On 2 December 2025, the Department of English at the College of Languages, Nawroz University, organized a seminar entitled "Who Produces Meaning? Linguistic Perspectives on Authorial Absence," was delivered by Assistant Lecturer Agar Fadhil Ali in the presence of several academics and attendees.
The seminar focused on three phases in how meaning is produced. The first is the reign of the Author-God, where the author's intentions are treated as the sole key to a text's meaning. The second is the revolution brought by language, the recognition that once writing is set in motion, it takes on life beyond its creator. The third is the rise of the reader as the true producer of meaning, a position Barthes crystallizes in his famous line: "the birth of the reader must be ransomed by the death of the Author."
The session concluded with an open discussion in which participants exchanged views, questions, and comments on the topic.
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