Semiotic Sociology

Risto Heiskala is Professor of Sociology at Tampere University, EU Finland (Orcid id: 0000-0003-4466-7491). He is the author of Society as Semiosis and coeditor of Policy Design in the European Union and Social Innovations, Institutional Change and Economic Performance. He is a member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters and Vice-Chair of the Society for the Study of Power Relations (SSPR). He has been the Director of the Institute for Advanced Social Research (IASR) at the University of Tampere and a member of the executive committee of the European Sociological Association (ESA) as well as a founding member of its Social Theory Research Network.

• 1. Introduction: toward semiotic sociology and social theory.- 2. A synthesis of semiology, semiotics and phenomenological sociology.- 3. Economy and society in semiotic institutionalism.- 4. Power and signification in neostructuralism.- 5. Modernity and the intersemiotic condition.- 6. Modernity, postmodernity and reflexive modernization.- 7. Modernity and the articulation of the gender system.- 8. Gender as an institution.- 9. From Goffman to semiotic sociology.- 10. Conclusion and the next steps.