ECREA WEEKLY digest ARTICLES

September 1, 2020

RMIT University, Melbourne

Deadline: August 14, 2020

Unless it is 100% safe to return to RMIT, this symposium will be held online. Even if we return to campus, those who aren’t able to present in-person are welcome to join us remotely.

The Screen & Sound Cultures Research Group and the Critical Intimacies Reading Group at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, present eco_media II: Fire & Rain

The first eco_media symposium was held at RMIT University in October 2019. Theorists, poets, researchers, filmmakers, recorders, and artists gathered to explore what it means to think and make in a time of climate catastrophe. See a summary of the day, along with the programme, at this page on the Screen & Sound Cultures website.

The second symposium invites a similarly broad range of thinkers and makers to take the conversation further. In particular, we seek theoretical, empirical, philosophical or creative responses to the extreme weather events that have wreaked havoc all over Australia in the last six months: the devastating bushfires that engulfed Australia in late 2019 and early 2020, and the extreme flooding events along the eastern seaboard in late January and early February 2020. Media responses to the COVID-19 pandemic will doubtless be covered by other conferences, journals and institutions. However, we also welcome discussion of how our ideas, understandings, philosophies of climate change – as well as the response to the bushfires and flooding – have been affected by the pandemic.

Academics and postgraduate researchers from humanities, communications, social sciences, media studies, environmental studies, and more, are invited to contribute.

Topics to be covered can include -- but are not limited to:

- analyses/discussion of media representations of these extreme events, or environmental issues in general

- documentary/creative interventions into the climate catastrophe discourse

- social media-based responses to the bushfires, including international

celebrity attention

-new media and environmental justice

-discussion of (or contributions to) media responses (or lack thereof) to the impact of the bushfires/floods on animal life and Indigenous Australians and Country

-how the climate debate – or responses to extreme Australian weather events – has been affected by COVID-19

-the meeting places between the natural and the mediated

-the impacts of media practice/research on the environment

-media materialism (which can incorporate elements of the above)

Presentations have a max duration of 20 mins (you will be timed), but within that 20 mins you can read or present a paper; screen or present work-in-progress; philosophise on the current media/environmental condition; live riff/performance along a theme; or any combo of these.

Selected presentations concerning visual media will be invited for conversion into articles for a special issue of Senses of Cinema planned for publication in 2021.

Please send a 200-word abstract and 50-word bio to eco.media2.rmit@gmail.com by 5pm Friday 14 August.

December 12-19, 2020

Deadline: September 30, 2020

Theme: Global Punk

A virtual, online, global conference spanning eight days is being brought together by the Punk Scholars Network – be a part of it. 

Punk is a truly global phenomenon that manifests in myriad ways in different scenes, political regimes, cultural contexts and individual experiences. Punk is many things to many people and seldom remains static over a lifetime. Increased globalisation, changes in connectivity and technology, and shifts in both capitalism and populism have impacted punk for better and worse. International and intranational punk scenes and connections are growing and finding commonality and conflict through music, education, mutual aid, performance, political activism and human behaviours. The global Coronavirus pandemic has laid bare the differences people face accessing resources and how governments respond. How have, and how will, various local punk scenes respond to this crisis, and what does their response tell us about punk as a global phenomenon?

The current Punk Scholars Network series /Global Punk/ has attempted to capture the spread and variance of punk across the world (Bestley, Dines, Gordon & Guerra 2019, 2020, 2021). Gabriel Kuhn’s (2019) work on Straight Edge punk experiences has been based upon interviews with straight edge punks around the world, exploring different aspects of their experiences, attitudes, and activism. The journal /Punk & Post-Punk/ regularly features contributions from punk scholars in a variety of geographical locations and settings. With these efforts, and others, serving as a base we are seeking to hold an entirely virtual conference that explores, examines and critically engages with punk scholars around the globe. Each PSN region will be responsible for one day over an eight day period and will include some academic papers or panels responding to this call for papers.

Taking global punk seriously as a theme means considering the variety of experiences within local, national and international punk communities.

This conference takes place against the backdrop of increased political authoritarianism and a noticeable rise in racial and religious intolerance across the world more generally, and under the guise of responses to the global pandemic more specifically. We must consider what impact these issues have – good and bad – on punk scenes and individuals. To do this together, we are asking to what extent is punk a helpful means or a hindrance in considering identity and ‘being’ within wider social problems, dynamics, and understandings?

In line with the broad view being taken on the theme of global punk and in keeping with the PSN’s wide ranging academic reach, we are seeking contributions from a range of interdisciplinary areas, including, but not limited to: cultural studies, musicology, ethnography, art and design, humanities, performing arts, and the social sciences. Papers and panels could be on the following themes, (list is by no means exhaustive):

* Globalisation of new media, communications, social networking, internet

* Ethnographic considerations of scene/space and borders

* Political appropriation: re-definitions of ‘anarchism’, ‘ecology’ and anti-authoritarianism

* What role does exogenous and endogenous appropriation have in punk politics, resistance and allegiance around the world?

* In what ways does gender, ethnicity, race, sexuality, disability, class, religious beliefs, and cultural norms shape punk around the world?

* Notion of local/national/international ‘scene’, tribes, counterculture/subculture

* Importation and exportation of punk as a commodity, statement, academic discourse

* Music and the performer: creativity, authorship, identity, problems with definition, crossing musical boundaries.

* Reception: DIY culture, activism.

* Lifestyle: crustpunk, squatter, vegetarianism, animal rights, straight edge etc within different cultural contexts.

* The art of punk: record covers and associated graphic styles.

Punk Scholars Network events and conferences usually mix the conventionally "scholarly" with the more informal or "organic" intellectualism which punks often display. We therefore invite proposals of a non-standard type, including films, performances, Q and As with punks or punk performers and other creative mediums. In other words, you are welcomed and wanted to be a part of this global conference so please don't worry if you've never set foot in a university.

It is intended that this will be an online conference spanning eight days, from December 12^th until December 19^th 2020 inclusive. Each region with a PSN affiliate is responsible for programming one day. The planned schedule is as follows:

Saturday 12^th December: *PSN* *France*

Sunday 13^th December:*PSN* *UK and rest of EU*

Monday 14th December: *PSN* *Australia/**Aotearoa (NZ)*

Tuesday 15th December: *PSN* *Indonesia*

Wednesday 16th December: *PSN* *USA*

Thursday 17th December: *PSN* *Iberia*​

Friday 18th December: *PSN* *EU and UK*

Saturday 19th December: *PSN* *Colombia*

The affiliates will put together a mixed programme for their day based on a mixture of submissions and connections with local punk scenes. If you wish to take part, please submit your proposal to the relevant affiliate, if there is not one in your immediate geographical region then please submit it to the affiliate that aligns with your time zone for ease of inclusion. Proposals should be 350 words maximum (or equivalent, 3 minutes if a video clip for example) and do not have to be in English, please feel that you can use the language of your region if you wish. Proposals should be submitted to the following affiliated branches of the Punk Scholars Network:

Australia and Aotearoa (NZ), proposals to samantha.bennett@anu.edu.au Colombia, proposals to punkscholarsnetworkcolombia@gmail.com UK and the rest of Europe, proposals to psnconference2020@gmail.com (we can support proposals/presentations in French or German and will try to support other languages if we can) Iberia, proposals to punkscholarsnetworkiberia@gmail.com Indonesia, proposals to psnindonesia15@gmail.com USA and Canada, proposals to punkscholarsusa@gmail.com Brazil, proposals to joaobitt.cs@gmail.com by 30th September 2020 for consideration. Successful submissions will be notified by 15th October 2020, all submissions will be responded to by 28th October 2020.

University of Bergen

The University of Bergen, Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Information Science and Media Studies is advertising a PhD position in media studies. The duration of the PhD position is 4 years, of which 25 per cent of the time comprises obligatory duties associated with research, teaching and dissemination of results.

This is an open call, and we invite you to relate to one or more of our four relevant research groups:

-Research Group for Media Use and Audience Studies: Research on how people use media - as audiences, users and citizens, and how they relate to each other and to society through media.

-Research Group for Rhetoric, Democracy and Public Culture: Research on communication as a tool for argumentation, assurance, and for the expressions of identity and identification - as individuals, in organizations and in society.

-Journalism Studies Group: A broad approach to the role of journalism, news and the social media in the public sphere.

-Media Aesthetics: Focus on media aesthetic expressions, broadly oriented towards contemporary and historical genres, media technology and forms of interaction.

For more information about the research groups and the Department, see the website of the department: https://www.uib.no/…dia . Do feel free to contact the leader of relevant research group(s).

Detailed information about the position can be obtained by contacting:

Head of Department, professor Leif Ove Larsen, e-mail: leif(dot)larsen(at)uib(dot)no.

Practical questions about the application process should be directed to senior executive officer Bodil Hægland, e-mail: bodil(dot)hagland(at)uib(dot)no.

Appointed research fellows will be admitted to the PhD programme at the Faculty of Social Sciences. Questions about the programme may be directed to Adviser-PhD: hanne(dot)Gravermoen(at)uib(dot)no.

The complete announcement and application portal is available here: https://www.jobbnorge.no/…ies

Special Issue of Revenant

Deadline: October 5, 2020

Guest Editors Dr Bethan Michael-Fox (@bethmichaelfox) and Dr Renske Visser (@Renske_Visser)

www.revenantjournal.com

Revenant is now accepting abstracts for critical articles, creative writing pieces, and book, film, music, or event reviews for a themed issue on Death and the Screen, examining how screens, in the broad sense of the word, have shaped and continue to shape the way we witness, experience and reflect on death and dying.

Numerous and complex relationships between death and the screen have already been charted. The dead come back in film, on television and online. Screens let us not only see the dead but hear them too. As Penfold-Mounce has emphasised, in a technology saturated world of mass media, ‘the dead no longer remain silent as the grave’ (2018, p.36).

Whilst relationships between screens and digital media more broadly have gained attention, so have the dynamics of death and individual screen media.While some argue that television is one way in which death is brought into the home, others have examined the ways in which the representation of dying on television might be problematic or harmful to audiences.

In terms of ‘real’ death, it is possible to witness death, dying and trauma on mobile phones, tablets and laptops simply by scrolling through social media. Autoplay and ‘live’ features in apps have been critiqued for the ways they expose people to these images without warning. When George Floyd’s death at the hands of US police officers was recorded some people sought this video out, while others have shared their experiences of deciding not to watch it.

Many people don’t shy away from death and the gory on screen. To what extent is this a form of escapism and to what extent is it an extension of their everyday life? And how can you ‘escape’ death on the screen when death and dying is at the center of the daily news and a theme in almost any film, television show and now also in advertisements? How do screen deaths relate to ‘real’ deaths in people’s lives and can such a distinction even be made?

As screen media become more ubiquitous, these complex and multifaceted relationships continue to warrant further critical attention. In keeping with/Revenant/’s positioning as an inter-disciplinary journal encouraging discussion about the supernatural, uncanny or the weird, we welcome proposals for submissions that engage with these ideas. However,/Revenant/also emphasises that the ‘natural’ is part of the super-natural and as such academic and/or creative engagement with ‘natural’ death and/on the screen, or which complicates the notion of a ‘natural’ death, is also welcome.

We believe a range of different methodological and theoretical approaches will enrich this special issue and as such urge you not to feel limited. We encourage proposals for academic articles or creative responses, which might be poetry, fiction, fanfiction, art, comics, audio or film that might stand alone or be accompanied by critical reflections, as well as autoethnographic and/or personal responses.

Submissions that blur the boundaries of these categories are also welcomed.

Topics or areas of focus might include: 

• Making sense of death and dying through the screen
• Haunting and/in screen cultures
• Weird screen deaths
• The ethics of screen deaths
• Death and the supernatural on screen
• Documentary engagement with death and dying
• Adaptation of death (from literature or elsewhere) to the screen
• Death and the uncanny in screen cultures
• Death, social media and any of/Revenant’/s themes: the uncanny, the
• supernatural, the weird or haunting
• Personal and/or creative responses to death and the/on the screen
• Crises (climate, pandemic, other crises), death and screens
• Non-human death and/on the screen
• Death in screen gaming

Please submit extended abstracts of 500 words by 5 October 2020 with a short bio either via the Google Form here:https://forms.gle/…R19 Or to:deathandthescreen@gmail.com

For creative or innovative submissions please also feel welcome to get in touch via email ondeathandthescreen@gmail.com to discuss your ideas or propose your work in a different way.

Reviews of books, films, games, events, and art related to the death and the screen will be considered (800-1,000 words in length).

If your abstract is accepted, the full submission will be due in April 2021 with a view to publish in late Winter 2021.

Inquiries are welcome and should be directed todeathandthescreen@gmail.com

Edited by Gabriele Balbi and Andreas Fickers

This book focuses on the history of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), from its origins in the mid-19th century to nowadays. ITU was the first international organization ever and still plays a crucial role in managing global telecommunications today. Putting together some of the most relevant scholars in the field of transnational communications, the book covers the history of ITU from 1865 to digital times in a truly global perspective, taking into account several technologies like the telegraph, the telephone, cables, wireless, radio, television, satellites, mobile phone, the internet and others. The main goal is to identify the long-term strategies of regulation and the techno-diplomatic manoeuvres taken inside ITU, from convincing the majority of the nations to establish the official seat of the Telegraph Union bureau in Switzerland in the 1860s, to contrasting the multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance (supported by US and ICANN).

“History of the International Telecommunication Union” is a trans-disciplinary text and can be interesting for scholars and students in the fields of telecommunications, media, international organizations, transnational communication, diplomacy, political economy of communication, STS, and others. It has the ambition to become a reference point in the history of ITU and, at the same time, just the first comprehensive step towards a longer, inter-technological, political and cultural history of transnational communications to be written in the future.

With contributions by: Christiane Berth, Simone Fari, Andrea Giuntini, Roxane Gray, Christian Henrich-Franke, Richard R. John, Léonard Laborie, Gianluigi Negro, Lisa Ruth Rand, Maria Rikitianskaia, Marie Sandoz, Valérie Schafer, Marsha Siefert, Adrian Stecher, Heidi Tworek, Anne-Katrin Weber, Dwayne Winseck, Nina Wormbs.

For more information: https://www.degruyter.com/view/title/567062.

University of Cambridge - Department of Sociology

Location: Cambridge

Salary: £41,526 - £52,559

Hours: Full Time

Contract Type: Fixed-Term/Contract

Placed On: 17th June 2020

Closes: 20th July 2020

Job Ref: JM23273

Fixed-term: The funds for this post are available for 21 months in the first instance, with the possibility of extension.

Applications are invited for a fixed-Term University Lectureship in the Sociology of Gender and Reproduction from 1 September 2020, or as soon possible thereafter. The postholder will contribute to teaching and research in the Department of Sociology and will become a member of the Reproductive Sociology Research Group (ReproSoc) directed by Professor Sarah Franklin. The main areas of contribution required of the postholder are to assist in the organisation and delivery of the undergraduate Sociology of Gender paper and the MPhil pathway in the Sociology of Reproduction, and to contribute to the research activities of ReproSoc. The successful candidate will join a vibrant and thriving academic community in the Department of Sociology, where world-leading research and teaching on gender and reproduction is complemented by strengths in the areas of race and decolonising, science and technology, media and culture, health and biomedicine, class and political economy, social theory, social movements and environmental studies.

Candidates for this post must have a doctorate and a proven record of teaching, research and publications in sociology or a related discipline. They must demonstrate an ability and willingness to teach and to conduct research in the sociology of gender and reproduction, and have excellent organisational as well as communication skills. The postholder will be involved in all aspects of undergraduate and postgraduate provision including course organisation and administration, lecturing, conversion to online delivery, supervision, assessment, admissions and outreach.

Candidates will need to show evidence of the following qualifications, skills, and experience:

• Good first degree and a doctorate (or clear evidence that completion of such a doctorate is imminent) in sociology or a related discipline;
• Evidence of ability to engage in internationally significant original research in their field;
• Publications and participation in scholarly activity commensurate with stage of career;
• Ability to deliver teaching in the sociology of gender and the MPhil on the sociology of reproduction;
• Ability to play an effective role in the life and work of the department and faculty as a whole;
• Ability to work co-operatively with colleagues;
• Excellent communication and organisational skills.

Click the 'Apply' button below to register an account with our recruitment system (if you have not already) and apply online.

Please ensure that you upload your Curriculum Vitae (CV), a full list of all publications, and the names and contact details of three referees. Application letters should include a statement of research interests and future research plans, and a summary of teaching experience and interests. Interviews for short-listed candidates will be conducted remotely on-line.

Informal enquiries about the post may be made to Professor Sarah Franklin (sbf25@cam.ac.uk). Enquiries about the application process should be made to hspshr@hermes.cam.ac.uk

We particularly welcome applications from women and candidates from a BME background for this vacancy as they are currently under-represented at this level in our University.

The closing date for applications is 20 July 2020.

Interviews will be held as soon as possible after the closing date.

The position is based in the Department of Sociology in central Cambridge, England.

Further information about the Department of Sociology may be found on our website at https://www.sociology.cam.ac.uk

Please quote JM23273 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.

Special issue of Mediterranean Journal of Communication (January 2021)

Deadline: September 1, 2020

Submission: http://goo.gl/99Xtg1

Coordinated by Dr. Miguel Vicente-Mariño (University of Valladolid, Spain) and Dr. Ilija Tomanič Trivundža (University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)

Europe is one of the two key cultural actors and geopolitical areas to understand the historical evolution and current status of scientific knowledge in the Social Sciences. Communication Research is a scientific field and/or discipline experiencing an undeniable expansion since the 1990s, grounding part of its growth on works arising from the Old Continent, where big changes –ranging from the collapse of the geopolitical East-West division to the long-standing institutional efforts to build up a strong European Union- stand behind the rapid growth and consolidation of a European community of Communication Research scholars.

The constitution of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA), as a merging initiative between the European Consortium of Communication Research (ECCR) and the European Communication Association (ECA) in 2005 appears as an enriching initiative opening a forum for discussion and mutual recognition between and within a growing community of researchers facing similar challenges, topics of study, theoretical anchorages and methodological resources.

This special issue of Revista Mediterránea de Communication/Mediterranean Journal of Communication aims to reflect on the origins, the processes and the outcomes of Communication Research on and from Europe. Therefore, Europe is considered here both as topic of study (Communication Research on Europe) and as a territory generating scientific evidence (Communication Research from Europe). Departing from a comparative perspective, these contents aspire to turn into a useful discussion platform about how European researchers have developed Communication Research during the last century, identifying the main findings achieved and posing open questions towards a near future.

Research projects and scientific networks proving to be able to transcend borders and dealing with the challenges of identifying common or divergent patterns across Europe are also invited to present here their main arrival points, as this special issue expects to elaborate and deepen in the roots and horizons of Media Studies and Communication Research in Europe.

An initial list of topics, open to any other suggestion coming from the readership, could be as follows:

• History of European Communication Research;
• European Media Audiences;
• Media industries in Europe;
• Journalism Studies on Europe;
• Comparative Media Studies at a European scale;
• European Social Movements and Activism;
• European Public Opinion and the emergence of a common continental public sphere;
• Academic Labour Conditions in European institutions devoted to Communication Research;
• The role played by ECREA, and other scientific associations with a European scope, in shaping a research community at the continental level;
• The role played by the European Communication Conference (ECC) as a meeting point for European Communication researchers;
• The role played by European and national institutions active in the field of Social Sciences.

Consequently, all ECREA sections, working groups and networks are especially addressed by this call, as the experience accumulated during the last fifteen years is a valuable resource to elaborate on the role played by Communication Research and Education in shaping up a common and updated notion of Europe. But this call is not limited to these actors, but open to any research project including the European territory and culture as a priority.

This special issue will be co-edited Miguel Vicente-Mariño, University of Valladolid and Ilija Tomanič Trivundža, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. Anyone willing to receive additional information about this call or to address any question about potential participation, can directly contact the invited editors at miguel.vicente@uva.es.

ECREA Journalism studies Section Conference

February 25-26, 2021

Utrecht, the Netherlands

Deadline: September 4, 2020

https://www.journalismlab.nl/ecrea-journalism-studies-conference-2021/

Hosted by Research Centre Quality Journalism in Digital Transition at the University of Applied Sciences Utrecht

Deadline for abstracts and submissions: September 4, 2020.

The 2021 Section Conference of the Journalism Studies Section of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA) will take place in Utrecht, the Netherlands, on February 25-26, 2021.

We welcome submissions focusing on journalism in digital transition.

We especially welcome proposals for co-creative sessions – co-creation understood as collaboration between researchers and practitioners.

We also want to make the regular sessions more collaborative by introducing active respondents. They will contact the participants before the session.

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The process of digitalization has challenged professional journalism in every way, not only in its organization but also in the way its products are made, sold, and consumed.

For instance, while the newsroom is still often the core space of journalism, the place where the news-beat is felt, the transition to freelance practices and the collaboration with other professions in the creative industry have challenged both organizations and the identity of the journalistic profession. Also, moving away from traditional forms of consuming journalistic production, the public is offered information and entertainment via a multitude of, mostly online, channels. Technological innovation gives journalists and media organizations a range of opportunities. Algorithmic tools are increasingly used to uncover data and gather information. At the same time, artificial intelligence can provide a more personalized and tailor-made news experience. Technologies provide opportunities for storytelling in which the role of the user is more prominent – for example in interactive stories, immersive productions and podcasts.

At the same time concerns have been voiced about the negative aspects of these changes. It might promote fragmentation, polarization of deliberative spaces and the spread of disinformation, to name just a few of these concerns.

What is particularly fascinating in the process of digitalization is the question of how to study it. While the field of journalism studies is booming, the debate on methodological thinking is still surprisingly limited. Therefore, we also encourage submissions focusing on methods.

The scholarly field of journalism studies has developed into a sophisticated field of research. The question often remains how much of this scholarly knowledge is translated into journalism practice. This conference therefore especially invites journalism scholars who work together with practitioners or can show how their research impacts the field. Therefore co-creative sessions will be organized in which we will invite prominent journalists to join the scholarly discussion.

The journalism industry has always been dependent on technology. However, as scholars, we need to heighten our focus on the socio-cultural consequences of this dependence, more so because digital technology exponentially increases new theoretical, methodological, and ethical questions.

In sum, we encourage submissions in three main areas:

• Research on how the digital transition challenges the field of journalism in the way it is produced, sold and consumed.
• Methodological discussions, challenging current scholarly methods or proposing innovative methods in journalism studies.
• Best practices, especially on how scholarly research is embedded into journalistic practice.

The conference will feature traditional paper presentations and co-creative sessions between academics and media professionals.

Traditional paper presentations: Traditional paper presentations will take place in panels consisting of four to five papers. Each panel will be moderated by an active respondent.

Co-creative sessions: A limited number of slots will be available for co-creative sessions in which one topic is addressed in four short presentations, followed by an organized debate between academics and invited media-professionals. We stimulate submissions for these sessions. We will also search for coherent papers to organize such sessions. Presenters will be informed beforehand.

SUBMIT: Submissions can be sent to ecreajournalism2021@hu.nl no later than 4 September 2020.

Please include in the email (1) the title of your paper, (2) an abstract of no more than 750 words, (3) names and affiliations of the authors.

Submission will undergo scholarly peer-review. Only one proposal per first author can be accepted. Notifications of acceptance will be issued early October 20.

November 19-20, 2020

Online (hosted by Malmö University, Sweden)

Deadline for abstracts: 15 August 2020

Notification of acceptance: 1 September 2020

Conference website: mau.se/artcre-2020

The Artificial Creativity conference aims to stir a discussion about the cultural, societal and ethical aspects of artworks featuring A.I. or robots engaged in creative production.

We encourage submissions regarding ongoing research about creative embodied robots (i.e. robotic systems that use physical brushes, pencils, etc. to make their artefacts), but do welcome any inquiries concerning the use of A.I. and deep learning in the production of novel artefacts. The notion of a "robotic system" above may include different types of embodied agents such as an appropriated industrial arm, swarm, drone, etc.

We also welcome submissions that critically challenge contested terms, such as "creativity", "artificial intelligence" and our playful conference title "artificial creativity".

Possible topics include but are not limited to:

• Creative robotics and/or A.I.
• Ethical questions regarding authorship in computational art
• The analysis of media discourses about creative A.I.
• Human-robot collaboration in the process of cultural production
• Robots and performative arts
• Cultural imaginaries about creative artificial agents
• Design approaches to creative robotics

The keynote speakers are: Professor Joanna Zylinska (Goldsmiths University, UK), Professor Andreas Broeckmann (Academy of Fine Arts, Leipzig, Germany), and Professor Mark Amerika (University of Colorado, US).

The online conference will feature a virtual exhibition supported by Mozilla’s Hubs. Amongst other content, the exhibition will feature the latest works of the artist Justine Emard (France).

The call for abstracts invites researchers from different areas of expertise, including but not limited to: creative arts research, humanities, human-robot interaction (HRI), art history, media and communication studies, ethics of technology, design anthropology, social sciences, gender studies, posthumanism, voice interface design, and science and technology studies (STS).

The discussion around the Artificial Creativity theme will continue in a special issue in an open access peer-reviewed journal in 2021. Please follow our website for updates.

Please submit a 500-word abstract (excluding references) to Dr. Bojana Romic: bojana.romic@mau.se before 15 August 2020.

Please include:

• The name(s) of the author(s)
• The affiliation(s) and address(es) of the author(s)
• The e-mail address, and telephone number(s) of the corresponding author
• Your time zone

If using any pictures in your abstract, please do not include more than three. If you are experimenting with creative A.I. or robots and want to include some recordings to our virtual exhibition, please indicate that in the abstract. This, however, will not be a criterion for acceptance.

The notification of acceptance is 1 September 2020.

The Artificial Creativity conference is free of charge for all participants and is hosted by the research lab Medea and the School of Arts and Communication, Malmö University, Sweden. The conference has received generous support from Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, Sweden.

Documentary Film Cultures

Deadline: June 30, 2020

Edited by Dafydd Sills-Jones and Pietari Kaapa

Documentary Film Cultures (Peter Lang) (https://www.peterlang.com/view/serial/DFC )

The cultural practices that sustain the documentary form in all its varieties have been in a rapid state of evolution during the era of digital production. During that era, documentary filmmakers have dealt with the difficulties of negotiating a shrinking list of marketplace ‘gatekeepers’, and coped with the precarity of their working lives. In this period public service TV has retreated from its decades-long role as the main sponsor of documentary, and documentary has made strides into cinematic and online distribution, and immersive technology. To some extent funders and audiences have followed this evolution, but at the beginning of 2020 the documentary community faced urgent questions regarding the monetisation of their work, and the future of their form.

Since then the COVID-19 pandemic has potentially radically transformed the media, and social, landscape, and presents a moment of significant social change, one whose implications are potentially far-reaching for the very sustainability of large-scale industrial media production. The pandemic has necessitated fundamental changes to media production practice, exhibition contexts, distribution arrangements as well as screen content. As the sector scrambles to innovate new distribution models and socially-distanced production arrangements, questions about the economic sustainability of media labour and the resilience of social support networks unbalance the creative work of media professionals.

Media producers have been forced to both interrogate their chosen professions and innovate with limited resources. Already, we are seeing new distribution and production methods emerge to highlight the importance of media-makers as essential workers as they are uniquely equipped with the ability to represent the various dialogues undertaken to respond to the cultural, social, economic, and political challenges the pandemic has foisted on global society.

In this context, how can documentary react to the severe and sudden challenge posed by COVID-19 to the community of practitioners who produce it? How will viewing documentary change? How will funding documentary change? In what Strate (2012) might call a moment of ‘punctuated equilibrium’, what strains within the documentary ecology will evolve, or become extinct? In which way will documentary as a form and practice mutate? And how might documentary production strategies premised on comparatively limited resources and a commitment to critical societal commentary provide models for a new media industry world order?

This collection is intended as a rapid-fire response book to the unusual and disturbing challenges of the pandemic. As such, the volume aims to both survey the immediate effects of the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in documentary film cultures, as well as to provide a space in which the recent past and future of documentary may be unpacked in the context of the pandemic’s possible effects. It is published as part of Peter Lang’s Documentary Film Cultures series and reflects the value of documentary as an enduring and influential channel of media discourse, and community of practice.

Topics to be considered include following areas

• Recent pasts: where were we when COVID-19 arrived?
• Documentary futures: how could COVID-19 change documentary?
• Production arrangements and social distancing
• Representing a socially distanced society
• (New) technologies and (new) documentary forms
• The ethics of representation
• The documentarian as essential worker
• Amateur documentaries
• The documentary as ‘fake news’
• Social media as documentary
• Citizen journalism and the pandemic
• Policy and practice shifts in particular national/regional film environments

We welcome a range of written formats:

Full Research Chapter: 7000-8000 words. These are traditionally formatted book chapters, with the depth and rigour expected of a chapter in a traditional edited collection.

Provocation, Think Piece or Interview: 2000-5000 words. A shorter format for the positing of a set of questions or critical problems raised by effects of COVID-19 on documentary film. These pieces could also outline a particular perspective on the ‘here and now’ circumstances of coping with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Interviews should be with leading practitioners in the field of documentary making who have a specific and significant outlook on this issue.

Please send proposals of 200 words to Dafydd Sills-Jones (dafydd.sills-jones@aut.ac.nz) and Pietari Kaapa (P.Kaapa@warwick.ac.uk ) by 30th June 2020 with full article submissions by December 2020. We expect publication to take place in September 2021.