Semiology of Public Space
This course explores how public spaces communicate meaning through signs, symbols, design, and everyday practices. Drawing on semiotic theory—from thinkers like Ferdinand de Saussure and Roland Barthes—students will analyze how architecture, monuments, urban layouts, advertisements, and social behaviors shape collective identities and power relations.
Through case studies and field observations, the course examines how public spaces construct narratives about culture, politics, memory, and belonging. Students will develop tools to “read” cities and public environments as complex systems of meaning, and critically reflect on how space influences social interaction and perception.
By the end of the course, participants will be able to decode the visual and spatial language of public environments and articulate how meaning is produced, contested, and transformed in shared spaces.