ECREA WEEKLY digest ARTICLES

Digital Media Research Centre

Deadline: September 1, 2019

We are looking for promising PhD candidates to undertake projects starting in 2020 that align with the DMRC’s overarching mission to conduct world-leading research for a creative, inclusive and fair digital media environment. Applicants with excellent academic track records or equivalent professional research experience may be eligible for competitive PhD scholarships in QUT’s Annual Scholarship Round to undertake study with us.

We welcome expressions of interest for projects that directly address the DMRC’s research priorities of creativity and innovation, inclusion and diversity, and trust and fairness. We are also calling for projects that specifically address the following priority PhD topics linked to funded DMRC research projects:

• Transformations in screen industry development and distribution
• Local and regional game development cultures
• Platform regulation and communications policy
• Digital media, location data, and geoprivacy
• Smart cities, algorithms, and privacy by design

How to apply

All applications must go through an Expression of Interest (EOI) process, which closes on 1 September 2019. The purpose of the EOI process is to identify whether we can match prospective applicants and proposed projects with supervisors, and begin the process of developing the full application. To submit an EOI,

1. check the application and eligibility requirements for QUT’s annual scholarship round
2. review the priority topics above and supervisory interests below, but please avoid contacting potential supervisors directly—you will nominate potential supervisors for your project via the EOI form in step 4.
3. prepare a CV, writing sample, and preliminary research proposal using this document template, and
4. complete the online Expression of Interest form by 1 September 2019. If you are unable to access the online form, please email rtc-soc@qut.edu.au for a Word version.

Expressions of Interest close: 1 September 2019

Final applications due to QUT: 30 September 2019

Supervisors and supervisory interests

• Assoc. Prof. Dan Angus: computational methods for social science and humanities research, algorithmic culture, social media, data journalism, information visualisation, speech and language processing
• Assoc. Prof. John Banks: videogames industry, consumer co-creation
• Prof. Axel Bruns: social media, journalism studies, citizen journalism, Internet studies, media and communication, user-led content creation
• Prof. Jean Burgess: platform studies, algorithms and automation, critical digital methods, online subcultures, feminist and LGBTQ politics
• Assoc. Prof. Susan Carson: cultural tourism, literary and cultural trails, digital applications, Indigenous tourism, Australian studies
• Dr Elija Cassidy: digital diversity and inclusion, everyday digital media use, digital dating/hookup apps, digital LGBTQ cultures, online safety and harassment, participatory reluctance, cultures of non-use and resistant appropriation, digital diasporas
• Prof. Stuart Cunningham: media industries in transition; digital platform studies; creative industries; media convergence; media, arts, communications and cultural policy
• Assoc. Prof. Michael Dezuanni: digital and media literacy, digital inclusion, children’s digital cultures, media education and media arts
• Prof. Terry Flew: creative industries, globalisation and international trade, media convergence, media and citizenship, media in Asia, media policy
• Prof. Marcus Foth: urban informatics, smart cities, human-computer interaction, sustainability, community engagement, design, blockchain
• Dr Timothy Graham: social network analysis, social theory, social media analytics, natural language processing, machine learning
• Assoc. Prof. Stephen Harrington: emergent forms of journalism, entertainment, political citizenship
• Dr Jenny Zhengye Hou: strategic communication in the digital age, public relations theory and practice, intercultural communication, fake news, disaster, risk and crisis communication
• Dr Brendan Keogh: video games, game studies, creative industries, game development, creative labour, digital media, informal labour, game industry, new media
• Prof. Amanda Lotz: media industries, internet-distributed media, television/screen studies, transnational media flows
• Dr Monique Mann: surveillance, privacy, algorithmic justice, biometrics, technology and regulation
• Dr Ariadna Matamoros Fernández: Platform governance and platform studies, digital methods, popular cultures of digital media, race and racism on digital platforms, online harassment, misinformation/disinformation
• Assoc. Prof. Peta Mitchell: locative/mobile/geosocial media, media geography, digital ethics, digital diversity, critical approaches to data, data literacy, everyday digital media use
• Dr Benjamin Nicoll: media history and historiography, platform studies, game studies, critical theory of technology, media and cultural studies
• Dr Kylie Pappalardo: copyright, intellectual property, intermediary liability, open access, online governance, regulation, digital media
• Prof. Matthew Rimmer: intellectual property, digital copyright, clean technologies, and climate change, media and information technology law
• Assoc. Prof. Angela Romano: cultural diversity and journalism, journalism and democracy, journalism in developing countries, public journalism, civic journalism and deliberation, media representations of refugees, women in the media
• Dr Mark Ryan: Film, television, and screen genres; Australian film and television; film and screen industries; health and screen media; blockchain and screen production
• Dr Kevin Sanson: media industries, globalization, creative labour, creative industries, film/television studies
• Dr Aljosha Karim Schapals: journalism studies, political communication, media and democracy, election reporting (Brexit), fake news
• Dr Christina Spurgeon: advertising studies, co-creative media, community media
• Assoc. Prof. Nic Suzor: platform governance; internet regulation; open knowledge, open access, and free culture; digital copyright
• Dr T. J. Thomson: visual communication, visual journalism, journalism studies, self-representation, visual literacy, visual sociology, image culture, mobile media production and distribution, everyday digital media use
• Dr Tess Van Hemert:
• Prof. Patrik Wikström: digital creative economy, cultural economics, music, computational social science

Questions?

Contact rtc-soc@qut.edu.au for further information.

Find us on Twitter and Instagram as @qutdmrc, or on Facebook at http://facebook.com/qutdmrc

More here

Commons Journal, Vol. 8. No. 2 (December 2019)

Deadline: July 1, 2019

Throughout the world it is possible to find undergraduate and postgraduate study programmes that include modules pertaining to the so-called ‘Communication for Social Change’ (CSC) phenomenon. The sociocultural contexts, academic cultures, institutionalisation processes, etc., through which CSC has been incorporated into university curricula are extremely varied. But we now have more than enough experience to take stock of the ground covered to date.

By incorporating CSC in university curricula, students and PhD students completing traineeships can approach research focusing on the efforts of social movements, NGOs and citizen networks to implement social and communication actions aimed at achieving social justice.

Under the rather broad label of CSC, this call for papers focuses on broaching the following curricular issues:

• The relationship between communication, the critique of capitalism and social mobilisation.
• The study of the processes of social mobilisation and transformation from a communication perspective.
• The analysis of the role of community media and other communication mediations led by the citizenry and social movements.
• The introduction of a series of ‘Epistemologies of the South’ (Sousa Santos and Meneses, 2014) that break with the hegemonic models of knowledge construction.
• Proposals for more inclusive social representations that go beyond the stereotypes generated by the dominant cultural industries (the ‘Disney World’ as a paradigmatic example).

Looking back on the progress made, we could beg the following question: is the incorporation of these topics into university curricula leading to critical theoretical research and to transforming practices or, on the contrary, are we witnessing a strict disciplining of a number of issues that, constrained by bureaucratic rationales, lose their critical and transforming capacity? Are authors like Paulo Freire being studied to pass the exam or rather to learn how to transform reality?

This dilemma reflected in the title (disciplining the field /or/ indisciplining universities) allows for other combinations (i.e. disciplining the field /and/, at the same time, indisciplining universities) which we would like contributions to this monograph to examine.

The aim of this number of /Commons /is to map ongoing processes in the largest number of social, geographical and institutional contexts possible.

Papers, which should be submitted before 1 July 2019, should deal with some or other of the aforementioned aspects.

Bibliography

Sousa Santos, Boaventura and Meneses, M.ª Paula (eds.) (2014). Epistemologías del Sur: perspectivas [Epistemologies of the South: perspectives]. Madrid. Akal.

Freire, Paulo (1970). Pedagogía del oprimido [Pedagogy of the oppressed]. Montevideo, Uruguay. Nueva Tierra.

Gumucio-Dagron, Alfonso and Tufte, Thomas (Eds.). (2006). /Communication for social change anthology: Historical and contemporary readings/. New Jersey, EE.UU.CFSC Consortium.

Kaplún, Gabriel. (2005). Indisciplinar la universidad [Indisciplining universities], in /Walsh, Catherine.(comp), Pensamiento crítico y matriz (de) colonial: reflexiones latinoamericana/ [Critical thinking and the (de)colonial matrix: Latin American reflections]/. /Quito, Ecuador. Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar/Abya-Yala.

Marí, V. M. (2018). Análisis de los movimientos-red contemporáneos desde una perspectiva comunicacional y freiriana. Desbordamientos, transformaciones y sujetos colectivos. [Analysis of Contemporary Networked Movements from a Communicational and Freirean Perspective. Overflows, Transformations and Collective Subjects], /Utopía y Praxis Latinoamericana/, /23/, 140-147. Disponible en: (PDF) Análisis de los movimientos-red contemporáneos desde una perspectiva comunicacional y freiriana. Desbordamientos, transformaciones y sujetos colectivos.

Walsh, Catherine, Shiwy, Freya and Castro-Gómez, Santiago (eds.) (2002). Indisciplinar las ciencias sociales. Geopolíticas del conocimiento y colonialidad del poder. Perspectivas desde lo andino [Indisciplining social sciences. Geopolitics of knowledge and coloniality of power. Andean perspectives]. Quito, Ecuador. 2002.

Call for papers for edited book

Deadline: June 30, 2019

The editors are in talks with John Benjamins Publishing Company (Amsterdam) and plan to publish the edited volume in the Benjamins’ Discourse Approaches to Politics, Culture and Society series (edited by Jo Angouri and Andreas Musolff). This book series is peer-reviewed and indexed in Scopus.

Discourse Analysis and Conflict Studies

Interest in the broad subject of conflict studies by linguists and language scholars has increased over the years with the growing incidents of conflicts, wars and political violence around the world. There have also been increasing and interesting studies that applied linguistic and discourse approaches to the study of violent protests, activism and political struggles. These studies have given significant insights to the role of language use or discourse in conflict initiation and conflict resolution. From these burgeoning studies, it is clear that there is a strong connection between how what is said or written and how conflict may develop and escalate.

Discourse theorists generally believe that oral or written discourse produced by different people vary with recognizable patterns, depending on their social domains of life (see, for example, Laclau & Mouffe, 1985). The work of a discourse analyst is to analyze these patterns and identify their significance and consequences. Critical discourse analysis (CDA) for example, shows how language works in sociocultural and political contexts, focusing on power relations and ideological perspectives reflected in discourse texts, and their wider implications for the society.

Hence, a critical discourse study of subtle texts such as news reports (or “fake news”), editorials, propaganda, social media publications, etc. in the form of writing, visual or multimodal/video streaming will be very important in contemporary times.

This collection of essays will aim to show the synergy between discourse analysis and conflict studies by showing how topics in conflicts studies and conflict resolution may be researched using methods and approaches in discourse analysis (e.g. CDA, multi-modal discourse analysis, conversation analysis etc.)

This study will attempt to cover all conflict-related topics within the fields of political science, international relations, sociology, media studies, applied linguistics etc., which will include:

• Terrorism and extremism
• Conflict and war
• Political crisis
• Ethnic violence/sectarian crisis
• Activism and violent protest
• Hate speech and verbal war (in the media and the Internet etc.)
• Conflict resolution techniques
• Discourse and peace processes

Contributors are invited to submit chapter proposals (about 200 words) not later than 30th June 2019. Kindly send Abstracts or questions as email attachment to Innocent Chiluwa: innocent.chiluwa@covenantuniversity.edu.ng

IAMCR 2019 Pre-conference

July 5, 2019

Valencia, Spain

Deadline: May 15, 2019

Confirmed key-note speaker:* Dr. Gianpietro Mazzoleni (Università degli Studi di Milano).

The IAMCR 2019 pre-conference *Misinformation and political processes: media strategies and audience attitudes* aims to reflect on the concept of misinformation and its multiple dimensions, as well as the strategies and practices developed around them, particularly those linked to political contexts and electoral processes.

The Oxford Dictionary declared post-truth word of the year in 2016, highlighting a historical and political moment in which disinformation strategies, fake news and lies are exponentially spread through social networks: facilitating, among others, Trump’s rise to power and having an impact also in Brexit debates (Jankowski, 2018). Since then, the role of manipulative messages has increased (Baudrillard, 1981; Wardle, 2017) – rising concern about their effects in political decisions, particularly in times of crisis (Spence, Lachlan, Edwards, & Edwards, 2016).

The potential role of social networks in disseminating misinformation (Woolley & Howard, 2016) grows in importance if we take into account that they have become the main source of information (Shearer & Gottfried, 2017), especially during electoral processes (Allcott & Gentzkow, 2017). Considering that misinformation takes advantage of the increasing polarization of public opinion (Lewandowsky, Ecker & Cook, 2017; Horta et al,. 2017), its pernicious effects on decision-making and political debate demand a greater knowledge of the motivations behind the dissemination of misinformation (Flynn, Nyhan & Reifler, 2017).

Topics of interest for the conference may be related, but not limited, to the following:

• Genealogy of post-truth and its different expressions: misinformation, disinformation, manipulation, fake-news, conspiracy theories, rumors, memes …
• Origins and historical evolution of misinformation.
• Fact-checking and digital platforms for verifying public discourse: Experiences and results.
• Effects of disinformation on democratic stability
• Polarization and success of misinformation: perception and influence.
• Reception studies of fake-news
• Active audiences and the fight against the spread of false news: counter-narratives and different civic society initiatives.
• Bots and dissemination of fake news: who is behind the massive dissemination of false or manipulative messages?
• Algorithmic transparency: The role of platforms such as Google, Facebook and Twitter in the control of false news.
• Regulation and self-control: viability of regulation
• News transparency and fact-checkers in the newsrooms.
• Reputation of the sources: Value assignment and social credibility.
• Misinformation and human rights
• Media literacy and misinformation
• Methods for the empirical approach to disinformation
• Trends, styles, and narratives of fake news.
• Dynamics of dissemination
• Clickbait and other misinformation strategies
• Important deadlines and other information:*

Call for proposals:

Submissions should include the name(s) and institutional affiliation of the applicant(s), email address and abstracts no longer than 500 words (including references), and a short bio (100 words) in English or Spanish (public presentation will be in English)

Abstracts must be submitted before May 15, 2019 at: misinformation2019iamcr@gmail.com

Participants will be notified about acceptance by June 10.

Participation and registration: Registration will be required.

Registration fee: 20€

The registration fee includes attendance to all events of the conference, coffee breaks & snacks, and lunch.

For more information about the call, click here

The School of Media and Communication at the University of Leeds

Deadline: June 10, 2019

Are you an outstanding academic with passion and enthusiasm for your research? Do you want to be part of a thriving media and communication school in a Russell Group University? Are you an experienced academic leader looking for a challenging senior leadership position?

The School of Media and Communication at the University of Leeds is a vibrant and highly ranked department with a commitment to excellence in both research and teaching. We are ranked in the top three in the UK for Communication and Media Studies (Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2018) and 22nd in the world (QS World University Rankings by Subject). In the 2014 REF exercise we were placed in the top ten departments in the UK with 82% of our research judged to be either ‘world leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’.

We are looking to appoint a Professor or Associate Professor to join us to provide leadership across the range of the School’s activities. The successful candidate will be expected to enhance the School’s research and teaching activities and work with colleagues to build on the School’s reputation for excellence in political communication. We are seeking applicants who can contribute to world-leading research on the relationship between the media and politics, broadly conceived. This may include (but is not limited to): the relationships between communication and political attitudes/behaviour; the civic roles of the media; emerging technologies and forms of political participation; and the significance of news for politics and civil society.

The School is keenly interested in diversifying its staff and welcomes applications from candidates belonging to groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in media and communication, including but not limited to ethnic minorities.

To explore the post further or for any queries you may have, please contact:

Dr Kate Nash, Head of School

Tel: +44 (0)113 343 4443, email: K.Nash@leeds.ac.uk

• Location: Leeds - Main Campus
• Faculty/Service: Faculty of Arts, Humanities & Cultures
• School/Institute: School of Media and Communication
• Category: Academic
• Grade: Grade 9 to Grade 10
• Salary: £50,132 to £73,539 p.a.
• Associate Professor, Grade 9 (£50,132– £58,089 p.a.), Professor, Grade 10 (competitive salary)
• Working Time: 100%
• Post Type: Full Time
• Contract Type: Ongoing
• Release Date: Tuesday 05 March 2019
• Closing Date: Monday 10 June 2019
• Reference: AHCMC1037

Download here

September 12-14, 2019 

Portland, Oregon, USA

Deadline: May 15, 2019

Keynotes: Amanda Ann Klein, East Carolina University, and Matt McCormick, Gonzaga University

In holding this year’s conference in downtown Portland, one of the most environmentally conscious cities in the United States, we invite attendees to consider the themes of “repurpose” and “recycle,” broadly conceived. What function—socially, politically, and economically—do sequels, remakes, and reboots serve in media culture? How do reboots and remakes allow creators and audiences to not only revisit, but reimagine familiar narratives? What historical precedents might we return to in our attempts to better understand the nature and influence of series, serials, and (trans)media franchises today? And how might adaptation studies play a vital role in these critical discussions? While we welcome papers on any aspect of adaptation studies, we are especially interested in presentations that address one or more of the following concerns (or similar topics):

• transmedia storytelling
• media franchising
• recombinant culture
• questions of authorship in adaptation
• film genres and genre cycles
• economic and industrial perspectives on remakes
• rebooting television series
• evaluating sequels, remakes, and reboots
• the question of originality and artistry in adaptation
• environmental media and ecocritical perspectives
• ecocinema and ecomedia
• media and the anthropocene
• historical precedents in series, serial, and franchise storytelling
• formalist and narratological approaches to series, serial, and franchise storytelling
• narrative extensions into new media, including video games
• the impact of #OscarsSoWhite and #MeToo on reimagining adaptation
• teaching adaptation

The LFA also welcomes work in media studies, more broadly. We have significant interest in broader studies of American and international cinema, film and technology, television, new media, and other cultural or political issues connected to the moving image. In addition to academic papers, presentation proposals about pedagogy or from creative writers, artists, and filmmakers are also welcome.

We are excited to feature two outstanding keynote speakers this year:

Amanda Ann Klein, Associate Professor of Film Studies in the English Department at East Carolina University, is author of American Film Cycles: Reframing Genres, Screening Social Problems, & Defining Subcultures (University of Texas Press, 2011) and co-editor ofMultiplicities: Cycles, Sequels, Remakes and Reboots in Film & Television (University of Texas Press, 2016). Her manuscript, Identity Killed the Video Star: A Cultural History of MTV Reality Programming, is under contract with Duke University Press. Her scholarship has appeared in Quarterly Review of Film and Video, Jump Cut, Film Criticism, Flow, Antenna, Salon, The Atlantic, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, and The New Yorker.

Matt McCormick has for many years been a key figure in the Portland art and film scene and is currently Assistant Professor of Integrated Media & Art at Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA. Matt’s work crosses mediums and defies genre distinctions to fashion witty, abstract observations of contemporary culture and the urban landscape. His films, which include The Subconscious Art of Graffiti Removal, Some Days Are Better Than Others, The Great Northwest, and Buzz One Four, have screened in venues ranging from the Sundance Film Festival to the Museum of Modern Art, and have been critically acclaimed by The New York Times, Art Forum, and many other media outlets. Matt has also directed music videos for bands including The Shins, Sleater-Kinney, and Broken Bells.

Please submit your proposal via this Google Form by May 15, 2019. If you have any questions or concerns, contact Pete Kunze atlitfilmconference@gmail.com. Accepted presenters will be notified by June 1.

All sessions will be held at the University of Oregon in Portland, located at 70 NW Couch St. in downtown Portland. Limited travel grant support is planned to be available for select graduate students, non-tenure-track faculty, and/or independent scholars and artists. Details for an added application process for such support will be shared following proposal acceptances.

The conference registration fee is $200 ($150 for students and retirees) before August 1, 2019 and $225 ($175 for students and retirees) thereafter. All conference attendees must also be current members of the Literature/Film Association, and all presenters must be registered by September 1 to appear on the final conference program. Annual dues are $20. To register for the conference and pay dues following acceptance of your proposal, visit the Literature/Film Association website at http://litfilm.org/conference and use our PayPal feature.

Presenters will be invited to submit their work to the Literature/Film Quarterly for potential publication. For details on the journal’s submission requirements, visit http://www.salisbury.edu/lfq

Deadline: October 31, 2019

The Professional Wresting Studies Association invites submissions for the inaugural issue of the Professional Wrestling Studies Journal. We welcome scholarly work from any theoretical and methodological lens that is rigorous, insightful, and expands our audience’s understanding of professional wrestling past or present as a cultural, social, political, and/or economic institution.

All submissions must be original scholarly work and free of identifying information for blind review. Written articles should be submitted as Word documents and no more than 8,000 words, inclusive of a 200-word abstract and a reference list. MLA citation style is required. Any images that are not original require copyright clearance. Articles will be converted into PDFs for publication, so hyperlinks should be active. For multimedia productions and experimental scholarship, please contact editor-in-chief Matt Foy (foym38@uiu.edu) to verify length and proper format in which to send the piece.

The deadline for submissions is October 31, 2019 for an April 2020 publication. Please email submissions to prowrestlingstudies@gmail.com. For more information on the Professional Wresting Studies Association, please visit https://prowrestlingstudies.org.

Special Issue of Synoptique: An Online Journal of Film and Moving Image Studies

Deadline (EXTENDED): May 15, 2019

At the heart of animation is movement, and the expression of movement is negotiated differently across media. How then do LGBTQ+ communities reappropriate the specificities of animation, comics, videogames, and other forms of visual representations that rely on putting bodies into motion? How does animation support the emergence of social and political movements from within, between, and outside media production spaces? Since 2010, studies of LGBTQ+ representation in animation have steadily increased in number. From queer readings (Halberstram 2011), to media histories (McLelland, Nagaike, Suganuma, Welker 2015), to queer media makers (such as bisexual, non-binary creator Rebecca Sugar and other queer animators like Noelle Stevenson and Chris Nee), animation production has become a vital site for the study, performance, and persistence of queer media practices. Although much conversation has been devoted to queer readings of texts in transmedia movements, the people, circuits, and institutions of queer animated media production have attracted significantly less attention.

By focusing on the “politics of movement,” we intend to grasp the convergence of

1. common techniques of animation in and across multiple media platforms
2.  means of mobile image production both amateur and industrial
3. social agendas in queer communities using the motion of images to negotiate their representation and place in society.

While this issue will brush up against the various transmedia (narrative-based, Jenkins, 2008), media mix (image-based, Steinberg, 2012) and cross-media (toy-based, Nogami, 2015) models and their cultural geographies across the globe, our central aim here is to expand the knowledge and visibility of LGBTQ+ sociopolitical projects evolving conjointly with the creation and circulation of animated images. Producing movement in, across, and outside of media extends the synchronization of images to networks of commodities, territories, and peoples. Although an important amount of scholarship tends to address this question as the “queering of texts,” we seek another point of view coming directly from the creation of moving images itself. Such production practices are also imbricated in and respond to geo-political and cultural contexts. How then does the movement in between frames, vignettes, illustrations, and memes (to name a few examples) initiate social action (be it just to produce pornography for marginalized communities or to create conventions for amateur artists and publics to meet)?

This issue of Synoptique: An Online Journal of Film and Moving Image Studies will focus on queer media practices and the politics of movement. When animating LGBTQ+ images, media creators are also mobilizing queer practices, communities, and identities. Therefore, we are particularly interested in analyses and testimonies that examine sites of queer media production and their animation techniques, strategies, and practices. We encourage contributions that examine the interactions of animation within media related to animation, such as comics and videogames, as forms of queer movement often overflow and interact throughout multiple media platforms (Hemmann, 2015). We also invite submissions of artwork either from queer-identifying artists and practitioners, or pieces that explore queer movement, embodiment, and existence. Interviews, manifestos, essays, and other forms of writing on animated movement in queer media making are warmly welcome, as are multimedia contributions.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

• The industrial or amateur structures of LGBTQ+ images production
• Movement in LGBTQ+ pornography and erotika
• Queer movement in comics, visual novels, videogames, etc.
• The strategies and places of queered images (“Queer” Media mix, Marketing, Festivals, and Conventions)
• Animated media production of the Global South (such as Brazilian Netflix show Super Drags)
• Distribution networks for LGBTQ+ animated series (TV, platforms, VOD)
• LGBTQ+ representations in animated media emerging from manga including both more mainstream (Boy’s Love, Yuri) and subcultural (so-called Bara or Gachimuchi) productions
• Local LGBTQ+ communities and their struggles expressed through moving images
• Queer movement across comics and animation
• Decolonizing sexualities
• Cosplay as queer (re)animation

We use a broad interpretation of LGBTQ+ identity, including Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay, Trans*, Queer/Questioning, Two-Spirit, Intersex, Agender, Asexual, Pansexual, Genderqueer, Genderfluid, Non-binary, X-gender, Genderfuck, etc.

Essays submitted for peer review should be approximately 5,500-7,500 words and must conform to the Chicago author-date style (17th ed.). All images must be accompanied by photo credits and captions.

We also warmly invite submissions to the review section, including conference or exhibition reports, film festival reports, and interviews related to the aforementioned topics. All non-peer review articles should be a maximum of 2,500 words and include a bibliography following Chicago author-date style (17th ed.).

Multimedia works such as digital video, gifs, still images, or more (surprise us!) are also welcome. Works under 8MB may by hosted directly on the Synoptique site; anything larger must be uploaded to an external site (Youtube, Vimeo, etc). Please contact the Synoptique Board for more information on the procedures to submit artworks.

All submissions may be written in either French or English.

Please submit completed essays or reports to the Editorial Collective (editor.synoptique@gmail.com) issue guest editors, Kevin J. Cooley (kevin.cooley@ufl.edu), Edmond (Edo) Ernest dit Alban (ernestedo@gmail.com), and Jacqueline Ristola (jacqueline.ristola@gmail.com), by April 30. We will send notifications of acceptance by June 30.

Special issue of Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture

Deadline: June 1, 2019

Guest Editors: Annamária Neag and Richard Berger (Bournemouth University, UK)

Discussions on the relationship between children & youth and (social) media have predominantly focused on issues involving online safety, self-image, media use and media literacy (e.g. Canty et al, 2016; Hoge & Bickham, 2017; Livingstone et al, 2017; Nikkon & Schols, 2015;). However, less attention has been cast on the mediated experiences of children and youth in what we call ‘in between spaces’. These ‘in between’ spaces can be both physical (e.g. migrating from one country to another), and more intangible or abstract, such as re-negotiating gender. We know that childhood and adolescence are transitional states, which, for many, are often contradictory and difficult. Research shows that children and teenagers have a fluid and interdependent relationship with both the world around them and the technologies they are using (Rooney, 2012). The work of Turkle (2011) and latterly Sefton-Green and Livingstone (2017) highlights, for instance, that young people often turn to the online world as it has “intense individual meanings” (p. 245) for them, away from the school and the home. In this space then, new identities are constantly re-negotiated. As one study found, teenagers use selfies as tools for both confirming heteronormativity and for renegotiating and mocking gender norms (Forsman, 2017). In the ‘in between spaces’ of migrating youth then, social media is seen to play a vital role for maintaining social links with friends and families, and with new acquaintances in the receiving societies (Kutscher & Kress, 2018).

For this special issue, we are seeking contributions which explore and map the ‘in between’ spaces children and youth negotiate in their everyday lived media experiences. We seek articles which research how (social) media and digital technology is used/deployed in these spaces, as tools of negotiation and transaction. For this special issue, we are interested in seeing how these relationships are influenced or changed because of social platforms and digital technologies.

We would welcome expressions of interest from academics working in these fields, as well as practitioners and those who work with directly with children/childhood in these ‘in between spaces’ (e.g. those from NGO/charity sectors).

Submissions may cover, but are not limited to, the following:

• The transitioning of young people/youth through foster care;
• Unaccompanied minor asylum-seekers and migrant youth settling in a new country;
• Re-negotiating gender (including trans/non-binary transition);
• Children and young people who are transitioning between being home-schooled or from having been educated in isolated communities;
• The negotiating of new identities, such as becoming step-son/daughter, step-brother/sister;
• Transition from high school to university/labour market

GUIDELINES FOR SPECIAL ISSUE PROPOSALS

Please write a 300-word statement of the overall concept of your study, its thematic coherence and especially how it relates to the aims and scope of the call, carefully articulating the transition under discussion in a well-defined mediated ‘in between’ space. Please include your name, institutional affiliation and contact details. The deadline for sending in the proposals is the 1st of June 2019. The abstracts should be sent to both Dr. Annamária Neag (aneag@bournemouth.ac.uk) and Dr. Richard Berger (rberger@bournemouth.ac.uk).

A selection of authors will be invited to submit a full paper (from 6000-8000 words, including references) due on the 1st of October 2019.

All submissions will be peer-reviewed, and the issue is scheduled for publication in November 2020.

Please make sure to follow the Intellect Style Guide and requirements for images, graphs and tables available at https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-editors-and-contributors

All inquiries about this Call for Papers can be addressed to Dr. Annamária Neag (aneag@bournemouth.ac.uk) and Dr. Richard Berger (rberger@bournemouth.ac.uk)

July 7, 2019, 9:00am-4:30pm

Madrid, Spain

(Extended) Proposal deadline: May 10, 2019 (11:59 pm MST)

The Program:

Reimagining Our University aims to cultivate solidarity and collaboration by bringing emerging scholars together to discuss our concerns with the contemporary university and brainstorm solutions to some of these questions. We are the future of the university, and we can either choose to accept the university as it stands, prioritizing our personal success within market-driven structures, or we can choose to develop transnational networks of emerging scholars committed to supporting one another as we develop and cultivate visions of what the university might become.

The preconference will be divided into two parts: (1) three conference-style roundtables in which individuals share ten-minute provocations, followed by open discussion; and (2) carefully designed workshops aimed at targeted brainstorming and goal-setting in response to previously identified key areas of concern.

The Vision:

At the upcoming 2019 IAMCR Conference, we will be gathering to engage the role of communication in fulfilling the Preamble of the Paris Declaration (UN, 1948), which states that "recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world".

This commitment must begin within our own institutions. However, contemporary universities are undergoing a process of the so-called “neoliberalization”, in which students are called “customers” or “users”, and faculty and graduate students are reduced to labor force or “service providers”. In this context, the contemporary University’s commitments to financial viability often undermine and prevail upon the collective attempts of faculty, staff, and students to cultivate a community of knowledge.

It can be tempting to call for a return towards the origins of the university, for a restoration of its initial commitment to the Humanities and the development of thoughtful citizens. However, even if the university was not always as commercially driven, the university has never been committed fully to the dignity and rights of all members of the human family. It has always been exclusionary in some form, and the university participated actively in the European colonial project.

Instead it is necessary to begin with a blank slate and imagine the modern university from the ground up, as we need it to be. What purpose should the university have in today’s society? For whom should the university be designed? How should coursework be structured? How should the tenure process function? Can we design financially stable institutions without structuring such institutions around financial viability and market interests? These are massive questions with which we must wrestle, and we must wrestle with them together.

Call for Proposals:

Faculty and graduate students at all levels are encouraged to apply. Though this preconference is sponsored by the Emerging Scholars Network and emphasizes the collaboration and contributions of emerging scholars, we value the insights and perspectives of experienced academics who also wish to reimagine the university as it exists today.

For the first session, we request interested participants to submit an author bio and a 300-word abstract outlining their brief ten-minute provocations that offer insights, challenges, calls to action, or other reflections in response to the central question of this preconference: how must we rethink and reimagine the university today?

For the second session, we request interested workshop organizers to submit a CV and one-page proposal outlining their idea for a workshop related to the theme of this preconference.

Potential topics for provocations or workshops could include:

• Decolonizing the university
• Rethinking the publishing model
• Public scholarship and the university
• The future of finances within the Academy
• The tenure-track process
• University infrastructures
• The university’s responsibility to the environment

As this pre-conference will function as a workshop, involving the active participation of all conference attendees, all in attendance may request a letter to their home institution, in which we advocate for their merit to receive travel funding, regardless of whether they are one of the speakers presenting a provocation.

Please send all proposals and queries to Rachel Lara van der Merwe (University of Colorado Boulder) at rachel.vandermerwe@colorado.edu no later than May 10, 2019 (midnight MST).

Organisers:

The Emerging Scholars Network is the key organizer and sponsor of this event. ESN (http://iamcr.org/s-wg/section/emerging-scholars-network-section/home) is a section dedicated to the work and careers of emerging scholars in the field of media studies and communication.

The ESN organizes emerging scholar panels and joint panels with other sections. Emerging Scholars panels provide a comfortable environment for the presentation of theses and works in progress, where emerging scholars can receive feedback from colleagues also at the beginning of their careers and from senior scholars who act as respondents to individual papers.