ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that, from a semiotic point of view, learning and adaptation should not be understood as dichotomised. The suprasubjective view on learning is explained in biosemiotics through an account of endosemiosis. An ecosemiotic approach to education challenges the usual assumption that in educational settings, there are deliverers and receivers. The notion of suprasubjectivity is mainly attributed to the semiotician John Deely, who, developing Charles S. Peirce's ideas, considers that the broad field of semiotics offers the epistemological advantage of comprehending reality not as strictly subjective or objective. The chapter argues that educational settings should be seen as semiotic environments in which all their inhabitants participate. The concept for environment used in biosemiotics is that of Umwelt, as inherited from Jakob von Uexkull, understood as a functional circle, by which the animal is integrated in its environment according to its embodied possibilities.
