I’m the founder and (with Adelina Vaca) convenor of Semiofest’s series of informal online “sessions.” These events are intended not only to share best practices among, but to nurture collegiality and friendship within the global semio community.

Coming up on 27th February (at 2 pm UK time)…

MYTHICAL SEMIOTICS

As a practicing commercial semiotician, do you:

• Nostalgically marvel at the power myth holds over those cultures that have not been fully desacralized?
• Critically denounce those that try to present present-day myths as natural and eternal?
• Pragmatically weaponize myth expertise in the service of branding?
• All of the above?
• None of the above?

For this session, Alfredo Troncoso has invited three commercial semioticians to discuss their encounters with the perplexing allure of the mythical in their respective fields of interest — namely, luxury, psychoanalysis, and advertising.

Get tickets (suggested donations only) at the link above.

Our sessionists:

• DORA JURD DE GIRANCOURT is a brand strategist and cultural researcher who helps global businesses decode meaning, shape brand positioning, and understand consumer perception across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.

• GISELA GRIMBLAT works as a psychoanalyst and is currently a PhD student in Marketing and Communication at Anáhuac University, Mexico City. Before becoming an independent analyst, she worked as a qualitative director at Kantar TNS (Mexico). In her work, she combines consumer insights with cultural and semiotic analysis.

• CHRISTO KAFTANDJIEV is professor of semiotics and marketing communications at Sofia University (Bulgaria). The author of 10 marketing semiotics textbooks, including 2008’s “Absolut Semiotics in the Absolut World,” he is also editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Linguistics. He speaks at business seminars, scientific conferences, and advertising festivals worldwide.

Session host: ALFREDO TRONCOSO is director of the semiotics division at de la Riva, one of the top quant & qual research companies working from Mexico. Alfredo has taught Greek philosophy, rhetoric and semiotics at universities including UNAM, Tec de Monterrey, and Universidad de Querétaro. His 2025 publication for Penguin-Aguilar, México Rifado 2.0, was co-authored with Gabriela de la Riva.

SEMIOFEST SESSIONS: R/D/E | BINARIES | SEMIOTICS & UX | BODY SEMIOTICS | AI & SEMIOTICS | SEMIOTICS & CINEMA | FICTIONAL DECODERS | ON COLOUR | & more.

Also see these global semio series: MAKING SENSE (Q&As) | SEMIOFEST SESSIONS (monthly mini-conferences) | COVID CODES | SEMIO OBJECTS | COLOR CODEX | DECODER (fictional semioticians) | CASE FILE | PHOTO OP | MEDIA DIET | TATTOO YOU (semioticians’ tattoos).