Waste Semiotics: Language, Materiality, Space

Content

The course will be ideal for those studying sociolinguistics, literature, semiotics, media studies, and communication studies, but also students of urban studies and environmental studies.

The programme comprises a series of six online sessions and a five-day site visit to Bern in late November including outings, methods workshop, and a community-engagement project. Students travelling to Bern will use their journey as a chance to complete a “Trash Trajectories” fieldwork exercise serving as the basis for our hands-on work together.

Online sessions will cover a range of different perspectives on discarding, answers questions like these:

• How is waste defined and represented in everyday and/or official talk and texts?
• How is waste mediatized (e.g., in newspapers, advertisements, etc.)?
• How are people socialized or schooled into the meanings of waste?
• Where does wasting take place in our lives and in the places we call home?

Above all, what role might language and communication play in changing wasting practices for the greater social and ecological good?

Learning outcomes

This workshop will be structured around five superordinate academic practices which are central to just about all academic work: observing, describing, explaining, evaluating and critiquing. By the end of this workshop, it is expected that students will:

• have a foundational understanding of the theoretical and conceptual links between “waste semiotics” and the interdisciplinary field of discard studies;
• understand how “waste semiotics” is grounded in the study of linguistic, representational and other communicative practices;
• have an appreciation for the way waste is approached in other fields such as cultural studies, geography, fine arts, and anthropology;
• develop practical and methodological skills for studying and documenting the “trajectories of waste” in urban spaces;
• recognize the concrete ways in which a semiotic approach to waste creates opportunities for wider community engagement and perhaps solutions for key ecological problems.

Programme

The programme will center around a five-day site visit to Bern. Drawing on expertise from our research team in Bern and our ENLIGHT partners, online framing sessions will cover the following types of theoretical and conceptual perspectives:

• discard studies and waste culture
• social semiotics and biosemiotics
• semiotic landscapes and geosemiotics
• multimodal discourse studies 

Students travelling to Bern will be invited to use their journeys as a chance to document their “trash trajectories” by way of photographs and fieldnotes. This material will serve as a basis for a core “messy methods” workshop during the site visit. Bern students will be given equivalent fieldwork to complete. We are planning the site visit around a range of academic and applied engagements:

• a messy methods workshop (using first-hand materials collected by students);
• a fieldtrip to the Energie Wasser Bern EWB waste management plant or a City of Bern sewer tour;
• a hands-on “clean-up” and ethnographic mapping exercise in collaboration with the Swiss-based Trash Hero World;
• a visits to/by the Waste and Resources Division of the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN).

Assessment

Pass/fail based on (a) satisfactory participation and engagement in online sessions and site visit programme; and (b) the completion of short project report with reflection statement. The course will be assessed and certified by the four Bern instructors (see below).

Lecturers

• Prof. Crispin Thurlow, Department of English, University of Bern together with Articulating Rubbish team members Ms Charmaine Kong, Mr Alessandro Pellanda and Ms Laura Wohlgemuth
• Prof. Marco Caracciolo, Department of Literary Studies, Ghent University
• Prof. David Karlander, Department of Scandinavian Languages, Uppsala University
• Prof. Riin Magnus, Department of Semiotics, University of Tartu
• Prof. Erika Darics, Department of Communication and Information Studies, University of Groningen

Course dates

On-site period: 24-28 November 2025, Bern

Online period: Specific dates and times to be confirmed; six sessions planned provisionally for weeks starting 13, 20, 27 October and 03, 10, 17 November.

Maximum of five bachelor students (BA2 or BA3) from each participating ENLIGHT partner university can enroll. Students interested in the course need to apply via their home university and will be selected by their home university. Interested students should contact their departmental study counsellor to verify how the ECTS earned will fit within their curriculum. Ideally, participants should also be confirmed by course instructors:

• University of Bern – Prof. Crispin Thurlow (Department of English)
• Ghent University – Prof. Marco Caracciolo (Department of Literary Studies)
• Uppsala University – Prof. David Karlander (Department of Scandinavian Languages)
• University of Tartu – Prof. Riin Magnus (Department of Semiotics)
• University of Groningen – Prof. Erika Darics (Department of Communication and Information Studies)

Once home institutions have selected the students, they will inform the students and send nominations (names and contact details) to the host institution. Students who are not initially selected may be placed on a waiting list in case spaces become available.

The Transcript of Records will be provided shortly after the on-site visit.

Please select your home university below and contact your ENLIGHT mobility coordinator for further information on the application process or consult the linked information.

• University of Bern: See KSL for course description; send an email to Professor Thurlow with your expression of interest.
• Ghent University:This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (see information about BIP's)
• University of Groningen: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
• University of Tartu: Application instructions for students at the University of Tartu
• Uppsala University: Application instructions for students at Uppsala University

Grants: Visiting students will be eligible for a SEMP mobility grant paid by the University of Bern. Find more information here. Please check with your local mobility coordinator whether you are also eligible for an E+ grant, provided by your home university.

Visiting students will be responsible for making their own travel arrangements.

Prof. Dr. Crispin Thurlow, Department of English, University of Bern; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.