The Institute of General Semantics recently did a soft relaunch of its online store, and now we are ready to more officially announce its release!

The new IGS Store features many of the same books, ebooks, periodicals, and audio recordings as the past store. You can also purchase IGS memberships and gift memberships as well as request articles from ETC: A Review of General Semantics and the General Semantics Bulletin.

If you had an account with the prior store, you will need to create a new account when ordering.

We will be fine-tuning the IGS Store over the Summer 2018. Should you have any issues with the store, or any feedback on the new store, please reach out the IGS Orders Dept. (aka Customer Service) by email here.

Our long-awaited issue 73:3 (July 2016) of ETC: A Review of General Semantics is in the mail and is now available for download from the IGS Store in searchable PDF format.

• Click here to download ETC 73:3 from the IGS Store.

Table of Contents Preview

• "'Copying Animals in Our Nervous Processes' with Possible Implications for the Evolution of Psychiatric Disorders" by Mark H. Bernstein
• "The World as Process" by Richard L. Epstein
• "Oceanic Gyres, Grammatical Gyres: What We Do Not Know That Has Hurt Us" by Stan Kozikowski
• "Dating General Semantics" by Martin H. Levinson
• "In Defense of the Athenian Way: Neil Postman and Eric Hoffers' Arguments Regarding Aesthetic Creativity" by Barry D. Liss
• "General Semantics and Worker Supervision: A Case Study" by Martin H. Levinson
• "Peripheral Vision: Re-Imaginging Marginality" by Janelle Wilson
• Poems:
  "San Francisco November 16 2010" by Lance Strate
  "My System" by Lance Strate
  "A Turn of a Phrase" by Lance Strate
  "No Fairytale Ending, I'm Afraid" by Lance Strate
  "Flushing" by Lance Strate
  "The Art of Facts" by Lance Strate
  "Cross I'd Twisted Tongue" by Lance Strate
  "Grecian Formula" by Lance Strate
  "A Fickle Pickle" by Lance Strate
  "The Oranges of Consciousness in the Breakdance of the Bicameral Mind" by Lance Strate
• Plus Letter from the Editor and News & Notes.

Cover Art

The photograph used for the cover of ETC 73:3 is by Rick Wise -- the third image in a four-part series.  Wise labels his images “Photographic Fiction.” Currently he is working on two different series, Things, everyday objects we pass by without seeing, and Time-Flows, in which time is simultaneously expanded and contracted. He considers all of his work “Dancing with the Eye.”

Gordon and Breach, Science Publishers, Inc., has recently given permission to the Institute of General Semantics to distribute PDF scans of the entire back catalog of its journal Communication. All fifteen issues are now available for free download from the IGS Store.

• Click here to download Communication from the IGS Store.

Published from 1974 to 1983, editor Lee Thayer -- recipient of the 2017 J. Talbot Winchell Award for exceptional service to the field of general semantics -- described the biannual periodical as:

[…] devoted to new conceptual, theoretical and philosophical approaches to the role and consequences of communication in human affairs. The relevance, timeliness and topicality of this publication make it invaluable if you are interested in studying man through communication or concerned with communication generally from a professional or academic point of view. Each issue will be devoted to a specific topic.

The original editorial board for Communication featured an impressive lineup of individuals, many of whom influenced the field of general semantics. The editorial board as described in the first issue included the following individuals, helmed under the editorship of Lee Thayer:

John G. Bennett, England
Herbert Blumer, U.S.A.
Daniel J. Boorstin, U.S.A.
Kenneth E. Boulding, U.S.A.
Kenneth Burke, U.S.A.
S. N. Eisenstadt, Israel
Georges Friedmann, France
George Gerbner, U.S.A.
Gyorgy Kepes, U.S.A.
Harold D. Lasswell, U.S.A.
Claude Lévi-Strauss, France
Marshall McLuhan, Canada
Floyd W. Matson, U.S.A.
Igor Mel'čuk, U.S.S.R.
F. S. C. Northrop, U.S.A.
Walter J. Ong, U.S.A.
lthiel de Sola Pool, U.S.A.
Karl H. Pribram, U.S.A.
Anatol Rapoport, Canada
David Riesman, U.S.A.
Jurgen Ruesch, U.S.A.
Wilbur Schramm, U.S.A.
Thomas A. Sebeok, U.S.A.
Harley C. Shands, U.S.A.
Geoffrey Vickers, England

• Click here to download Communication from the IGS Store.

To the IGS YouTube account, we are currently adding videos of presentations from the 65th Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture and its subsequent 2-Day General Semantics Symposium, sponsored by the Institute of General Semantics, and co-sponsored by the Media Ecology Association and the New York Society for General Semantics.

The entire event was held at the Princeton Club in New York City, October 27-29, 2017.

The videos are compiled into a sequential playlist that mirrors the sequence of events from the weekend.

As of publication, not all videos are available as we await consent from the presenters. As presenters consent, we will release more videos in the playlist.

Watch individual entries from the playlist »

After a long wait, issue 73:1 (January 2016) of ETC: A Review of General Semantics is in the mail and is now available for download from the IGS Store in searchable PDF format.

• Click here to download ETC 73:1 from the IGS Store.

Table of Contents Preview

• From the Vault:
  "Interview with Allen Flagg" by Martin H. Levinson
• "Spirituality at the Speed of Light" by Lance Strate
• From the Vault:
  "The Future of Consciousness" by Lance Strate
• "Meet Me Tonight in Dreamland: Revisiting S. I. Hayakawa's 'Popular Songs vs. the Facts of Life" by Robert Albrecht
• "Why Journalists Lie: The Troublesome Times for Janet Cooke, Stephen Glass, Jayson Blair, and Brian Williams" by Jefferson Spurlock
• "Fairy Tale: Swansong for Trump" by Marleen S. Barr
• "Groping 'Pussy Galore': Transporting Trump from Reality TV to Unreal Genre Fiction--Dystopia, Fairy Tale, and Science Fiction" by Marleen S. Barr
• "Live from New Yawk: Donald Trump Sounds like The Real Housewives of New York City Cast" by Marleen S. Barr
• "Of Hopis and Heptapods: The Return of Sapir-Whorf" by John Engle
• "The Star Image and National Identity of Sessue Hayakawa and Marlene Dietrich" by James Eric (Jay) Black
• "Photonics, Globalism, and Tribalism" by Eugene Marlow
• "The Language of the Gods: An Analysis of the Possibility of Conceptual Schemes" by John Engle
• "Reconstructing (What Barely Passes for) English Grammar: Looking Well Beyond E-Prime" by Stan Kozikowski
• Poems:
  "Condo" by Jane Blanchard
  "A Priori" by Jane Blanchard
  "As If to Shine" by Danny P. Barbare
  "Us Janitors" by Danny P. Barbare
• Plus Letter from the Editor and News and Notes.

Cover Art

The photograph used for the cover of ETC 73:1 is by Rick Wise.  Wise labels his images “Photographic Fiction.” Currently he is working on two
different series, Things, everyday objects we pass by without seeing, and Time-Flows, in which time is simultaneously expanded and contracted. He considers all of his work “Dancing with the Eye.”

The Institute of General Semantics is pleased to announce its latest book in the New Non-Aristotelian book series.

The book, How to Avoid Making a Fool of Yourself: An Introduction to General Semantics by R. Wayne Pace, provides a classic refresher of basic principle of GS brought into today's world.

The book presents itself an ideal workbook for classroom use, and it serves an an excellent updated introduction to the insights and applications of general semantics.

• Click here to purchase How to Avoid Making a Fool of Yourself from the IGS Store.

After a long wait, issue 72:4 (October 2015) of ETC: A Review of General Semantics is in the mail and is now available for download from the IGS Store in searchable PDF format.

• Click here to download ETC 72:4 from the IGS Store.

Table of Contents Preview

• "Introduction: A Seat at the Nerd Table" by Lonny J. Avi Brooks and Aram Sinnreich
• "Everybody and Nobody: Visions of Individualism and Collectivity in the Age of AI" by Aram Sinnreich, Jessa Lingel, Gideon Lichfield, Adam Richard Rottinghaus, and Lonny J. Avi Brooks
• "Black Holes as a Metaphysical Science" by Jessa Lingel, Daniel Sutko, Gideon Lichfield, and Aram Sinnreich
• "The End of Material Scarcity: Dystopia and Immanent Critique of Capitalism" by Adam Richard Rottinghaus, Roseann Pluretti, and Daniel Sutko
• "The Medium Is the Message of the Future: Tyranny of Media in Organizing Our Imagery" by Daniel Sutko, Jessa Lingel, Aubrie Adams, and Adam Richard Rottinghaus
• "The Aliens Are Us: The Limitation That the Nature of Fiction Imposes on Science Fiction about Aliens" by Gordon Lichfield, Aubrie Adams, and Lonny J. Avi Brooks
• "Narratives on Extending and Transcending Mortality: An Essay on Implications for the Future" by Aubrie Adams, Adam Richard Rottinghaus, and Ryan Wallace
• "Toward an 'Other' Dimension: An Essay on Transcendence of Gender and Sexuality" by Roseann Pluretti, Jessa Lingel, and Aram Sinnreich
• "Future Im/perfect: Defining Success and Problematics in Science Fiction Expressions of Racial Identity" by Ryan Wallace, Roseann Pluretti, and Aubrie Adams
• "Afro-Futuretyping Generation Starships and New Earths 05015 CE" by Lonny J. Avi Brooks, Daniel Sutko, Aram Sinnreich, and Ryan Wallace
• Poem:
  "A Map of Her Own" by Matthew Wells
• Plus Letter from the Editor.

Cover Art

The photograph used for the cover of ETC 72:4 is a collage titled Futuretypes that was designed and created by Aram Sinnreich. Dr. Sinnreich is an associate professor at the American University’s School of Communication, and author of the recent book The Piracy Crusade: How the Music Industry’s War on Sharing Destroys Markets and Erodes Civil Liberties (University of Massachusetts Press). He holds a Ph.D. from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California.

On December 27, 2016, Fordham University professor and IGS trustee Lance Strate delivered a talk on general semantics at Henan University in Kaifeng, China.

There were about 100 faculty and students in attendance from his host, the School of Journalism and Communication, as well as attendees from the departments of foreign languages and linguistics.

Professor Strate's talk followed a previous talk he gave at Henan University in November 2016 on language and media, which included a discussion of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.

Institute of General Semantics trustee Thom Gencarelli (Manhattan College) will lead a roundtable panel at the Eastern Communication Association's 108th Annual Convention.

The panel, titled "Freedom to Agree to Disagree? General Semantics, Political Discourse, and the 2016 Presidential Campaign and Election," will feature IGS trustee Lance Strate (Fordham University), IGS trustee and president Martin H. Levinson, as well as Michael Plugh (Manhattan College) alongside Gencarelli.

The panel discussion will be on March 31, 2017, from 2pm-3:15pm at the Omni Park Hotel in Boston, MA. For more information on the panel discussion, consult our event page.

To the IGS YouTube account, we are currently adding videos of presentations from the 64th Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture & 2-Day General Semantics Symposium, sponsored by the Institute of General Semantics, and co-sponsored by the Media Ecology Association and the New York Society for General Semantics.

The entire event was held at the Princeton Club in New York City, October 21-23, 2016.

The videos are compiled into a sequential playlist that mirrors the sequence of events from the weekend.

As of publication, not all videos are available as we await consent from the presenters. As presenters consent, we will release more videos in the playlist.

Watch individual entries from the playlist »