We discuss a relational turn in higher education through semiotic lenses, which we propose and develop in our latest book Relational and Multimodal Higher Education (Digital, Social and Environmental Perspectives). Semiotics is a study of relationships par excellence. Whereas there have been several relational turns associated with specific disciplines (e.g. relational sociology), examples of moving from theory to applied semiotic practice of embodied and environmental relationality in higher education are rare. We addresses this gap. Relations are and should be at the core of education. Relational pedagogy has been commonly seen through the ethics of care, concerned with a variety of relationships and collaborative initiatives at universities. Recently, this approach has been expanded into pedagogies of mattering, building on posthumanist and new material approaches.Our proposal adds to these developments through distinctly critical semiotic lenses.Relational practices in higher education centre on analysing meaning-making, as ocurring through knowledge circulation, sharing, interpretation and production. These are discussed in terms of how educational resources and modalities relate to social, environmental and digital meanings, power relations, complexities and materialities. We exemplify relational pedagogies shared in the book (e.g. by five scholars-practitioners), and interrogate how educational futures and innovation are and can be produced through the enmeshing of modalities.Selected references Gravett, K., Taylor, C. A., & Fairchild, N. (2021). Pedagogies of mattering: Re-conceptualising relational pedagogies in higher education. Teaching in Higher Education, 1-16. Lacković, N., & Olteanu, A. (2023). Relational and Multimodal Higher Education: Digital, Social and Environmental Perspectives. Routledge, Taylor & Francis.