Join us on Saturday, April 29th for Ecologies of Mind, Media, and Meaning II: An Online Symposium. As the title indicates, this is a continuation of the Ecologies of Mind, Media, and Meaning Symposium held in person following the 2022 Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture in New York City.
Our online symposium is free and open to members and non-members alike, but registration is required. The symposium will be held via Zoom, with the information for signing on to be distributed in advance of the event. Please note that sessions will be recorded for later distribution online.
Ecologies of Mind, Media, and Meaning II
An Online Symposium
April 29th, 2023
All times listed are Eastern Daylight Savings Time
Greetings and Welcomings 8:45 AM EDT
Lance Strate, Fordham University, US
Session I The Map is Not the Territory 9:00 AM to 10:15 AM
Chair: Eva Berger, College of Management and Academic Studies, Israel
“How Do Celebrities Understand Media as an Environment/Ecology?”
Renee Peterson, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia
“Japanese English: A Descriptive Grammar of ‘Educated’ Written English in Japan”
Kolawole Waziri Olagboyega, Tsuru University, Japan
“General Semantics and Samkhya Philosophy”
Deepa Mishra, Smt. Chandibai Himathmal Mansukhani College, India
“Challenging the Ecology of Orchestra Music Performance”
Anders Lind, Umeå University, Sweden
Session II Semantic Reactions 10:30 AM to 11:45 AM
Chair: Nora Bateson, International Bateson Institute, Sweden
“‘Reality’ on Demand: How Streaming Media Services Influence the Structure of Semantic Reactions”
Kasia Drogowska, Independent Scholar, Poland
“The Podcast as a Memory Transferential Space”
Nadja Touzari, Roskilde University, Denmark
“Media Ecology and Symbolic Ludoliteracy in Flux: Games of Chance, Games of Change?”
Rozane De Cock, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
“Conceptualization of Refugee and Ecological Crises in Multimodal Semantic Environments”
Olena Marina, Kerry Education and Training Board, Ireland,
& Igor Korolyov, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Ukraine
Session III Patterns That Connect 12:o0 Noon to 1:15 PM
Chair: Corey Anton, Grand Valley State University, US
“The Polyploid Horse and the Frankenstein Apple: Why Wishes Go Wrong“
Nora Bateson, International Bateson Institute, Sweden
“Being, Semantics, Time: The Foundation of a Transformational Ontophenomenology”
Mauro Ventola, Center for Ontological Transformation, Italy
“Literary Character in the Bardo”
Eleni Chatzi, Independent Scholar, Greece
“Culture's End”
Camilo Montenegro, Independent Scholar, Spain
Session IV Feeling and Form 1:30 to 2:45 PM
Chair: Michael Plugh, Manhattan College, US
“What Boobs Have to Say”
Zíngara Lofrano, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
“When the Map is Not the Territory: General Semantics and Satire”
Martin H. Levinson, Institute of General Semantics, US
“These Bots are Made for Walkin’”
Gina Valenti, Universidad Nacional de Rosario, Argentina
“Book Clubs, Technology, and Education: Paulo Freire and Marshall McLuhan for a (Media) Literacy Approach in Schools”
Vanessa Martins, Federal University of Juiz de Fora, Brazil
Session V Language, Thought, and Reality 3:o0 to 4:15 PM
Chair: Thom Gencarelli, Manhattan College, US
“Mediating Information and Meaning: An Exploration of Hearing, Listening, and the Mind”
Ryan McCullough, West Liberty University, US
“On the Most Proper Means for Acquiring Knowledge” and Other Translations of Condillac’s 18th Century Words”
Robert T. Ackland, State University of New York College at Plattsburgh, US
“The Limits of ChatGPT from a General Semantics Perspective”
Laura Trujillo Liñan, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico
“On Epistemology”
Milton Dawes, Independent Scholar, Canada
Session VI Semantic Environments 4:30 to 5:45 PM
Chair: Susan Drucker, Hofstra University, US
“The Drying and Dying of the Great Salt Lake
and the Colorado River: Mediating Water Relations in Three Acts”
Heather Crandall, Gonzaga University, US
“Info/Eco andThe Nature of Information: Towards an Ecological
Understanding of the Information Environment”
Richard Lowenberg, 1st-Mile Institute, US
“On An Ecology of Witnessing: Humans, Earth, Universes and Media ”
Julianne Newton, University of Oregon, US
“The And”
Lance Strate, Fordham University, US
Concluding Remarks 6:00 PM
Lance Strate, Fordham University, US
About the Participants
Robert T. Ackland describes his concept of the idiolecte dynamique (an individual’s linguistic ID) in “The Night is a Strawberry: The Joys of Being Multilingual While Reading Louise Penny’s Québec Mysteries” (2020). His Nice Photo of Synchronicity highlights how we use words to make sense of the world (1999). He co-authored “Beyond The Lorax: Examining Children’s Books on Climate Change” in The Reading Teacher in 2016. Now retired from Literacy and Teacher Education at SUNY Plattsburgh, Bob is translating portions of Condillac’s 18th century philosophy.
Corey Anton is Professor of Communication Studies at Grand Valley State University and a Fellow of the International Communicology Institute. He is author of Selfhood and Authenticity (2001, SUNY Press), Sources of Significance: Worldly Rejuvenation and Neo-Stoic Heroism (2010, Purdue University Press), Communication Uncovered: General Semantics and Media Ecology (2010, IGS), and How Non-being Haunts Being: On Possibilities, Morality, and Death Acceptance (2020, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press). He is the editor of Valuation and Media Ecology: Ethics, Morals, and Laws (2010, Hampton Press), and the co-editor, along with Lance Strate, of the collection Korzybski And… (2012, IGS), and co-editor, along with Robert K. Logan and Lance Strate, of the collection, Taking Up McLuhan’s Cause (2017, Intellect). Past Editor of the journal Explorations in Media Ecology and Past President of the Media Ecology Association, Anton currently serves as Vice-President of the Institute of General Semantics, and on the editorial boards of The Atlantic Journal of Communication, ETC, and Explorations in Media Ecology.
Nora Bateson is an award-winning filmmaker, research designer, writer and educator, as well as President of the International Bateson Institute based in Sweden, and a Trustee of the Institute of General Semantics. Her work asks the question “How can we improve our perception of the complexity we live within, so we may improve our interaction with the world?”. An international lecturer, researcher and writer, Nora wrote, directed and produced the award-winning documentary, An Ecology of Mind, a portrait of her father, Gregory Bateson. Her work brings the fields of biology, cognition, art, anthropology, psychology, and information technology together into a study of the patterns in ecology of living systems. Her book, Small Arcs of Larger Circles released by Triarchy Press, UK, 2016 is a revolutionary personal approach to the study of systems and complexity, and the core text of the Harvard University LILA program 2017-18. Her new book, Warm Data, will be released by Triarchy Press. Nora was the recipient of the Media Ecology Association’s 2019 Neil Postman Award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual Activity.
Eva Berger is a Professor of Media Studies at the College of Management and Academic Studies in Israel. She serves as Secretary of the Institute of General Semantics. Dr. Berger is the author of, Context Blindness: Digital Technology and the Next Stage of Human Evolution (2022, Peter Lang), and co-author of The Communication Panacea: Pediatrics and General Semantics (2014, IGS). She holds a Ph.D. in Media Ecology from New York University.
Eleni Chatzi is a Greek writer. She studied Classics and Linguistics (University of Athens) with a postgraduate degree in the prehistoric writing systems of the Aegean Bronze Age and the Near East (University of London). She published poetry, novels and essays; she has translated and edited poetry from English to Greek. Her plays have been performed in the theater and have formed the basis of multimedia installations presented in Greece and the U.K.
Heather Crandall is an Associate Professor at Gonzaga University where she teaches courses in Rhetoric in Civic Life, Understanding Meaning-Making, Analyzing Public Texts and Discourse, and The Rhetoric of Social Change. Her new co-authored book, The Climate Girl Effect: Fridays, Flint, and Fire, was just published. She has served as the pedagogy editor of Explorations in Media Ecology, and currently serves as the book review editor of Communication Research Trends. She is an affiliate faculty in the Women's and Gender Studies Department, and she serves on the board of the Northwest Alliance for Media Literacy. Dr. Crandall earned her interdisciplinary Ph.D. in American Studies, Communication, and Rhetoric from Washington State University. Her research interests include rhetoric and social change, communication pedagogy, and techno-ecofeminism.
Milton Dawes is a Fellow of The Institute of General Semantics, and a scholar of Alfred Korzybski's General Semantics...He is the author of numerous articles, including "The Calculus as The Logic of Sanity,"”Bernard Lonergan S. J.'s, Transcendental Insights,” and "The Detached, Unrestricted, Disinterested, Desire to Know." He was presented the J. Talbot Winchell Award for "Outstanding Contributions to General Semantics" and also the Irving J. Lee Award for "Excellence in Teaching General Semantics." His seminar approach focuses on learning from ourselves, others, and from whatever happens to be going on in the moment.
Rozane De Cock is an Associate Professor at the Institute for Media Studies (IMS), University of Leuven (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium) and former director of the Brussels Center for Journalism Studies (BCJS, 2013-2022) at KU Leuven campus Brussels.
Kasia Drogowska has completed the first Polish translation of Alfred Korzybsk’s Science and Sanity, selections of which will be published in September 2023. She graduated from the Faculty of Journalism and Political Science at the University of Warsaw, where she earned her PhD researching the influence of new media on the production, management and usage of news.She works for Warner Bros Discovery as an editorial director and product owner of local Polish streaming services.
Susan J. Drucker is a Distinguished Professor of Journalism in the Department of Journalism/Media Studies, School of Communication, Hofstra University, and a Trustee of the Institute of General Semantics. She is an attorney, and treasurer of the Urban Communication Foundation. She is the author and editor of 13 books and over 150 articles and book chapters including two volumes of the Urban Communication Reader, Regulating Convergence (Peter Lang, 2010), Voices in theStreet: Gender, Media and Public Space and two editions of Real Law @ Virtual Space: The Regulation of Cyberspace (1999, 2005), and Regulating Social Media: Legal and Ethical Considerations (2013) with Gary Gumpert. She co-edited Urban Communication Regulations: Communication Freedoms and Limits (Lang, 2018). Her latest book is Fake News: Real Issues in Modern Communication with Russell Chun (Peter Lang, 2020). She received the Walter J. Ong Award for Career Achievement in Scholarship from the Media Ecology Association in 2018. Her work examines the relationship between media technology and human factors, particularly as viewed from a legal perspective.
Thom Gencarelli is Professor and founding Chair of the Communication Department at Manhattan College in Riverdale, New York. He is a Past President of the Media Ecology Association, the New York State Communication Association, the New Jersey Communication Association (twice), and current Treasurer and member of the Board of Trustees of the Institute of General Semantics, and Editor of the IGS’s official journal ETC: A Review of General Semantics. He researches and writes about media ecology, media education/media literacy, new media, and popular media and culture with an emphasis on popular music. He is co-editor (with Brian Cogan) of the anthology Baby Boomers and Popular Culture: An Inquiry into America’s Most Powerful Generation (ABC-Clio/ Praeger, 2014), and is currently at work on a book entitled Searching for the Right Notes: Essays on Media, Music, and Meaning. Thom is the recipient of multiple awards including the Eastern Communication Association’s Distinguished Teaching Fellows Award and the Media Ecology Association’s Louis Forsdale Award for Outstanding Educator in the Field of Media Ecology in 2019, the John F. Wilson Fellowship Award for Scholarship and Service from the New York State Communication Association in 2016, and the Media Ecology Association’s Christine L. Nystrom Award for Outstanding Career Achievement in Service to the Field of Media Ecology in 2013. He is also a songwriter, musician, and producer and has released three album-length works with his ensemble bluerace, World is Ready (2009), Beautiful Sky (2013), and Mistral (2019). The group is currently at work on their fourth record.
Igor Korolyov is Doctor of Sciences in Philology, and Professor of the
Department of Polish Studies and Head of the Centre for Baltic Studies at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv in Ukraine. He is the manager of the Project “Ecolinguistic Modes of Ukrainian Discursive Space in the European Multicultural Continuum” (2020-2021) in the framework of the “Supporting the leading researchers and young scientists” competition under the National Research Foundation of Ukraine. His research interests include general linguistics, language philosophy,
linguistic communication, ecolinguistics, and psycholinguistics.
Martin H. Levinson earned his PhD at New York University, and is a past president of the Institute of General Semantics, book editor of ETC: A Review of General Semantics, and a contributing editor to The Satirist, an online journal. He has published dozens of articles and five books on GS subjects. His most recent book, Lunch with the American People, contains a collection of his satires that appeared in The Satirist and deal with contemporary concerns. He is currently a faculty member with the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Stony Brook University and a teacher for the United Federation of Teachers’ Si Beagle Learning Program, which is located in New York City.
Anders Lind is a composer and artistic associate professor at the Department of Creative Studies/ UmArts/ Umeå University/ Sweden. Lind develops and explores new performance practices within contemporary art music. His artistic research projects often involve novel interactive instruments/ platforms and/or animated music notation. In recent works Lind has been using media ecology as a tool for music composition in experimental music performance settings.
Zíngara Lofrano is a 29-years-old journalist, who enjoys painting, writing and learning. She is a masters student in social communication at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, with emphasis in digital ethnography (Netnography) and social interactions. She specialized in manager projects and marketing at ESPM-Rio (Escola Superior de Propaganda e Marketing do Rio de Janeiro) and graduated in social communications at PUC-Rio.
Richard Lowenberg has spent over 50 years creatively integrating understandings and grounded involvements in non-profit .org development, architecture, environmental/ecosystems design, interspecies communication, rural community + networked society planning, performance, new media and eco-arts/sciences practices. He has dedicated his creative life to realization of works exploring and setting examples for an ‘ecology of the information environment’ and resulting opportunities for growing a vibrant cultural economy. Richard initiated Electronic Media Arts classes at Pratt Institute in 1971, and helped create and taught Technoculture Studies at UC Davis, 2000-06. He prepared and stewarded the statewide broadband plan for New Mexico, 2008-13. Richard has exhibited and conducted arts/sciences collaborations internationally. He is now preparing a book, Info/Eco: The Nature of Information.
Olena Marina is a Doctor of Science in Philology and Professor at the Kerry Education and Training Board, Ireland. Her research interests include multimodal studies, cognitive linguistics, transmediality studies, media ecology, and general semantics.
Vanessa Martins is a PhD candidate in Communication at Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), Brazil, where she received her Master’s in Communication. She is a member of the research groups CNPq ‘Media Narratives’ and ‘Group of Studies & Research in Educommunication’ at Federal University of São João del-Rei (UFSJ).
Ryan McCullough is an Associate Professor of Communication in the Department of Media and Visual Arts at West Liberty University (West Liberty, West Virginia). He teaches courses in public speaking, media theory, media law and ethics, public relations, and social media. His research interests include media ecology, rhetoric, communication ethics, and general semantics.
Deepa Mishra is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at Smt. Smt. Chandibai Himathmal Mansukhani College, Ulhasnagar, Mumbai, India. She has been with the Board of Studies of English, University of Mumbai for the past ten years, and in this capacity she has been actively involved in designing undergraduate and post graduate syllabi for the University of Mumbai. She serves as a mentor for doctoral students in the Department of English, University of Mumbai; and as an external referee to adjudicate PhD theses of reputed universities; and has wide publications in international journals. Dr. Mishra is the recipient of the 2016 Hayakawa Book Prize from the Institute of General Semantics, fir her edited volume, General Semantics: A Critical Companion. She was instrumental in establishing a Nodal Centre for General Semantics at CHM College in collaboration with Balvant Parekh Centre for General Semantics and Other Human sciences, Baroda, and has organized many seminars and workshops for the promotion of general semantics in India. Dr. Mishra is a member of the editorial board ofETC: A Review of General Semantics, a co-editor of Anekaant: A Journal of Polysemic Thought (a refereed journal published annually by BalvantParekh Centre for General Semantics and Other Human Sciences), and assistant editor of Writing Today: International Journal of Studies in English.
Camillo Montenegro has been an educator for over 16 years, and currently works in EdTech, providing digital formative assessment tools to universities, schools and government agencies internationally. His interest in art history, media and political science led him to media ecology. As an independent scholar, his research has focused on the works of Van Eyck, Bach and Dante. He is a musician, composer and painter and is currently working on a Spanish translation of Dante's Divine Comedy which he hopes to publish on city walls. Born in Mexico City, he currently lives in Valencia, Spain.
Julianne H. Newton is Director of the Communication and Media Studies Doctoral and Master’s Program and Professor of Visual Communication in the School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon. An award-winning scholar and educator, she has worked as a reporter, editor, photographer and designer for newspapers, magazines, electronic media, and organizations. Her research applies ethics and cognitive theory to the study of visual behavior, focusing on visual journalism and media. She is author of The Burden of Visual Truth: The Role of Photojournalism in Mediating Reality and co-author (with Rick Williams) of Visual Communication: Integrating Media, Art and Science. Recent work includes chapters on visual ethics in the Handbook of Media Ethics (Wilkins & Christians), Handbook of Visual Communication (Josephson, Kelly & Smith), Routledge Companion to Journalism Ethics (Price, Sanders & Wyatt), The Handbook of Global Media Ethics (Ward), and A Companion to Television (Meehan & Wasko). She joined the University of Oregon faculty in Fall 2000 after serving 15 years on the faculty of The University of Texas
at Austin and two years at St. Edward’s University.
Kolawole Waziri Olagboyega is Professor of Linguistics and Graduate School at Tsuru University Japan. Prior to this position, he was simultaneously the Director of the English for Academic Excellence and the Director of the Language Acquisition Center at the International College of Liberal Arts, Japan. He is the Editor of Language and Intercultural Communication Studies and has published widely in the area of second language acquisition, learning and teaching in multilingual classrooms and World Englishes. His publications include Japanese English: A Descriptive Grammar (Shumpusha Publishers, 2020) and English Language: Structure, Varieties, Social Contexts and Learning (YGU Press 2017). He is a Fellow of Cambridge Commonwealth Trust.
Renee Peterson is completing her PhD in Media and Communication at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, to graduate as a Doctor of Media. Renee's PhD research focuses on the media ecology of celebrities navigating their professional transition as social media influencers in a podcast series called 'From Screen Celebrity to Social Media influencer' with her dissertation. Renee has over 20 years of experience in the Australian and international media industry as a professional radio and television presenter, podcaster, executive producer, and writer. Renee Peterson is Renee Peterson Presents Pty Ltd's founder, director, and CEO. She is a sessional academic lecturer at Victoria University for the Bachelor of Screen Media degree: Radio Production, Introduction Screen Media, and Cross Media Practice. Renee uses her professional media industry experience collaborating with the academic curriculum to engage all students.
Michael Plugh is Associate Professor of Communication at Manhattan College. He currently serves as President of the New York Society for General Semantics, as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Institute of General Semantics, and as President of the Media Ecology Association. Dr. Plugh is a Past President of the New York State Communication Association. His research interests include learning and education, technology and socio-cultural change, and the relationship between language and culture.
Lance Strate is Professor of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University in New York City, a Trustee and President of the Institute of General Semantics, a Past President of the New York Society for General Semantics, the New York State Communication, Association and the Media Ecology Association, and the co-chair of the Global Listening Centre’s Academic Board. He held the 2015 Harron Family Chair in Communication at Villanova University, and received an honorary appointment as Chair Professor in the School of Journalism and Communication at Henan University in Kaifeng, China, in 2016. He is the author of Echoes and Reflections: On Media Ecology as a Field of Study (2006), On the Binding Biases of Time and Other Essays on General Semantics and Media Ecology (2011), Amazing Ourselves to Death: Neil Postman's Brave New World Revisited (2014), Thunder at Darwin Station (2015), 麦克卢汉与媒介生态学 [McLuhan and Media Ecology, an original collection of essays published in Mandarin translation, 2016], Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition (2017), Introdução à Ecologia das Midías [Introduction to Media Ecology, co-authored by Adriana Braga and Paul Levinson, original contributions published in Portuguese translation, 2019), Diatribal Writes of Passage in a World of Wintertextuality: Poems on Language, Media, and Life (2020), and Concerning Communication: Epic Quests and Lyric Excursions in the Human Life World (2022). He is co-editor of two editions of Communication and Cyberspace: Social Interaction in an Electronic Environment (1996, 2003), Critical Studies in Media Commercialism (2000), The Legacy of McLuhan (2005), Korzybski and... (2012), The Medium is the Muse: Channeling Marshall McLuhan (2015), La Comprensión de los Medios en la Era Digital: Un Nuevo Análisis de la Obra de Marshall McLuhan (2016), and Taking Up McLuhan's Cause: Perspectives on Media and Formal Causality (2017). He has served as editor of the Speech Communication Annual, General Semantics Bulletin, and Explorations in Media Ecology, a journal he founded and edited for 9 years (2002-2007, 2017-2019). He delivered the 2018 Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture, received the Media Ecology Association's 2018 Marshall McLuhan Award for Outstanding Book and their 2013 Walter J. Ong Award for Career Achievement in Scholarship, the Eastern Communication Association's 2019 Distinguished Research Fellow Award, the New York State Communication Association's 2019 Neil Postman Mentor Award and their 1998 John F. Wilson Fellow Award for exceptional scholarship, leadership, and dedication to the field of communication, the Global Listening Centre’s 2020 Outstanding Research Award, and the 2022 J. Talbot Winchell Award for Service from the Institute of General Semantics. Translations of his writing have appeared in French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Hungarian, Hebrew, Mandarin, and Quenya.
Nadja Touzari earned her Master of Arts from Roskilde University, Denmark. Her research has mostly been centered on mediating processes, discourse and media phenomenology.
Laura Trujillo-Liñán is professor/researcher of Humanities and Media at Universidad Panamericana, General Coordinator for the Universidad Panamericana Open University, member of the Board of trustees of the General Semantics Institute, member of the Media Ecology Association, Asociación Filosófica de México, and the International Communication Association. She is the author of a number of articles and book chapters, on topics related to Marshall McLuhan, Aristotle, metaphysics, ethics and media. She is the author of Formal Cause in Marshall McLuhan’s Thinking: An Aristotelian Perspective (2022, IGS).
Gina Valenti is an artist, professor, writer, composer, international curator, and artistic director who specializes in new media art. She holds the position of Professor at the Faculty of Humanities and Arts of the National University of Rosario, Argentina, where she also directs the Center for Studies “CTRL+Z.” Valenti is the creator and director of the “404 International Festival of Art and Technology,” an independent nonprofit project that is the oldest festival of its kind in Argentina. “404” has been presented in 12 countries so far, including Argentina, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, Austria, Spain, Taiwan, Russia, Colombia, Japan, the United States, and France. In 2023, the 20th anniversary will be hosted in Ciudad de México and NYC.
Mauro Ventola is the Founder and President of the Center for Ontological Transformation, an institution that intends to promote the critical re-foundation of transformationality in existential ontology, and creator of transformational ontophenomenology. Previously he was Director of the Center for Psychosynthesis in Naples from 2017 to 2020, and member of the Board of Directors of the Institute of Psychosynthesis founded by Roberto Assagioli. He graduated in Philosophy at the University of Naples Federico II with a thesis in bioeducational sciences, furthering his education at the Italian Institute for Philosophical Studies (IISF). He has devoted his entire research to the realm of transformation from an ontological-existential point of view, publishing about twenty books, including L’Esperienza Transpersonale (with Sergio Guarino, Integral Transpersonal Institute, 2021), L’Orizzonte di un Mondo Nuovo (with Alberto Alberti, L’UOMO Edizioni, 2020), and Al Cuore della Questione (with Marco Guzzi, Editrice Nuova Era, 2020). He is the author of numerous articles in specialized journals, including the Journal of the Italian Society of Therapeutic Psychosynthesis (SIPT), the Journal of the Italian Institute for the Future (IIF) and in the Integral Transpersonal Journal (ITJ).
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