From September 24 to 28, 2025, the international conference Semiotics of Friendships: Relations Beyond Interactions took place in Prague. The event was organized by the Semiotic Society of America (SSA) in collaboration with the Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Palacký University Olomouc, and the International Semiotic Institute.

The local organizing team, led by Dr. Martin Švantner (Faculty of Humanities, Charles University), in collaboration with Dr. Ludmila Lacková-Bennett (Faculty of Humanities, Charles University; Director of the International Semiotic Institute), Dr. Martin Macháček (graduate of the doctoral program in Semiotics and Philosophy of Communication), Dr. Ivan Fomin (Faculty of Arts, Charles University), and with the generous support of students from the Faculty of Humanities led by Mgr. Alena Ivanová, prepared the conference under the auspices of the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, Assoc. Prof. Věra Sokolová. The event welcomed approximately seventy participants from around the world.

The rich conference program offered a wide range of topics reflecting friendship as a complex phenomenon that transcends everyday interactions. Contributions explored, for example, the relationship between friendship and the natural world, visual arts, intercultural dialogue, religious experience, as well as the challenges posed by generative language models and artificial intelligence.

The event was supported by the BIP Erasmus Plus programme at Palacký University Olomouc.

Press Release

Photo: Ondřej Trojan