352 posts in 2022

In 2022 I made 352 posts in Utopian Realism, including this one. This is somewhat fewer than the last few years.

Summing up the work year 2022

In 2022, I logged 2.763 work hours. This is 53 hours a week (all year, including in holiday weeks). At 163,6% of a standard Norwegian work year, this is considerably longer than the average employee´s work week. And yet it was my second shortest work year in terms of work hours over the last 10 years, due to health issues (which resulted in about a month´s sick leave altogether in the autumn). However, in 2013, my first year as a father, I had a somewhat shorter work year (2.650 work hours). In 2020, as an effect of the covid pandemic and a month´s sick leave related to surgery, my work year amounted to some 2.790 work hours. My longest work year ever was 3.231 work hours (2011).

2022 stands out with a few records of different sorts: Highest share ever for academic work (vs. literary and other work), lowest share ever for "other work".

Google Scholar: 865 citations; 250 more registered in 2022; updated Google scholar history

According to Google Scholar (cf. my profile) my research has to date attracted 865 citations (+15 since November 23rd). My h-index remains 18 and my i10-index 33. 128 of the citations are from 2022 (+13 since November 23rd).

My best years to date are: 

2021 (184)

2022 (128)

2016 (93)

2020 (85)

2018 (81)

124 texts are listed as associated with my profile. This compares to 100 texts listed as of December 26th 2021. At that point, 2021 was registered with 110 citations, and I had 615 citations overall. Since then, 250 more citations of my work has been registered, including 74 more in 2021.

Updated Google Scholar history (cf. my February 2021 post):

My first Google Scholar citation occurred in 2002.

By April 2013 I had 38 citations, and a verified Google Scholar profile.

I passed 100 citations in the winter of 2016.

I passed 200 citations in the summer of 2017.

I passed 300 citations in the summer of 2018.

I passed 400 citations in the autumn of 2019.

I passed 500 citations in Spring 2021.

I passed 600 citations in the autumn of 2021.

I passed 700 citations in the winter of 2022.

I passed 800 citations in the autumn of 2022.

#27,5; ca. 12.000 words written this Autumn

Today I have had writing day no. 27,5 this Autumn, devoted to work with research assistant Jan Karlstrøm and minor revision of my Steffens chapter - and the final writing day of the term. Altogether I have written some 11.826 words this Autumn, which is less than usual.

2 meetings; 7 this week; 197 + 3 this Autumn

Today I have attended 2 scheduled appointments. This week I have had 7 meetings, and one day of sick leave. Altogether this Autumn I have attended 197 meetings and 3 conferences.

2 meetings

Today I have had 2 scheduled meetings.

3 appointments Monday 19th

Yesterday, on Monday December 19th, I had 3 scheduled meetings/appointments. This included the annual department Christmas lunch at hotel Victoria, with some 40 colleagues attending.

Abstract for "After Nagel" conference: “Phenomenological triangulation in the study of animals as subjects of phenomenology – perspectives from cognitive semiotics and biosemiotics”

I have submitted the abstract below as an invited speaker at the conference «After Nagel: Science and the phenomenology of animals subjects”, which is to be held at Radhoud university, the Netherlands, March 6-7th 2023:

Phenomenological triangulation in the study of animals as subjects of phenomenology – perspectives from cognitive semiotics and biosemiotics

In earlier work I have argued that a genuine ´Uexküllian phenomenology´ can be derived from the Umwelt theory of Jakob von Uexküll, and that such a phenomenology is capable of accounting for the subjective experience of both human and animal subjects of the phenomenal world at large. With its foundation in contemporary biosemiotics, such a modern, empirically informed phenomenology is particularly relevant for the study of human-animal relations and interaction in societal and ecological settings.

Cognitive semiotician Jordan Zlatev has proposed some interesting methodological principles for what he conceives of as the transdisciplinary science of cognitive semiotics. This includes a “conceptual-empirical loop” with a research process involving a combination of theoretical and empirical work, and “phenomenological triangulation” involving combined use of 1st person perspective, 2nd person perspective and 3rd person perspective studies of one and the same topic of study. I will discuss to what extent something similar could be applied within the context of biosemiotics, with the aim of integrating biosemiotics and phenomenology further.

To be invited speaker at the conference: «After Nagel: Science and the phenomenology of animals subjects”, at Radhoud university, March 2023

I have been invited to be a speaker at the conference: «After Nagel: Science and the phenomenology of animals subjects”, which will be held at Radhoud university, the Netherlands, March 6-7th 2023.

10 appointments this week; 190 + 3 so far this Autumn

With 10 scheduled appointments this week including 3 ph.d. defense-related appointments - and 3 days of sick leave Monday to Wednesday - I have so far this Autumn attended 190 scheduled meetings/appointments and 3 conferences.

2 meetings Friday; opponent at Juan Mendoza-Collazos´ ph.d. defense at Lund university, Sweden, this weekend

On Friday I had 2 meetings at UIS. 

This weekend I have been faculty opponent at the ph.d. defense of Juan Mendoza-Collazos´, who defended the thesis "Agency and Artefacts: A cognitive semiotic exploration of design" at Lund university, in Lund, Sweden, December 17th. My presentation and opposition in dialogue with the candidate went on for about two and a half hours. Some 35 people attended, most of which physically.

Related to the ph.d. defense, I also attended an informal dinner Friday evening, and a celebration party Saturday evening.

To be plenary speaker at the 13th Conference of the IAVS-AISV: Visual Semiotics & Agency, Bogotá, September 2023

I will be a plenary speaker at AISV-IAVS 2023 - 13th Conference of the IAVS-AISV: Visual Semiotics & Agency, to be held at Universidad de Bogotá Jorge Tadeo Lozano, in Bogotá, Colombia, September 28-30, 2023.

Call for papers is available here. Abstracts are due February 15th.

5 appointments

Today - after three consecutive days of sick leave - I have attended half of the "fagdag" for Cognitive Lab at UIS, where I was part of opening the day, and three more scheduled appointments. I will furthermore attend the faculty leadership group´s dinner on town this evening, where my stepping down as Head of department will be marked.

A meeting; 12 meetings this week; 180 + 3 so far this Autumn

Today I have attended one scheduled meeting. This week´s total is 12 meetings, despite 1 day sick leave (yesterday). So far this Autumn I have attended 180 meetings and 3 conferences.

#26,5

Today I have had half a writing day with work done with my research assistant on our GDP review article.

Jablonka and Ginsburg comment now published in Biosemiotics issue

My comment to Jablonka and Ginsburg´s Target article has now been published as part of an issue of Biosemiotics, issue 3 of volume 15. Updated reference: 

Tønnessen, Morten 2022. The evolutionary origin(s) of the Umwelt. Commentary. Biosemiotics 15(3): 451–455. Published online November 3rd 2022. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-022-09506-7 

Environmental crisis article addressed in Sign Systems Studies´ "Semiotics 2021: The year in review" article

I am honored to see my article on "how to solve the environmental crisis", "Anticipating the societal transformation required to solve the environmental crisis in the 21st century" (Open access), being addressed in Sign Systems Studies´ review of the year 2021 in semiotics, written by Frank Nuessel and Ott Puumeister:

"Anticipating the future The future is neither fully pre-determined nor absolutely empty. The future does not exist, but it does insist: we have to behave in a certain manner to fulfil our dreams, we have to envision future states as already existing to make sense of the past and present. Future is an imperative: life has to find a way to continue transforming while maintaining its integrity. Anticipating the future is an interplay between predictability and unpredictability. The special issue of SSS on “Anticipation and change”,5 guest edited by Lauri Linask, Inesa Sahakyan and Aleksei Semenenko, situates itself in the midst of this interplay and asks how we produce predictability in the context of unpredictability, and how the production of predictability hinders the unpredictability at the core of actualization of the future. These questions are especially relevant in the face of the environmental crisis, which requires fundamental transformations in cultural, political, social, economic, etc. spheres – that is, in most spheres of life that have become our “human nature”.

Morten Tønnessen (2021) attempts to envision how ecosemiotics could help model the societal transformation necessary to address the environmental crisis.6 He juxtaposes the positions of ecomodernists and Deep Ecologists, preferring the latter to the former, since they do not rely on continuous growth based on technological solutions and take non-human beings seriously. He advocates for a normative orientation in ecosemiotics, which “constitutes a form of transformative semiotics in so far as human ecology is approached critically in a political, ethical and/or another normative context” (Tønnessen 2021: 55). In other words, semiotics can no longer satisfy itself with being descriptive, but needs to intervene in the sociopolitical field."

3 meetings

Today I chose to have home office, and have attended 3 scheduled meetings.

4 scheduled appointments

Today I have attended 4 scheduled appointments, including - digitally - the trial lecture and ph.d. defense of Samita Wilson.

4 meetings

Today I have attended 4 meetings.

#27

Today I have had a writing day, the 27th this Autumn, with some 1.100 words added to my article "Wasted GDP in the USA".

To be opponent at Juan Mendoza-Collazos´ ph.d. defence

I will be the opponent at Juan Mendoza-Collazos´ ph.d. defence of the thesis "Agency and Artefacts: A cognitive semiotic exploration of design", which is to take place at Lund university, in Lund, Sweden, on December 17th 2022. More info and link to the ph.d. thesis here.

#26

Today I have had half a writing day devoted to work with my research assistant.

2 meetings; 9 this week; 168 + 3 this Autumn

Today I have attended 2 meetings. Altogether this week I have attended 9 meetings - and had one day of sick leave. So far this Autumn I have attended 168 scheduled meetings and 3 conferences.

3 meetings

Today I have attended 3 scheduled meetings, including 2 Universities Norway (UHR) meetings.

To be keynote speaker at Tartu conference on Umwelt analysis

I will be a keynote speaker at the conference “Contemporary Umwelt Analysis: Applications for Culture and Ecological Relations”, which will be held in Tartu, Estonia, 18th-19th of April, 2023, at the University of Tartu, Estonia, along with Kalevi Kull (University of Tartu) and Carsten Herrmann-Pillath (University of Erfurt, Germany). 

Abstracts are due January 31st 2023. For more info, see the conference webpage.