On behalf of Anna Maria Lorusso and Franciscu Sedda annamaria.lorusso@unibo.it and franciscu.sedda@gmail.com

With the deadline approaching . . .

Call for papers: Social Semiotics, Issue 5, 2022

Sociosemiotic Critique. A Lotmanian Perspective 

Edited by Anna Maria Lorusso (University of Bologna) and Franciscu Sedda (University of Cagliari)

In 2022 – the centenary of the birth of Juri Lotman – we invite you to focus on the potentiality of his semiotic theory (including ideas of as personality, translation, creolization, autocommunication, self-description, semiosphere) to critique power structures and ideological processes in semiosic phenomena.

We invite contributors to prepare an analytical essay focusing on a specific case study of a semiotic artefact or type of artefact, demonstrating how Lotmanian theory can fuel a critique of the limitations on, and variations in, the ways in which the semiotic resources/practices in question may perpetuate biases, imbalance or legitimize and maintain kinds of power interests.

At this stage, we solicit not papers but a proposal of between 1000 and 1500 words length, with bibliographic references included. On this basis, we will select 8 proposals, to be developed in an essay of 7/8000 words (bibliography included).

Proposals should be sent to: annamaria.lorusso@unibo.it and franciscu.sedda@gmail.com

Publication CfP for proposals: August 2021

Deadline CfP: 30 October 2021

Communication of proposals selected: 15 November 2021

Deadline for papers: 15 March 2022,

Refereeing process: 15 March – 31 May

Delivery of definitive version of texts: 1 August 2022

Publication: October 2022

More info on Social Semiotics at https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/csos20/current

About the editors

Anna Maria Lorusso is Associate professor in the Department of Arts of Bologna University, where she teaches “Semiotics of Culture” and “Analysis of Media Communication”. Since 2017 she is President of the Italian Association of Semiotics. She is in the board of several international journals: she is vice-director of the semiotic journal VS-Versus. Quaderni di studi semiotici and in the editorial board of the international journals Nouveaux Actes Sémiotiques,  Acta Semiotica, Comunicaciòn y medios, De signis. Among her last books in English:  MemoSur/MemoSouth. Memory, Commemoration and Trauma in Post-Dictatorship Argentina and Chile (eds, along with A. Sharman,  M. Grass Kleiner and S. Savoini London,  Critical, Cultural and Communications Press, 2017), Cultural Semiotics (London, Palgrave-MacMillan, 2016). She published the entry “Jurij Lotman” for the Oxford Bibliographies.

Franciscu Sedda is Associate Professor in the Department of Arts, Languages and Cultural Heritage of Cagliari University where he teaches “General Semiotics” and “Cultural Semiotics”. He has occupied the position of vice-president in the Italian Association of Semiotic Studies (2007-2009) and since January 2017 is the Secretary General of the Italian Society of Philosophy of Language. He edited the collection of essays by Jurij Lotman Tesi per una semiotica delle culture (Rome, 2006), the book Retorica (Rome, 2021) and wrote the entry “Semiotics of Culture(s)” for the International Handbook of Semiotics (Berlin, 2015). Along with Ugo Dessì he recently edited a number of Glocalism – Journal of Culture, Politics, and Innovation, entitled  Glocalization and Everyday Life (2021). Among his other main fields of research there are the development of a general semiotic theory, the relation between media and political communication, the history of Sardinian culture and consciousness.