Workshop 3 - Groningen, 2010

Supported the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (NWO)

Introduction

Within the fields of cultural theory and philosophy of culture, one can identify a line of thinking concerned with semiotic patterns of development in the history of culture. The approach derives its impetus from the deep conviction that in order to understand the logic of cultural development, one must take the building blocks of culture, that is, signs and language, as a starting point for research. Within this tradition we find, among others, Giambattista Vico (Scienza Nuova, 1744), Ernst Cassirer (Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, 1923-1929), Michel Foucault (Les mots et les choses , 1966) and Hayden White (Metahistory, 1973). More recently, this semiotic perspective has been fuelled by work in the field of evolutionary psychology (Merlin Donald, Origins of the Modern Mind, 1992; A Mind so Rare, 2001) .

The workshop, which is the third and last in a series of workshops on semiotic evolution and the dynamics of culture, organized by the universities of Bremen, Århus, and Groningen, and supported by the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) aims at taking stock of what has been achieved, and to sketch new perspectives for further research. Three fields will have to be related: semiotics (the theory and philosophy of representation, signs and semiosis), cultural history, and (evolutionary) neuropsychology. Where possible, general questions related to patterns of cultural evolution will be tackled in the context of case studies.