This seminar consists of two parallel sessions, a theory seminar and a practicum, and it is addressed to the students in BA and MA. During the seminar we will analyse how performing techniques and practices in contemporary performing arts can change our understanding of language and of the human being as a speaking and acting subject. Theoretically, the new understanding is articulated in critical dialogue with different modern philosophies of language, among which we will particularly focus on structuralist, pragmatist, phenomenological, post-structural as well as cognitive conceptions. A special attention will be given to the recent contributions of the “speculative realism” (Meillassoux, Maniglier, Garcia). Different philosophical conceptions will be approached from the point of view ofscenic practice: given that a performer is capable of using linguistic elements in a certain way, what are the consequences in terms of understanding how language ‘is’ or ‘works’? To what extent can existing linguistic theories describe the scenic embodiment of language? Is it possible to change ideas of language so as to correspond more closely with the actual perceptive processes and bodily techniques of the performer? What new perspectives might the reconsideration of linguistic theories open up for contemporary performance practice and pedagogy?