Current Perspectives in Semiotics : Signs, Signification, and Communication

This unique book, inspired by the work of Umberto Eco - one of the greatest semioticians of all times - provides a compelling overview of current developments in semiotic research, bringing together various academic voices and critical reflections on the nature and function of signs, signification, and communication. Contributors, including Eco himself, discuss the status quo of the discipline, its scope, theoretical orientations, and methodological approaches, shedding light on the cognitive and philosophical complexity of the meaning-making process and form–meaning interfaces. The book is an outcome of the SIVO Signum-Idea-Verbum-Opus project initiated by Umberto Eco’s keynote address during his visit at the University of Łódź in 2015. More theoretical insights and further explorations into contemporary semiosphere can be found in Current Perspectives in Semiotics: Texts, Genres, and Representations, published simultaneously by Peter Lang.

Artur Gałkowski is Associate Professor of Italian and French linguistics at the University of Łódź, Poland, where he is the Head of the Department of Italian Studies at the Institute of Romance Philology. His research interests cover various issues in onomastics, semiotics, foreign language teaching, and translation, on which he has published numerous articles, edited volumes, monographs, and book chapters.

Monika Kopytowska is Assistant Professor in the Department of Pragmatics at the University of Łódź, Poland. Her research interests revolve around the interface of language and cognition, identity, and the pragma-rhetorical aspects of the mass-mediated representation of religion, ethnicity, and conflict. She has published internationally in linguistic journals and volumes.