June 27-28, 2020

Faculty of Humanities, North-West University, South Africa

Deadline: February 28, 2020

Indigenous language media in Africa (ILMA) conference

The advent of social media (such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, YouTube etc.) has brought about democratisation of communication as the public that hitherto had been considered to be consumers of messages has now also become producers. The platform of social media is open to everyone who has a device, an account to use and data or access to the internet. Communication has never been better and interesting in the history of man.

However, as we celebrate this ‘power’ of communication given to the people through social media, we also need to ponder the other side of this communication. This advent of social media and with it more opportunities for free participation by citizens in debates has given impetus to insurgent politics and also brought on us the acceleration and strengthening of post-truth, fake news and hate speeches. Before the emergence of social media, there were fake news and hate speech carried by different media in the chronology of media and communication history. These phenomena have been there since the time of communication by mere words of mouth, and through the advent of print, radio and television media. It has however become more obtrusive with the emergence of social media. This has had some deleterious impact on human relationships and the society at large. It has created crisis and fueled it to monstrous proportions.

These are some of the issues we intend to focus on in this conference. Submissions can touch on any of the following points:

• Theorisation around social media, fake news and hate speech
• Social media, Fake news, hate speech and the economy
• Social media, Fake news, hate speech and politics
• Social media, Fake news, hate speech and nationality
• Social media, Fake news, hate speech and race
• Social media, Fake news, hate speech and human relations
• Social media, fake news and hate speech in organisations
• Social media, fake news, hate speech and religion
• Social media, language use, fake news and hate speech
• Social media, indigenous language, ethnicity and hate speech
• Social media, indigenous culture, fake news and hate speech
• Social media, citizen education, fake news and hate speech
• Social media, fake news, hate speech and xenophobia
• Strengths and weaknesses of various social media for fake news and hate speech
• Social media regulation, fake news and hate speech

The list is by no means exhaustive.

Kindly submit abstracts of between 300 and 500 words to Dr. Francis Amenaghawon at olaiyagba@yahoo.com

Papers presented at the conference, after peer-review process, will be published in Habari: ILMA Book Series. Habari is the Swahili word for News. The book series editors are Professor Abiodun Salawu and Prof. Itumeleng Mekoa.

Important Dates:

1. Abstract Submission – February 28, 2020

2. Acceptance/Rejection Notice – March 15, 2020

3. Conference Registration Opens – March 30, 2020

4. Conference – June 27 – 28, 2020

Registration Fees:

Academics – R2500.00

Students – R1000.00

International participants – USD180.00