Institute of General Semantics upcoming events

Practical Fairy Tales for Everyday Living: GS Fables to Improve Your Thinking and Communicating Abilities (4 May 2026)

Mon, 04 May 2026 23:00:00 GMT

Practical Fairy Tales for Everyday Living:

General Semantics Fables to Improve

Your Thinking and Communicating Abilities

An Online Lecture Series Featuring

Dr. Martin H. Levinson

May 4-25

The Institute of General Semantics is pleased to sponsor an online lecture series to be taught by IGS Trustee and Past President Martin H. Levinson, author of 14 books, including the highly popular Practical Fairy Tales for Everyday Living. The series will consist of 4 sessions, each 90 minutes long, taking place via Zoom.

The lectures will focus on effective ways to evaluate people and situations through stories contained in Practical Fairy Tales for Everyday Living, a personal improvement book based on formulations from general semantics. Registrants for the course will be sent an e-copy of the book before the first session, and there will be ample time for discussion.

The lecture series is offered free of charge, but registration is required. Registrants will receive the Zoom link in advance of the series.

About the Instructor: Martin H. Levinson, PhD, New York University, is a past president of the Institute of General Semantics, book editor for ETC: A Review of General Semantics, and a contributing editor to The Satirist—America’s Most Critical Journal. He has published 14 books and scores of articles on topics ranging from self-help fairy tales to social and historical analyses. He is currently a faculty member with the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Stony Brook University, a teacher for the United Federation of Teachers’ Si Beagle Learning Program, which is located in New York City, and a lecturer on contemporary and historical topics for schools and public libraries.

Meaning in Motion: How Words Become Worlds: General Semantics Seminar (14 Jul 2026)

Tue, 14 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Meaning in Motion:

How Words Become Worlds

The 2026

Institute of General Semantics

In-Person

4-Day

Summer Seminar

July 14-17

The Century Club

London, UK

Registration Fee Covers Breakfast and Lunch

All Course Materials and

Four Full Days of Instruction

IGS Members: US$300

Non-Members: US$350

A language is like a map; it is not the territory represented, but it may be a good map or a bad map. If the map shows a different structure from the territory represented—for instance, shows the cities in a wrong order, or some places east of others while in the actual territory they are west.,—then the map is worse than useless, as it misinforms and leads astray. One who made use of it could never be certain of reaching his destination.

—Alfred Korzybski

Korzybski’s study of language, perception, and consciousness provides us with some of the most essential and least recognized theories and methods to make sense of this era in which communication has become polarizing, and media is stirring the storm of confusion.

General semantics is the name of the tradition of inquiry into language, thought, and abstracting that Korzybski founded. Join the Institute of General Semantics (based in New York City) in London, UK, for four days of theory and practical application, story and experiential learning, via an in-person seminar on general semantics and related non-aristotelian systems. The 4-day intensive course will include lecture, discussion, and exercises designed to provide participants with a thorough grounding in the discipline and its applications.

For those unfamiliar with general semantics, the seminar will provide a comprehensive introduction to the tradition and its 21st century evolution. For those already familiar with the non-aristotelian approach, the course will provide reinforcement, enrichment, and an updating and expansion of the discipline. And for those interested in and/or involved in teaching, the seminar will provide useful guidance on pedagogy related to topics such as language, symbolic communication, thought and behavior, and epistemology and evaluation.

During the seminar, we will explore how unexamined language behaviors perpetuate misperceptions of past and present controversies in professional and personal spaces. And we will determine which language and listening behaviors respect the infinite worth of each person in the interaction.

The seminar leaders will include six trustees of the Institute of General Semantics:

Mary P. Lahman, Professor Emerita of Communication Studies at Manchester University and author of Awareness and Action

Lance Strate, IGS President, Professor of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University, and author of Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, and Concerning Communication: Epic Quests and Lyric Excursions Within the Human Lifeworld.

Nora Bateson, President of the International Bateson Institute, Trustee of the Institute of General Semantics, Creator of Warm Data and the Warm Data labs, complexity/systems teacher, filmmaker, artist, and author of Small Arcs of Larger Circles, and Combining.

Dom Heffer, East Yorkshire-based artist, Trustee of the Institute of General Semantics, Art Editor of the journal ETC: A Review of General Semantics, founding member of Feral Art School, and previously associated with The Estate of Francis Bacon, 2021 Visual Arts Centre, Ferens Art Gallery, Cultural Olympiad 2012, and UK City of Culture 2017.

Peggy Cassidy, Professor of Communication at Adelphi University, President of the New York Society for General Semantics, editor of Explorations in Media Ecology, and author of Bookends: The Changing Media Environment of American Classrooms and Children, Media, and American History: Printed Poison, Pernicious Stuff, and Other Terrible Temptations.

Thom Gencarelli, Professor of Communication at Manhattan University, Treasurer of the Institute of General Semantics, and editor of ETC: A Review of General Semantics.

2026 AKML & Symposium (2 Oct 2026)

Fri, 02 Oct 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Registration is Not Yet Open

and will be for

In-Person Attendance ONLY

All IGS Members in Good Standing Will Receive Instructions on How to Livestream the Event Online Prior to the AKML

The 74th Annual

Alfred Korzybski

Memorial Lecture

and the Symposium on

Language,

Listening,

Literacy,

and Algorithms

October 2nd-4th, 2026

A Call for Papers and Proposals

Will Be Issued at a Later Date

Co-Sponsored by the

New York Society for General Semantics

the International Bateson Institute

the Media Ecology Association

the Tomkins Institute

and the 404 Festival of Art and Technology

featuring

Ted Chiang

Ted Chiang is an American science fiction writer. His work has won four Nebula awards, four Hugo awards, six Locus awards, and the PEN Malamud Award. His novella “Story of Your Life” was the basis of the film Arrival (2016). His most recent short story collection, Exhalation (Knopf, 2019), was listed as one of the Top Ten Books of 2019 by The New York Times, and included in President Barack Obama’s 2019 reading list. In 2023, he was named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in AI.

The lecture, dinner, and symposium are being held at the historic Players Club in Gramercy Park, Manhattan.

Registration is free for IGS members and their guests, but all attendees must be registered in advance in order to gain admittance to the club. More information regarding the dinner and symposium schedule will be made available at a later date.

Please note that as an historic 19th century landmark, the site is not handicap accessible. Dress code is business casual and is strictly enforced, including no sneakers, shorts, ripped jeans, t-shirts).