Is a general non-ethnocentric theory of human communication possible? An integrationist approach

•Linguistic ethnocentrism is the result of particular philosophies of language.•Post- and anti-humanism legitimize the third-person perspective on signs.•Natural Semantic Metalanguage decontextualizes communication in favour of language.•Harrisian integrationism is humanist, anthropocentric and universalist.•An integrationist theory of human communication is both general and non-ethnocentric. The present paper takes a supportive stance towards humanism, anthropocentrism and universalism. It does so through the lens of a theoretical approach known as integrationism (or integrational linguistics), as outlined in the work of Oxford linguist Roy Harris (Harris, 1996). Given the rise in research critiquing the ethnocentric nature of communication and linguistic theory, this paper examines the validity of the cultural bias argument as recently presented in posthumanist applied linguistics (Pennycook, 2018), anti-humanist semiotics (Cobley, 2016) and the linguistic school known as Natural Semantic Metalanguage (Wierzbicka, 2010; Goddard, 2011) by taking a distinctly semiological vantage point. The paper argues that Roy Harris’ integrationism allows for a theory of human communication that is general without being ethnocentrically biased because grounded in a semiology of personal experience rather than one characterised by scientific abstraction. The explanatory power of such an experienced-based theory turns out to be of a very different range and kind when compared to mainstream semiological and semiotic theories.