Conditions and implications of participation in semiotics (and elsewhere)

Abstract

Abstract
This paper examines the conditions of possibility for semiotics to engage with the notion of participation and, through it, with participatory sciences. After tracing the genealogy of participation as a concept—from participant observation and action research to actor-network theory—the paper analyses the political requalification of this sociological notion into an institutional project for science. It then considers the specific epistemic position of semiotics, arguing that, as an “undisciplined” body of knowledge, it is largely foreign to the applied research model that underlies participatory sciences. The paper concludes that semiotics may nonetheless find a meaningful connection with participation understood as a methodological condition, particularly through the educational missions it assigns itself, as illustrated by recent developments in social semiotics.