The Institute of General Semantics (IGS) is a not-for-profit corporation established in 1938 by
Alfred Korzybski
Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski (, ; July 3, 1879 – March 1, 1950) was a Polish-American independent scholar who developed a field called general semantics, which he viewed as both distinct from, and more encompassing than, the field of s ...
, to support research and publication on the topic of
general semantics
General semantics is concerned with how events translate to perceptions, how they are further modified by the names and labels we apply to them, and how we might gain a measure of control over our own cognitive, emotional, and behavioral respons ...
. The Institute publishes Korzybski's writings, including the seminal text ''Science & Sanity'', and books by other authors who have studied or taught general semantics, such as
Robert Pula Robert Paul Pula (December 3, 1928–January 11, 2004) was a director emeritus of the Institute of General Semantics, author of ''A General-Semantics Glossary'', and a composer. Pula served as the lead lecturer for the Institute of General Semantics ...
, Irving J. Lee,
Wendell Johnson
Wendell Johnson (April 16, 1906 – August 29, 1965) was an American psychologist, author and was a proponent of general semantics (or GS). He was born in Roxbury, Kansas and died in Iowa City, Iowa where most of his life's work was based. The ...
, and
Stuart Chase
Stuart Chase (March 8, 1888 – November 16, 1985) was an American economist, social theorist, and writer. His writings covered topics as diverse as general semantics and physical economy. His thought was shaped by Henry George, by economic philoso ...
. Every year since 1952, it has sponsored the Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture, with presenters from a broad range of disciplines, from science to medicine to entertainment, including names like actor
Steve Allen
Stephen Valentine Patrick William Allen (December 26, 1921 – October 30, 2000) was an American television personality, radio personality, musician, composer, actor, comedian, and writer. In 1954, he achieved national fame as the co-cre ...
, psychologist
Albert Ellis
Albert Ellis (September 27, 1913 – July 24, 2007) was an American psychologist and psychotherapist who founded rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). He held MA and PhD degrees in clinical psychology from Columbia University, and was cert ...
, scientist and visionary
R. Buckminster Fuller
Richard Buckminster Fuller (; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) was an American architect, systems theorist, writer, designer, inventor, philosopher, and futurist. He styled his name as R. Buckminster Fuller in his writings, publishing more ...
, linguist
Allen Walker Read
Allen Walker Read (June 2, 1906 – October 16, 2002) was an American etymologist and lexicographer. Born in Minnesota, he spent much of his career as a professor at Columbia University in New York. Read's work ''Classic American Graffiti'' is we ...
, and philosopher
F. S. C. Northrop
Filmer Stuart Cuckow Northrop (November 27, 1893 in Janesville, Wisconsin – July 22, 1992 in Exeter, New Hampshire) was an American legal philosopher and
influential comparative philosopher.
After receiving a B.A. from Beloit College in 191 ...
. The Institute offers periodic seminars, workshops and conferences and is headquartered in New York City.
The IGS is closely affiliated with GS groups around the globe, including the
Australian General Semantics Society
Australian(s) may refer to:
Australia
* Australia, a country
* Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia
** European Australians
** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists
** Aboriginal Aus ...
.
The Institute of General Semantics publishes:
* ''ETC: A Review of General Semantics'', a quarterly journal printed since 1943, distributed to IGS members and subscribed to by over 350 libraries around the world.
* Numerous books, CDs and DVDs on general semantics.
Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture
The Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture (AKML) series was begun in 1952. It is an annual event sponsored by the Institute of General Semantics in honor of
Alfred Korzybski
Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski (, ; July 3, 1879 – March 1, 1950) was a Polish-American independent scholar who developed a field called general semantics, which he viewed as both distinct from, and more encompassing than, the field of s ...
. Each year the Institute invites some prominent scholar or otherwise notable individual to give the lecture. Lecturers have included inventor
R. Buckminster Fuller
Richard Buckminster Fuller (; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) was an American architect, systems theorist, writer, designer, inventor, philosopher, and futurist. He styled his name as R. Buckminster Fuller in his writings, publishing more ...
, physicist
James A. Van Allen
James Alfred Van Allen (September 7, 1914August 9, 2006) was an American space scientist at the University of Iowa. He was instrumental in establishing the field of magnetospheric research in space.
The Van Allen radiation belts were named afte ...
, entertainer
Steve Allen
Stephen Valentine Patrick William Allen (December 26, 1921 – October 30, 2000) was an American television personality, radio personality, musician, composer, actor, comedian, and writer. In 1954, he achieved national fame as the co-cre ...
,
Gregory Bateson
Gregory Bateson (9 May 1904 – 4 July 1980) was an English anthropologist, social scientist, linguist, visual anthropologist, semiotician, and cyberneticist whose work intersected that of many other fields. His writings include '' Steps to a ...
,
Neil Postman
Neil Postman (March 8, 1931 – October 5, 2003) was an American author, educator, media theorist and cultural critic, who eschewed digital technology, including personal computers, mobile devices, and cruise control in cars, and was critical o ...
and
Ashley Montagu
Montague Francis Ashley-Montagu (June 28, 1905November 26, 1999) — born Israel Ehrenberg — was a British-American anthropologist who popularized the study of topics such as race and gender and their relation to politics and development. He w ...
. The only person to give the lecture more than once was surgeon
Russell Meyers, in 1958 and 1985.
Lecturers
*1952:
William Vogt
William Vogt (15 May 1902 – 11 July 1968) was an American ecologist and ornithologist, with a strong interest in both the carrying capacity and population control. He was the author of best-seller '' Road to Survival'' (1948), National Dire ...
and
Ashley Montagu
Montague Francis Ashley-Montagu (June 28, 1905November 26, 1999) — born Israel Ehrenberg — was a British-American anthropologist who popularized the study of topics such as race and gender and their relation to politics and development. He w ...
*1953:
F. J. Roethlisberger
*1954:
F. S. C. Northrop
Filmer Stuart Cuckow Northrop (November 27, 1893 in Janesville, Wisconsin – July 22, 1992 in Exeter, New Hampshire) was an American legal philosopher and
influential comparative philosopher.
After receiving a B.A. from Beloit College in 191 ...
*1955:
R. Buckminster Fuller
Richard Buckminster Fuller (; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) was an American architect, systems theorist, writer, designer, inventor, philosopher, and futurist. He styled his name as R. Buckminster Fuller in his writings, publishing more ...
*1956:
Clyde Kluckhohn
Clyde Kluckhohn (; January 11, 1905 in Le Mars, Iowa – July 28, 1960 near Santa Fe, New Mexico), was an American anthropologist and social theorist, best known for his long-term ethnographic work among the Navajo and his contributions to the ...
*1957:
Abraham Maslow
*1958:
Russell Meyers
*1959: Symposium with
Charles M. Pomerat
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*karilaz'' (in Latin alphabet), whose meaning was ...
,
William J. Fry
William is a masculine given name of Norman French origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conq ...
, and
James A. Van Allen
James Alfred Van Allen (September 7, 1914August 9, 2006) was an American space scientist at the University of Iowa. He was instrumental in establishing the field of magnetospheric research in space.
The Van Allen radiation belts were named afte ...
*1960:
Warren S. McCulloch
*1961:
Robert R. Blake
Robert R. Blake (January 21, 1918 – June 20, 2004) was an American management theoretician. He did pioneer work in the field of organizational dynamics.
Together with Jane S. Mouton, he developed the Managerial Grid Model (1964), which attempts ...
*1962:
Harold G. Cassidy
Harold may refer to:
People
* Harold (given name), including a list of persons and fictional characters with the name
* Harold (surname), surname in the English language
* András Arató, known in meme culture as "Hide the Pain Harold"
Arts ...
*1963:
Henri Laborit
Henri Laborit (21 November 1914 – 18 May 1995) was a French surgeon, neurobiologist, writer and philosopher. In 1952, Laborit was instrumental in the development of the drug chlorpromazine, published his findings, and convinced three psychiatr ...
*1964:
Joost A. M. Meerloo
Joost Abraham Maurits Meerloo (March 14, 1903 – November 17, 1976) was a Dutch/American Doctor of Medicine and psychoanalyst. He authored ''Rape of the Mind'', an analysis of brainwashing techniques and thought control in totalitarian states.
B ...
*1965:
Henry Lee Smith Jr.
*1966:
Alvin M. Weinberg
Alvin Martin Weinberg (; April 20, 1915 – October 18, 2006) was an American nuclear physicist who was the administrator at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) during and after the Manhattan Project. He came to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, in 1945 ...
*1967:
J. Bronowski
*1968:
Alastair M. Taylor
Alastair MacDonald Taylor (March 12, 1915 – October 15, 2005) was a Canadian historian, filmmaker, United Nations official, professor of geography and political studies, and interdisciplinary thinker. He co-authored the first world-history textb ...
*1969:
Lancelot Law Whyte
Lancelot Law Whyte (4 November 1896 – 14 September 1972) was a Scottish philosopher, theoretical physicist, historian of science and financier. Early life and career
Lancelot Law Whyte, the son of Dr. Alexander Whyte, was born in Edinburgh, Sc ...
*1970:
Gregory Bateson
Gregory Bateson (9 May 1904 – 4 July 1980) was an English anthropologist, social scientist, linguist, visual anthropologist, semiotician, and cyberneticist whose work intersected that of many other fields. His writings include '' Steps to a ...
*1971:
Henry Margenau
Henry Margenau (April 30, 1901 – February 8, 1997) was a German-American physicist, and philosopher of science.
Biography Early life
Born in Bielefeld, Germany, Margenau obtained his bachelor's degree from Midland Lutheran College, Nebraska bef ...
*1972:
George Steiner
Francis George Steiner, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature and society, and the ...
*1973: Panel with
J. Samuel Bois,
Elton S. Carter, and
Walter Probert
Walter may refer to:
People
* Walter (name), both a surname and a given name
* Little Walter, American blues harmonica player Marion Walter Jacobs (1930–1968)
* Gunther (wrestler), Austrian professional wrestler and trainer Walter Hahn (born 19 ...
*1974:
Kenneth G. Johnson
Kenneth is an English given name and surname. The name is an Anglicised form of two entirely different Gaelic personal names: ''Cainnech'' and '' Cináed''. The modern Gaelic form of ''Cainnech'' is ''Coinneach''; the name was derived from a byn ...
and
Neil Postman
Neil Postman (March 8, 1931 – October 5, 2003) was an American author, educator, media theorist and cultural critic, who eschewed digital technology, including personal computers, mobile devices, and cruise control in cars, and was critical o ...
*1975:
Harley C. Shands Harley may refer to:
People
* Harley (given name)
* Harley (surname)
Places
* Harley, Ontario, a township in Canada
* Harley, Brant County, Ontario, Canada
* Harley, Shropshire, England
* Harley, South Yorkshire, England
* Harley Street, in Lond ...
*1976:
Roger W. Wescott
*1977:
Ben Bova
Benjamin William Bova (November 8, 1932November 29, 2020) was an American writer and editor. During a writing career of 60 years, he was the author of more than 120 works of science fact and fiction, an editor of ''Analog Science Fiction and Fac ...
*1978:
Elwood Murray
Elwood Murray (1897-1988) was an American administrator and scientist in the field of speech communications and general semantics.
Biography
Elwood Murray was born in 1897 and raised on a farm near Hastings, Nebraska. He obtained a B.A. degree i ...
*1979:
Don Fabun
*1980:
Barbara Morgan
Barbara Radding Morgan (born November 28, 1951) is an American teacher and a former NASA astronaut. She participated in the Teacher in Space program as backup to Christa McAuliffe for the 1986 ill-fated STS-51-L mission of the Space Shuttle '' ...
*1981:
Thomas Sebeok
Thomas Albert Sebeok ( hu, Sebők Tamás, ; 1920–2001) was a Hungarian-born American polymath,Cobley, Paul; Deely, John; Kull, Kalevi; Petrilli, Susan (eds.) (2011). Semiotics Continues to Astonish: Thomas A. Sebeok and the Doctrine of Signs'. ...
*1982:
Robert R. Blake
Robert R. Blake (January 21, 1918 – June 20, 2004) was an American management theoretician. He did pioneer work in the field of organizational dynamics.
Together with Jane S. Mouton, he developed the Managerial Grid Model (1964), which attempts ...
and
Jane Srygley Mouton
Jane Srygley Mouton (April 15, 1930 in Port Arthur, Texas – December 7, 1987) was an American management theorist, remembered in particular for developing the Managerial grid model with Robert R. Blake.
Biography
Her father, Theodore Quarles ...
*1983:
Allen Walker Read
Allen Walker Read (June 2, 1906 – October 16, 2002) was an American etymologist and lexicographer. Born in Minnesota, he spent much of his career as a professor at Columbia University in New York. Read's work ''Classic American Graffiti'' is we ...
*1984:
Karl H. Pribram
Karl H. Pribram (; ; February 25, 1919 – January 19, 2015) was a professor at Georgetown University, in the United States, an emeritus professor of psychology and psychiatry at Stanford University and distinguished professor at Radford Univer ...
*1985:
Russell Meyers
*1986:
George F. F. Lombard
*1987:
Richard W. Paul
Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'stron ...
*1988:
Jerome Bruner
Jerome Seymour Bruner (October 1, 1915 – June 5, 2016) was an American psychologist who made significant contributions to human cognitive psychology and cognitive learning theory in educational psychology. Bruner was a senior research fellow at ...
*1989:
William V. Haney
*1990:
Warren M. Robbins
*1991:
Albert Ellis
Albert Ellis (September 27, 1913 – July 24, 2007) was an American psychologist and psychotherapist who founded rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). He held MA and PhD degrees in clinical psychology from Columbia University, and was cert ...
*1992:
Steve Allen
Stephen Valentine Patrick William Allen (December 26, 1921 – October 30, 2000) was an American television personality, radio personality, musician, composer, actor, comedian, and writer. In 1954, he achieved national fame as the co-cre ...
*1993:
William Lutz
*1994:
Lotfi A. Zadeh
Lotfi Aliasker Zadeh (; az, Lütfi Rəhim oğlu Ələsgərzadə; fa, لطفی علیعسکرزاده; 4 February 1921 – 6 September 2017) was a mathematician, computer scientist, electrical engineer, artificial intelligence researcher, an ...
*1995:
Nicholas Johnson
Nicholas Johnson (born September 23, 1934) is an American academic and lawyer. He wrote ''How to Talk Back to Your Television Set'' and was a Federal Communications Commission commissioner from 1966 to 1973. He is retired from teaching at the Un ...
*1996:
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Mihaly Robert Csikszentmihalyi (, hu, Csíkszentmihályi Mihály Róbert, ; 29 September 1934 – 20 October 2021) was a Hungarian-American psychologist. He recognized and named the psychological concept of "flow", a highly focused mental ...
*1997:
Robert Anton Wilson
Robert Anton Wilson (born Robert Edward Wilson; January 18, 1932 – January 11, 2007) was an American author, futurist, psychologist, and self-described agnostic mystic. Recognized within Discordianism as an Episkopos, pope and saint, Wilso ...
*1998:
Theodore R. Sizer
Theodore Ryland Sizer (June 23, 1932 – October 21, 2009) was a leader of educational reform in the United States, the founder (and eventually President Emeritus) of the Essential school movement and was known for challenging longstanding practi ...
*1999:
Ellen J. Langer
*2000:
Robert P. Pula Robert Paul Pula (December 3, 1928–January 11, 2004) was a director emeritus of the Institute of General Semantics, author of ''A General-Semantics Glossary'', and a composer. Pula served as the lead lecturer for the Institute of General Semantics ...
*2001:
Lou Marinoff
Lou Marinoff is a Canadian-born academic, author, and Commonwealth Scholar. He is Professor of Philosophy and Asian Studies at The City College of New York and founding President of the American Philosophical Practitioners Association.
Educat ...
*2002:
J. Allan Hobson
John Allan Hobson (June 3, 1933 – July 7, 2021) was an American psychiatrist and dream researcher. He was known for his research on rapid eye movement sleep. He was Professor of Psychiatry, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School, and Professor, Depar ...
*2003:
Sanford I. Berman
Dr. Sanford I. Berman (aka Dr. Michael Dean) was a philanthropist, real estate investor, professional hypnotist, and board member of the Institute of General Semantics. As of the year 2000, Berman had given more than a million dollars to the Univ ...
*2005:
Robert L. Carneiro
Robert Leonard Carneiro (June 4, 1927 – June 24, 2020) was an American anthropologist and curator of the American Museum of Natural History. His Circumscription Theory explains how early political states may have formed as a result of interacti ...
*2006:
Renee Hobbs
Renee Hobbs is an American scholar and educator who works in the field of media literacy education. She is Professor of Communication Studies at the Harrington School of Communication and Media and founder of the Media Education Lab at the Univers ...
*2007:
Leonard Shlain
Leonard Shlain (August 28, 1937 – May 11, 2009) was an American surgeon, writer, and inventor. He was chairperson of laparoscopic surgery at the California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, and was an associate professor of surgery at U ...
*2008:
Douglas Rushkoff
Douglas Mark Rushkoff (born February 18, 1961) is an American media theorist, writer, columnist, lecturer, graphic novelist, and documentarian. He is best known for his association with the early cyberpunk culture and his advocacy of open source ...
*2009:
Mary Catherine Bateson
Mary Catherine Bateson (December 8, 1939 – January 2, 2021) was an American writer and cultural anthropologist.
The daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, Bateson was a noted author in her field with many published monographs. ...
*2010:
Deborah Tannen
Deborah Frances Tannen (born June 7, 1945) is an American author and professor of linguistics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Best known as the author of '' You Just Don't Understand'', she has been a McGraw Distinguished Lecturer a ...
*2011:
Sherry Turkle
Sherry Turkle (born June 18, 1948) is the Abby Rockefeller Mauzé Professor of the Social Studies of Science and Technology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She obtained an BA in social studies and later a PhD in sociology and perso ...
*2012:
Shawn Lawrence Otto
Shawn Lawrence Otto (born April 21, 1961) is an American novelist, nonfiction author, filmmaker, political strategist, speaker, science advocate, and screenwriter and co-producer of the 2003 film '' House of Sand and Fog''.
Biography
Otto lives ...
*2013:
Terrence W. Deacon
Terrence William Deacon (born 1950) is an American neuroanthropologist (Ph.D. in Biological Anthropology, Harvard University 1984). He taught at Harvard for eight years, relocated to Boston University in 1992, and is currently Professor of Anth ...
*2014:
Jack El-Hai
Jack El-Hai is an American journalist and author who focuses most of his work on the history of medicine, the history of science, and other historical topics.
Career
El-Hai graduated from Carleton College in 1979. He was the president of the Am ...
*2015:
Andrew Keen
Andrew Keen (born c. 1960Saracevic, Alan T. (15 October 2006)Debate 2.0 / Weighing the merits of the new Webocracy.''San Francisco Chronicle'' ("Age: 46")) is a British-American entrepreneur and author. He is particularly known for his view th ...
*2016:
Iain McGilchrist
Iain McGilchrist (born 1953) is a psychiatrist, writer, and former Oxford literary scholar. McGilchrist came to prominence after the publication of his book '' The Master and His Emissary'', subtitled ''The Divided Brain and the Making of the Wes ...
*2017:
Terry Moran
Terry Moran is an American journalist, currently Senior National Correspondent at ABC News. Based in Washington, D.C., Moran covers national politics and policy, reporting from the Trump White House, the Supreme Court, and the campaign trail fo ...
*2018:
Lance Strate
Lance A. Strate (born September 17, 1957) is an American writer and professor of communication and media studies at Fordham University. He was the 2015 Margaret E. and Paul F. Harron Endowed Chair in Communication at Villanova University, and in 20 ...
*2019:
Nadine Strossen
Nadine Strossen (born August 18, 1950) is an American civil liberties activist who was president of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) from February 1991 to October 2008. A liberal feminist, she was the first woman to ever lead the ACLU. A ...
*2020:
Siva Vaidhyanathan
Siva Vaidhyanathan (born 1966) is a cultural historian and media scholar, and the Robertson professor of Media Studies at the University of Virginia. Vaidhyanathan is a permanent columnist at The Guardian and Slate; he is also a frequent contribut ...
(planned)
See also
*
Alfred Korzybski
Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski (, ; July 3, 1879 – March 1, 1950) was a Polish-American independent scholar who developed a field called general semantics, which he viewed as both distinct from, and more encompassing than, the field of s ...
*
General Semantics
General semantics is concerned with how events translate to perceptions, how they are further modified by the names and labels we apply to them, and how we might gain a measure of control over our own cognitive, emotional, and behavioral respons ...
*
Marjorie Kendig
Marjorie Kendig Gates (1892–1981), best known as M . Kendig, was an American administrator, director of the Institute of General Semantics from 1950 until 1965, and co-worker of Alfred Korzybski, who developed the theory of general semantics. ...
*
Robert Pula Robert Paul Pula (December 3, 1928–January 11, 2004) was a director emeritus of the Institute of General Semantics, author of ''A General-Semantics Glossary'', and a composer. Pula served as the lead lecturer for the Institute of General Semantics ...
*
Elwood Murray
Elwood Murray (1897-1988) was an American administrator and scientist in the field of speech communications and general semantics.
Biography
Elwood Murray was born in 1897 and raised on a farm near Hastings, Nebraska. He obtained a B.A. degree i ...
*
Sanford I. Berman
Dr. Sanford I. Berman (aka Dr. Michael Dean) was a philanthropist, real estate investor, professional hypnotist, and board member of the Institute of General Semantics. As of the year 2000, Berman had given more than a million dollars to the Univ ...
References
External links
Australian General Semantics Society The Institute of General Semantics
{{Authority control
General semantics
1938 establishments in the United States
Organizations established in 1938
501(c)(3) organizations
Non-profit organizations based in New York (state)