About ASIAN Congress of Semiotics
ACS, to be held on November 27–29, 2026, is the first ASIAN Congress of Semiotics in India, with a focus on Design, Visual, and Technological Cultures. Hosted by Navrachana University in Vadodara, the conference will serve as a tribute to the university’s sustained engagement with the world of design and to the significance of aligning semiotics with design, as well as with the future of visual cultures and technology.
The Conference aims to showcase the Indian array of Architectural and Design knowledge and practice, as well as many other representative countries from Asia, through paper presentations, Design Panels, significant Keynote and Plenary speakers. The key focus of the conference will be ‘Similitude’. Semiotically, the concept of similitude has never come into full focus, but many semioticians have covered a variety of concepts strictly related to this. An incomplete list would encompass: Gestalt’s law of similarity, Pierce’s iconicity, Baudrillard’s idea of Simulacra, Lotman’s work on translation, Greimas’ isotopies, Eco’s reproducibility in sign creation, and many more. If meaning emerges from difference, it seems that similitude is equally important for the working of semiotic systems - and the semiosphere itself.
The conference aims to look strategically at the relations (between cultures, countries, times, social strata, texts, signs) that participate in the creation of meaning in the many Scapes of Asia. As the Scapes in Asia are in the midst of these rhythms, the engaging discussions will address them in practical and meaningful ways.
About Navrachana University
What makes this Congress distinctive is the vividity of dialogue it invites. Navrachana University, as a boutique institution with a close-knit interdisciplinary culture across its five Schools — School of Environmental Design & Architecture, School of Engineering & Technology, School of Business & Law, School of Science, and School of Liberal Studies & Education — is uniquely positioned to host this kind of exchange. This interdisciplinary thinking is at the core of the University's academic identity and becomes the natural foundation for a Congress that spans Architecture, Urban Design, Visual Arts, Cultural Studies, Technology, Policy, and the Social Sciences.
The Congress aims not only to present research but to forge connections across disciplines, cultures, and institutions. Navrachana University's commitment to collaborative, boundary-crossing inquiry makes it the right home for a gathering of this kind — one that seeks to generate academic and creative inspiration that travels well beyond the conference room.
Track Themes
1.
"Similes in Visual Textuality: Aligning thinking and making in Arts, Design, and New Technology"
Similitude provides a necessary structure or baseline from which creativity can effectively diverge. Too much similarity results in monotony, while a complete lack of it can lead to chaos or a lack of comprehension. Artists and designers leverage influence, collecting ideas and remixing form through similitude to create their own unique path. Research suggests that creativity scores for ideas generated from combining dissimilar concepts tend to be higher than those from combining highly similar concepts, highlighting how breaking from similitude can spark significant innovation.
In essence, similitude allows for communication and comprehension, while creativity provides the spark that makes that communication novel and impactful. The most impactful work often arises from a seamless integration of both, producing results that are at once functional and deeply meaningful.
"Similes in Urban Semiospheres: The City, Cultural Landscapes, and Public Places"
2.
Cities have been among the most important expressions of human will and ingenuity. But do cities across cultures reveal something universal, or are they unique to their place and time? How do similarity and variation play out in the spatial organisation of cities? Is there a similitude in attitudes toward the modification of the natural environment in and around cities, and how does that reflect in the patterns that cultural landscapes produce?
In this track we will explore larger questions of the production of space, ecological approaches, and the creation of the public realm in the urban context — drawing on the conference themes to also question longstanding frameworks that treat the city as a universal object.
"Similes in Temporal Translations: Architecture, Objects, and the Permanence of the Ephemeral".
3.
Architectural production, in all its range, offers scholars a rich opportunity to explore the conference themes through the lens of the larger transnational flow of ideas. How do architectural concepts such as contextual regionalism and the idea of the universal play out in a world that appears increasingly fragmented, inward-looking, and hostile to the other? What are the new ways in which the production of space creates solidarities through similarity, or by celebrating diversity?
Moreover, the production of space through temporal expressions — such as art biennales, exhibitions, festivals, and similar events — is increasingly acquiring a permanence of a certain order within the event economy. How do these spatial expressions engage with questions of similitude, and can they offer new ways of looking at architecture itself?
Submissions and Registration
Call for Abstracts
The Asian Congress of Semiotics (ACS 2026) invites scholars, researchers, and practitioners to submit abstracts for presentation at the conference.
Please use the provided abstract template to prepare your submission, clearly outlining the focus, methodology, and contribution to the field of semiotics of design, with attention to how meaning is constructed, communicated, and interpreted within diverse cultural and visual contexts.
Abstract Submission Guidelines:
· The abstract must contain 300-500 words.
· The abstract should be entered as plain text; it must not contain any HTML elements.
· Keywords (at least 3) should be provided to represent the content of the abstract.
· Only one abstract by an author or co-author may be submitted.
· A maximum of three (3) authors per abstract will be accepted.
· Abstracts are to be submitted online using the link below.
Registration
Please note the deadline for submission of Abstract is 17th May 2026
Indian Students
International Students
Others
Note: Registrations will open only after submissions have been accepted
INR 7500
INR 10,000
INR 5000
Important Dates
30th March 2026
Conference Announcement
3rd April 2026
Call for Panels and Abstracts
17th May 2026
Deadline for Abstract Submission
17th June 2026
Announcement of Selected Abstracts
30th August 2026
Submission of Full Paper
27th November 2026
Conference
Confernce Schedule
DAY 1
27th November 2026
09:15
Inaugural Session
10:00
Key Note Speech
10:45
Plenary Speech
11:30
Technical Paper Presentation – Parallel Sessions
DAY 2
28th November 2026
09:15
Key Note Speech
10:00
Plenary Speech
10:45
Technical Paper Presentation – Parallel Sessions
11:30
A special ASIA session on Semiotics of Architecture and Design- Chaired and conducted by the President of ASIA, Prof.SUNG do KIM
DAY 3
29th November 2026
09:15
Option tours to Vadodara Old City and Champanere World Heritage Site
PM
14:00
Inauguration of the Semester End Exhibition on Architecture and Design (Evening)
PM
14:00
Concluding Session – SEMA Award for the best Branding Project
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Prof. Hidetaka Ishida
Hidetaka Ishida is a prominent Japanese semiotician, philosopher, and media studies theorist, specialising in information semiotics and contemporary thought. A Professor Emeritus at the University of Tokyo, he served as Dean of the Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies (1996–2019) and is known for his work at the intersection of technology, media, and human perception. He has authored The Knowledge of Sign / The Knowledge of Media (2003), Lectures on Semiotics (2020), and co-authored New Semiotics: When Brain Meets Media (2019) with Hiroki Azuma.
PLENARY SPEAKERS
Prof. Massimo Leone
Massimo Leone is Professor of Philosophy of Communication, Cultural Semiotics, and Visual Semiotics at the University of Turin, Italy, part-time Professor of Semiotics at the University of Shanghai, China, associate member of Cambridge Digital Humanities, and Director of the Institute for Religious Studies at the Bruno Kessler Foundation, Trento. He has been a visiting professor at universities across five continents. He has single-authored fifteen books, edited more than fifty collective volumes, and published more than five hundred articles in semiotics, religious studies, and visual studies. He is the recipient of a 2018 ERC Consolidator Grant and a 2022 ERC Proof of Concept Grant. He serves as editor-in-chief of Lexia and co-editor-in-chief of Semiotica (De Gruyter), and co-edits several international book series in semiotics and religious studies.
Prof. Pratyush Shankar
Prof. Pratyush Shankar
Provost , Navrachana University
Dean, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Provost , Navrachana University
Dean, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Dr. Seema Khanwalkar
Academic, Semiotician
CONFERENCE COMMITTEES
CHAIRS
ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Prof. Sung Do Kim
Professor, Korea University and President, ASIA
Prof. Kristian Bankov
Professor New Bulgarian University
Prof. Pascal Lardellier
Professor State academic university for Humanities, GAUGN Russia
Prof. Yunhee YEE
Professor, Balikesir University, Turkey
Prof. Pratyush Shankar
Provost , Navrachana University
Dean, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof. Hong hai Din
University of Hanoi, Vietnam
SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE
Dr. Seema Khanwalkar
Academic, Semiotician
Professor, Korea University and President, ASIA
Prof. Sung Do Kim
Professor, University of Turin, Italy
Prof. Massimo Leone
Japanese Semiotician, Philosopher, Media Studies Theorist
Prof. Hidetaka Isheda
Prof.Kristian Bankov
Professor New Bulgarian University
Prof. Pratyush Shankar
Provost , Navrachana University
Dean, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Ar. Neelkanth Chhaya
Former Dean of the Faculty of Architecture, CEPT
Prof. Claudio Guerri
Consultant Professor at University of Buenos Aires
Prof. Muntassar Dalvi
Professor, Metropolitan Architecture, Sir JJ School of Art
Ar. Pragya Shankar
PhD, AIA, is Past President of the Semiotic Society of America (SSA)
Ar. Ravi Sarangan
Director, Edifice Architects
Dr. Seema Khanwalkar
Academic, Semiotician
Prof. Yunhee YEE
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
Maniyarasan Rajendran
C.A.R.E School of Architecture, Trichy
Prof. Pascal Lardellier
Professor, Housing and Urbanization, Harvard Graduate School of Design
Prof.Hongbing YU
TorontoMetropolitan University
Smriti Saraswat
IIT, Rourkee
CONFERENCE COMMITTEES
CONVENER
Prof. Amita Heer
Program Chair, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
WORKING COMMITTEE
Prof. Shalini Amin
Program Chair, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof Shivani Handa
Assistant Professor, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof Arundhati Saikia
Assistant Professor, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof. Advaita Jalan
Associate Professor, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof. Vishvesh Pathak
Assistant Professor, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
Prof Bhavesh Patel
Assistant Professor, School of Environmental Design and Architecture
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