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Abakumova N.N., Li C. The language of educational innovations as “praxema”: Semiotics of urban environment transformations in the concepts of “city-university”. ΠΡΑΞΗMΑ. Journal of Visual Semiotics. 2026. Issue 3 (49). P. 9-31

The study emphasizes that the contemporary development of territories (cities) and universities, driven by the technocratic logic of efficiency and innovation, generates the risk of losing the human dimension. The aim of the research is to develop and test a methodology of comparative semiotic analysis of educational innovations as a tool for transforming the urban environment within the “city-university” concept. The relevance of the work is determined by the dominance of the technocratic paradigm in the interaction between universities and cities, which creates the risk of a “humanitarian deficit” — the loss of human subjectivity and its meaning-forming role in education and urban development. The theoretical basis of the study is the concept of the “praxema” (S.S. Avnesov) and the approach of G.N. Prozumentova, which emphasizes the phenomenon of “personal presence” and the overcoming of the anthropological deficit through the subjectivization of education. The methodological foundation of the study is the information-synergetic approach (I.V. Melik-Gaykazyan), based on the substantiation of the following propositions: 1) the phenomenon of information is an irreversible process; 2) the information process is a mechanism of self-organization; and 3) semiotic forms are the results of stages of the information process. One of the results of this approach was the concept of “semiotic diagnostics” (I.V. Melik-Gaykazyan), the procedures of which make it possible to resolve the problem of measurement in the humanities. The method used is a humanitarian (linguosemiotic) expertise, including discourse analysis and comparative analysis of two cases: Tomsk (Russia) as a historical university center and the Lanzhou New Area (China) as a project for creating a “university-city” from scratch. The material consisted of official narratives and self-descriptions representing educational innovations in these territories. The results of the study showed that the language of educational innovations in both cases functions as a praxeme — an active tool for constructing reality. Universal traits were identified: the university is universally positioned as a “hub,” “driver,” and “bridge,” which visualizes its new active role in the city. Culturally specific differences manifested in the ways of overcoming the “humanitarian deficit.” In Tomsk, the language of innovations (narrative “guardian of traditions and the engine of the future”) is aimed at preserving the humanistic mission of the classical university and rooting innovations in the historical and cultural code. In Lanzhou, the metaphor of the “scientific-educational oasis” and the frames of integration of education and production construct a new identity for the territory and strive to overcome the alienation of the individual from education by including them in solving real development tasks. The study proves that the language of educational innovations is a critically important factor and indicator of the humanitarian quality of transformations within the frameworks of “city-university” concepts. Its analysis not only allows for diagnosing current changes but also for predicting their anthropological consequences, opening perspectives for managing the development of territories not only as technological but also as truly human, meaningful spaces. The proposed tool — humanitarian expertise — allows moving from measuring quantitative effectiveness indicators to analyzing the deep anthropological effects of educational innovations and identifying risks of symbolic dehumanization in “city-university” concepts. Expanding the interpretation of educational innovation to include artificial intelligence infrastructure makes it possible to present universities as active semiotic agents that not only introduce technology into the urban environment, but also create new anthropological meanings in it, thereby overcoming the humanitarian deficit of technocratic development.

Keywords: educational innovations, concept of “semiotic diagnostics,” semiotics of the urban environment, city-university, humanitarian expertise, anthropological deficit, Tomsk, Lanzhou New Area, artificial intelligence in education