Friday, 10 November 2017

Workshop on Semantics @ Baroda, Gujarat

National Workshop
on
Radical General Semantics
(Based on The Book of Radical General Semantics)

15, 16, 17 December 2017

Balvant Parekh Centre For General Semantics and Other Human Sciences
Baroda, Gujarat
at
National Institute of Science and Technology
Berhampur, Orissa

The eleventh annual national workshop of Balvant Parekh Centre for General Semantics and Other Human Sciences will be organized in collaboration with The National Institute of Science and Technology on the theme, “Radical General Semantics” during 15-17 December 2017 at The National Institute of Science and Technology, Berhampur, Odisha. The Workshop will use The Book of Radical General Semantics as the study material. The author of the book, Gad Horowitz and the editor, Shannon Bell will conduct the workshop.

The Workshop will be based on Parts I-V of The Book of Radical General Semantics. However, for the benefit of participants with little experience with General Semantics, we shall begin with a video lecture which reviews Alfred Korzybski’s Structural Differential, the path breaking invention that brings General Semantics into being: A three dimensional structure that differentiates and relates the ‘event level’ (‘what is going on’ or ‘wigo’), the ‘object level’—abstracted from the event—where living beings see, hear, feel, smell, taste, move, grow old and die, and the ‘label levels’—abstracted from the object—where human beings construct meaning in language. We demonstrate how to work with the structural differential, including a discussion of the central General Semantics notions of ‘consciousness of abstraction’ and nonidentity. Sanity requires non-identification of these levels. Label is not object, object is not event.

We then engage with Part III of The Book of Radical General Semantics – “The Devices of General Semantics”. In this session we focus on the first of these devices – the Index – which facilitates liberation from the domination of experience by generalizations, concepts, etc., bringing into view the uniqueness, the singularity of each and every person and happening.

We then focus on the relevant sections of Chapters 5 and 6 of Part II, to consider the method of Contemplative Photography as a mode of opening ‘the eye of innocence’ in attending to the object level. Participants will have the opportunity to do contemplative photography on their own.

Next we introduce the ‘non-elementalistic’ devices – quotes and hyphens – which enhance our appreciation of the interdependence and relationality of all goings on, leading to methods of locating personal responsibility and personal achievement in biosocial space.

We then introduce work with the ‘meta-model’, a set of devices for enriching and clarifying verbal communication, concentrating on four of its eleven linguistic patterns.

Time permitting, we conclude with a viewing and discussion of a brief video lecture on ‘time binding’, the human species-specific characteristic par excellence, and its relation to non-human dimensions of life.

The Workshop Faculty

Gad Horowitz, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Toronto, Canada. Horowitz does political theory from a series of shifting locations:

Canadian political culture, psychoanalysis, Buddhism, Judaic scholarship, and general semantics. His books include:
Canadian Labour in Politics (University of Toronto Press, 1968),
Repression: Basic and Surplus Repression in Psychoanalytic Theory: Freud, Reich and Marcuse (University of Toronto Press, 1977),
Difficult Justice: Commentaries on Levinas and Politics (University of Toronto Press, 2006),
“Everywhere They Are in Chains”: Political Theory from Rousseau to Marx (Nelson Canada, 1988).

Gad Horowitz taught General Semantics at the University of Toronto since 1985. His course is available in video format at https://vimeo.com/channels/423528. In November 2013 he served as resource person for the VII National General Semantics Workshop at Saurashtra University, Rajkot. Workshop videos are available at https://vimeo.com/channels/1267984. In December 2016 he served as resource person for the X National General Semantics Workshop at Doon University, Derhadun India.

Shannon Bell is a Professor of Political Science at York University, Toronto, Canada http://www.yorku.ca/shanbell/. Her books include:
Fast Feminism (2010),
Reading, Writing and Rewriting the Prostitute Body (1994),
Whore Carnival (1995),
Bad Attitude/s on Trial coauthored (1997, rereleased 2017);
The Book of Radical General Semantics co-edited (2016),
Subversive Itinerary: The Thought of Gad Horowitz, co-edited (2013) and
New Socialisms co-edited (2004).
In November 2013 she served as co-facilitator for the VII National General Semantics Workshop at Saurashtra University, Rajkot. In December 2016 she served as co-facilitator for the X National General Semantics Workshop at Doon University, Derhadun India.

Registration
The Workshop is open to scholars from various disciplines, preferably humanities and social sciences. The registration fee for the workshop is Rs. 1500/ which may be sent through a bank draft or cheque favoring 'Balvant Parekh Centre GS & OHS' payable in any bank in Baroda. The fee will take care of lunch and tea, and a copy of the study material, The Book of Radical General Semantics, which will be sent to each registered participant by post. You may also do a direct bank transfer and the account details would be provided upon request. The registration fee does not include the cost of accommodation in Berhampur and is non-refundable. Those interested in participating in the Workshop are required to send their applications (with full name, designation & institutional affiliation, address to which the book has to be sent, phone number and email) and registration fee before November 15, 2017 to the coordinator of the workshop, Bini B.S. Outstation participants who need accommodation in Berhampur are requested to contact the convener, E. Raja Rao. The participants have to make their own travel arrangements.

For details, contact:
E. Raja Rao
(Convener)
Former Professor
Department of English
Berhampur University, Odisha
Phone: +91 9437186841

Bini B. S.
(Coordinator of the Workshop)
Academic Fellow, Balvant Parekh
Centre for General Semantics and
Other Human Sciences
C-302, Siddhi Vinayak Complex
Behind the Railway Station Faramji
Road, Baroda–390007
Phone: 0265-2320870 (O)

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