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Copenhagen–Tartu school of biosemiotics is a loose network of scholars working within the discipline of biosemiotics at the University of Tartu and the University of Copenhagen.

History

The school has been instrumental in developing biosemiotics as a new perspective on the study of life, in the biological and environmental sciences. Notable semioticians working in the Copenhagen–Tartu school are: Kalevi Kull, Jesper Hoffmeyer, Claus Emmeche, Frederik Stjernfelt, Søren Brier, Peeter Torop, Timo Maran, Mihhail Lotman.

Occasionally also the name 'Tartu–Bloomington–Copenhagen school' has been used, as having succeeded the earlier Tartu–Moscow school.

The biosemiotic co-work between the Tartu and Copenhagen groups was established in early 1990s. In 2001, Tartu and Copenhagen scholars inaugurated the annual international conferences for biosemiotic research known as the Gatherings in Biosemiotics, later organised by the International Society for Biosemiotic Studies.

The School values the classical works of Jakob von Uexküll and Juri Lotman as well as those of Charles Sanders Peirce.

Key texts

• Emmeche, Claus; Kull, Kalevi (eds.) 2011. Towards a Semiotic Biology: Life is the Action of Signs. London: Imperial College Press.
• Hoffmeyer Jesper 2008. Biosemiotics: An Examination into the Signs of Life and the Life of Signs. Scranton, University of Scranton Press.
• Kull, Kalevi; Deacon, Terrence; Emmeche, Claus; Hoffmeyer, Jesper; Stjernfelt, Frederik 2009. Theses on biosemiotics: Prolegomena to a theoretical biology. Biological Theory: Integrating Development, Evolution, and Cognition 4(2): 167–173.
• Kull, Kalevi; Emmeche, Claus; Favareau, Donald 2008. Biosemiotic questions. Biosemiotics 1(1): 41–55.

See also

• Tartu–Moscow Semiotic School

References

1. The institution of semiotics in Estonia. 2011. Sign Systems Studies 39(2/4). Compiled by Kalevi Kull, Silvi Salupere, Peeter Torop, Mihhail Lotman
2. Favareau, Donald (ed.) 2010. Essential Readings in Biosemiotics: Anthology and Commentary. Berlin: Springer.
3. Barbieri, Marcello (ed.) 2008. Introduction to Biosemiotics: The New Biological Synthesis. Berlin: Springer.
4. International Handbook of Semiotics, Springer, 2015, p. 98
5. Deely, John 2010. Semiotics Seen Synchronically: The View from 2010. New York: Legas, pp. 32, 95–97.
6. Hoffmeyer, Jesper; Kull, Kalevi 2011. Theories of signs and meaning: Views from Copenhagen and Tartu. In: Emmeche, Claus; Kull, Kalevi (eds.), Towards a Semiotic Biology: Life is the Action of Signs. London: Imperial College Press, 263–286. P. 270.
7. Rattasepp, Silver; Bennett, Tyler (eds.) 2012. Gatherings in Biosemiotics. (Tartu Semiotics Library 11.) Tartu: University of Tartu Press.

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