Hongjin Song Awarded 2026 Juri Lotman Foundation Scholarship for Research on the Cultural Semiotics of Rumors

The 2026 Juri Lotman Foundation Scholarship in Semiotics has been awarded to Hongjin Song, a PhD student at the University of Tartu, for a series of articles on the cultural semiotics of rumors.

The awarded publications include:

• "An allegory of Fama and Historia: rumor studies, collective memory, and semiotics.”
• "The Rumor Phenomenon in the Society of Knowledges and Its Ontological Status in Semiotics.”
• "Rumor infection and resonating fear: Rumor Communication in a Thickened Reality.” Article in the edited volume Through the Lens of Dread: Exploring the Meaning-Making of Fear in the Mediasphere. Edited by Merit Maran, Mari-Liis Madisson, and Andreas Ventsel. Tallinn: Tallinn University Press, 2025.

The Juri Lotman Scholarship has been awarded since 2002 to graduate students at the University of Tartu whose research continues the traditions of Juri Lotman and his school in philology and semiotics. Each year, the scholarship is awarded to one graduate student in Slavic Philology and one in Semiotics (and Culture Studies). The scholarship recipients are traditionally announced on February 28, Juri Lotman’s birthday.