The Institute of General Semantics (IGS) is a not-for-profit corporation established in 1938 by Alfred Korzybski, to support research and publication on the topic of general semantics. 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 Semantic ...
, 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, psychologist Albert Ellis, 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 t ...
, linguist Allen Walker Read, and philosopher F. S. C. Northrop. 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. 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 t ...
, 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 ...
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 an ...
F. J. Roethlisberger
Fritz Jules Roethlisberger (October 29, 1898- May 17, 1974) was a social scientist, management theorist at the Harvard Business School.F. S. C. Northrop
*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 t ...
Abraham Maslow
Abraham Harold Maslow (; April 1, 1908 – June 8, 1970) was an American psychologist who was best known for creating Maslow's hierarchy of needs, a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, cul ...
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 "f ...
,
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 conques ...
, 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 ...
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 a ...
J. Bronowski
Jacob Bronowski (18 January 1908 – 22 August 1974) was a Polish-British mathematician and philosopher. He was known to friends and professional colleagues alike by the nickname Bruno. He is best known for developing a humanistic approach to sc ...
*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 ...
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 an ...
Elton S. Carter Elton may refer to:
Places
England
* Elton, Cambridgeshire (formerly Huntingdonshire), a village
** Elton Hall, a baronial hall
* Elton, Cheshire, a village and civil parish
* Elton, County Durham, a village and civil parish
* Elton, Derbyshire, ...
, 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 ...
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 Londo ...
*1976:
Roger W. Wescott
Roger is a given name, usually masculine, and a surname. The given name is derived from the Old French personal names ' and '. These names are of Germanic origin, derived from the elements ', ''χrōþi'' ("fame", "renown", "honour") and ', ' ( ...
*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 F ...
Don Fabun
Don, don or DON and variants may refer to:
Places
*County Donegal, Ireland, Chapman code DON
*Don (river), a river in European Russia
*Don River (disambiguation), several other rivers with the name
*Don, Benin, a town in Benin
*Don, Dang, a vill ...
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 ...
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 Univers ...
George F. F. Lombard
George may refer to:
People
* George (given name)
* George (surname)
* George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George
* George Washington, First President of the United States
* George W. Bush, 43rd President ...
*1987:
Richard W. Paul
Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Frankish language, Old Frankish and is a Compound (linguistics), compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic language, Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' an ...
William V. Haney
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 conques ...
*1990:
Warren M. Robbins
Warren Murray Robbins (September 4, 1923 – December 4, 2008) was an American art collector, whose collection of African art led to the formation of the National Museum of African Art at the Smithsonian Institution.
Robbins was born in Worceste ...
William Lutz
William D. Lutz (; born December 12, 1940) is an American linguist who specializes in the use of plain language and the avoidance of doublespeak (deceptive language). He wrote a famous essay ''The World of Doublespeak'' on this subject as well as ...
*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 ...
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
Ellen Jane Langer (; born March 25, 1947) is an American professor of psychology at Harvard University; in 1981, she became the first woman ever to be tenured in psychology at Harvard. Langer studies the illusion of control, decision-making, agi ...
*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 ...
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 ...
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 Un ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 Semantic ...
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 ...