ECREA WEEKLY digest ARTICLES

February 9, 2023

I am pleased to invite you to the next in the series of IPRA Thought Leadership webinars. The webinar Connecting ideas + action: communications + sustainability will be presented by Jessie Nagel, Jemma Gould, and Alison Pepper on Thursday 9 February 2023 at 15.00 GMT/UCT (unadjusted). Note later time than usual.

What is the webinar content?

Green The Bid’s work is devoted to how advertising can be made sustainably. The webinar will focus on the communications aspects of the climate crisis and discuss the building of transitional movements.

How to join

Register here at Airmeet. (The time shown should adjust to your device’s time zone.)

A reminder will be sent 1 hour before the event. 

Background to IPRA

IPRA, the International Public Relations Association, was established in 1955, and is the leading global network for PR professionals in their personal capacity. IPRA aims to advance trusted communication and the ethical practice of public relations. We do this through networking, our code of conduct and intellectual leadership of the profession. IPRA is the organiser of public relations' annual global competition, the Golden World Awards for Excellence (GWA). IPRA's services enable PR professionals to collaborate and be recognised. Members create content via our Thought Leadership essays, social media and our consultative status with the United Nations. GWA winners demonstrate PR excellence. IPRA welcomes all those who share our aims and who wish to be part of the IPRA worldwide fellowship. For more see www.ipra.org

Background to Green the Bid

Green The Bid is a non-profit organisation of members commited to working together to share best practices in the sustainability space, reporting successes and acknowledging hurdles. They advocate across industry for consistent and measurable standards to support the building of a net-carbon negative, waste-free future for commercial production. For more see www.greenthebid.earth

Contact

International Public Relations Association Secretariat

United Kingdom

secgen@ipra.org

Telephone +44 1634 818308 

Mediální studia/Media Studies (special issue)

Marisa Torres da Silva, Maria José Brites & Miguel Vicente

Media Studies 3/2022 was supported by a subsidy from the Media and Audiovisual Department of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.

FULL ISSUE is available PDF

Introduction to Special Issue: Marisa Torres da Silva, Maria José Brites & Miguel Vicente

STUDIES

Magdalena Saldaña & Valentina Proust: Comments that hurt: Incivility in user-generated comments about marginalized groups 

Hilde Sakariassen: Facebook as a public arena for women: Infringing on democratic ideals and a cause of worry 

Anda Rožukalne & Dite Liepa: From “Covid idiots” to “Covidshow and “Covidhysteria”: Analysis of digital news commenters’ verbal aggressiveness and means of linguistics creativity during COVID-19 pandemic in Latvia (2020 – 2021)  

Ernestina Lamponi, Marinella Paciello & Francesca D’Errico: Mapping emotional responses across the individual moral system in Social Network ethical public communication: a quasi-experimental study

Bengt Johansson, Øyvind Ihlen, Jenny Lindholm, Mark Blach-Ørsten (red.)

This edited volume compares experiences of how the Covid-19 pandemic was communicated in the Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. The Nordic countries are often discussed in terms of similarities concerning an extensive welfare system, economic policies, media systems, and high levels of trust in societal actors. However, in the wake of a global pandemic, the countries’ coping strategies varied, creating certain question marks on the existence of a “Nordic model”. 

The chapters give a broad overview of crisis communication in the Nordic countries during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic by combining organisational and societal theoretical perspectives and encompassing crisis response from governments, public health authorities, lobbyists, corporations, news media, and citizens. The results show several similarities, such as political and governmental responses highlighting solidarity and the need for exceptional measures, as expressed in press conferences, social media posts, information campaigns, and speeches. The media coverage relied on experts and was mainly informative, with few critical investigations during the initial phases. Moreover, surveys and interviews show the importance of news media for citizens’ coping strategies, but also that citizens mostly trusted both politicians and health authorities during the crisis. 

This book is of interest to all who are looking to understand societal crisis management on a comprehensive level. The volume contains chapters from leading experts from all the Nordic countries and is edited by a team with complementary expertise on crisis communication, political communication, and journalism, consisting of Bengt Johansson, Øyvind Ihlen, Jenny Lindholm, and Mark Blach-Ørsten. 

https://www.nordicom.gu.se/sv/publications/communicating-pandemic

April 21-22, 2023

ESCS / IPL – Politécnico de Lisboa

Deadline: January 31, 2023

Dear ECREA colleagues,

On behalf of the Informal Media Literacy Group (GILM), we are pleased to invite all ECREA members to send proposals to the Call for Papers of the 6th Congress of Literacy, Media and Citizenship, which will take place next  April 21 and 22,  at the School of Communication and Media Studies (ESCS), Lisbon, Portugal.

The VI Congress on Literacy, Media and Citizenship – Digital Transition and Public Policies, promoted by GILM, is an initiative that aims to deepen reflection and debate around public policies that have been adopted nationally and internationally in the current scenario of digital transition. Today media literacy assumes its place as one of the key literacies for empowering all citizens, without exception. It is undeniable that, particularly in the context of European Union countries, this recognition has been accelerated by the role that media literacy can play in the unavoidable fight against misinformation and false online narratives, as well as in the fight against hate speech, which is expanding in digital environments, phenomena that threaten the strength of democracy and the full exercise of citizenship.

The event, which will take place on April 21 and 22, 2023, at the School of Communication and Media Studies – ESCS / IPL – Politécnico de Lisboa, aims to be an opportunity for decision-makers (policy makers, regulators, managers and directors of media outlets), to meet teachers and other educators, specialists in information and documentation sciences, researchers and higher education students, journalists and other media professionals, cinema and audio-visual professionals and other stakeholders. The organization of the congress invites researchers, educators and teachers, non-governmental organizations, specialists, and communication professionals to present their papers or poster proposals, whether they are studies, papers or projects that may fit in one of the following topics:​

• Current strategies of national and international public policies for media literacy;
  
• Prospects for an integrated and comprehensive national strategy for media literacy;
  
• Impacts of technological developments in the current communication universe;
  
• Digital transition and media literacy;
  
• New challenges in media education;
  
• Change of communicational paradigm and new business models;
  
• Impacts of COVID and war on media and information literacy;
  
• New media literacy projects and resources;
  
• Accessibilities and inclusive perspectives in media literacy;
  
• New dynamics of algorithms and message robotization;
  
• Manipulation of information in disinformation campaigns.
  

In this context, we invite you all to take part in the next Congress and we would be very pleased to see many ECREA members enriching our Congress with knowledge, experience, and ability to reflect on such current and pertinent topics.

Send your proposal

Looking forward to welcoming you in Lisbon, please accept my best regards,

On behalf of GILM

Fernanda Bonacho

February 9, 2023

Online

The IAMCR Publications Committee will be hosting the first in a series of talks exploring the politics of knowledge and its dissemination.

When: 9 February 2023, at 14h00 UTC / 09h00 New York / 14h00 London / 15h00 Paris / 17h00 Nairobi / 19h30 Kolkata / 22h00 Beijing. The event will last 90 minutes.

Pre-registration is required by 23h59 UTC on 07 February 2023. //  Register here.

Moderator: Prof Claudia Padovani, IAMCR Publications Committee.

Speakers 

• Prof Lucy Montgomery, Professor of Knowledge Innovation, Curtin University, Australia

Lucy Montgomery is the co-lead of the Curtin Open Knowledge Initiative: a major strategic research project exploring how big data can help universities to understand their performance as Open Knowledge Institutions. 

• Dr Fereshteh Rafieian Najafabadi, Associate Programme Specialist, Science Technology and Innovation Policy, UNESCO. 
  

Location: The meeting will take place on Zoom. Attendees will receive their personal invitation at least 24 hours before the event begins.

Who can participate: The event is open to the general public, but space is limited. Pre-registration is required by 07 February 2023.  //  Register here.

About the series

This series of conversations, hosted by the IAMCR’s Publications Committee, will explore the possibilities of open access publishing, and ways of achieving greater diversity and inclusion in systems of knowledge generation and dissemination. Drawing on multiple perspectives from across the globe, the series seeks to discuss how we can achieve a genuinely participatory, multi-vocal epistemic landscape. This would foster a productive dialogue around knowledge exchange, co-creation, with an interest in understanding alternative epistemologies, methods, and pedagogies.

The series will have two strands: the first will look at the possibilities, potential and challenges of Open Access publishing, while the second will explore how communication and media studies can grow beyond dominant epistemologies.

May 25-26, 2023

University of Salford, UK

Deadline: March 24, 2023

Two-day conference at the University of Salford, UK (on campus)

The development of social housing estates after the Second World War in Europe initiated in many cities the radical transition of urban environments from 19th-century dwellings to modern housing. The plans and hopes of architects, planners, and city councils when developing modern infrastructure and housing not only focussed on elevating living standards; modern housing estates were also believed to support the development of ‘new communities’ within which pre- existing and widespread social problems would dissolve.

Such modern developments appear in the material and visual culture (film, TV, art, literature, newspapers, etc.) between the 1950s and 1960s whereby artists observed and commented on the transition of urban quarters from blackened, often decaying 19th-century houses to modern tower blocks. The lives and living conditions in the old and new working-class quarters interested artists, filmmakers, and writers as much as the aesthetics of modern urban quarters. Both provided the backgrounds for commentaries on changes in society and modernisation. Films such as Albert Finney’s Charlie Bubbles in 1968 or Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 A Clockwork Orange utilised the imagery of this transition and offered commentary on the effects and social consequences of modernisation. TV soap operas such as Coronation Street (1960 – ), that were part of the ‘kitchen sink drama movement’ in the UK, also addressed social housing and modernisation efforts. The literary work of J.G. Ballard (High Rise, 1975) and B.S. Johnson (The Moron Made City, 1966) react to urban modernisation satirically and critically. In the fine arts, the topic and its social consequences were addressed multifacetedly; photographs by artists such as Shirley Baker, UK and Albert Renger-Patzsch, Germany juxtapose social housing and its inhabitants who appear alienated from the modern environment they find themselves in. Representatives of Art Brut and Art Informel were inspired by non-traditional subject matter and art production that was perceived as more genuine. Artworks such as Jean Dubuffet’s Parages fréquentés (Busy Neighbourhood), 1979 observed the asphyxiating nature of urban spaces. Others considered emotional conflicts, society and its development after the Second World War. Yuri Pimenov, on the other hand, worked in the context of the Soviet Union (Wedding on tomorrow’s street, 1962) and depicted the modernisation of cities and social housing as a beacon of hope and evidence of the improving living conditions of the working class.

Proposals are welcome from scholars in fields such as art and architectural history, media studies, urban studies, cultural anthropology, consumer studies and gender studies.

We are inviting papers that investigate topics such as:

- Representations of the Working-Class in material and visual culture (film, TV, photography, painting, literature, etc.)

- Architectural design and social engineering: theories on the transformative power of architectural design on behaviours of residents

- Mid-20th century narratives and histories of slum clearance, overspill estates and rehousing

- Challenges in architecture and planning concerning the process of slum clearance, rehousing, planning, building, and occupying mid-20th century social housing estates

- Stigmatiser and stigmatised. The role of news media in the stigmatisation process of residents and territories

- The roles of media in affirming and solidifying reputations of social housing estates and their residents

- The role of city councils in redeveloping urban ‘slums’

- The exclusion and inclusion of ‘slum dwellers’ in the planning and redevelopment processes

- Slum clearance and the short and long-term impacts of being ‘rehoused’

- Effects of media representations on memories of lived experiences

- Representations of the working class in the fine arts

Members of the Conference Programme Committee are:

• Tanja Poppelreuter. Reader in Architectural Humanities (Conference Chair)
  
• Andrew Clark. Professor in Sociology
  
• Ursula Hurley. Professor in English & Creative Writing
  
• Alaric Searle. Professor of Modern European History, Politics & Contemporary History Seamus Simpson. Professor of Media Policy
  

Please submit a title and 300-word abstract by Friday, March 24th, 2023 to: themodernbackdrop@salford.ac.uk

Each abstract should include the name and affiliation of the author(s), have a title, and be 300- words.

Venue Information: The conference will take place on campus at the University of Salford and registration is free of charge.

Tanja Poppelreuter

Reader in Architectural Humanities, University of Salford themodernbackdrop@salford.ac.uk

This two-day conference is part of the research project ‘The Modern Backdrop: Memories of Salford’ and is funded by the Paul Mellon Centre. https://hub.salford.ac.uk/modern-salford/

Tuesday, 30 May 2023 | 8:30 - 17:00

Off-site: The Creative School Catalyst, Toronto Metropolitan University

Deadline: February 3, 2023

Co-Sponsored: Urban Communication Foundation (UCF) and Activism, Communication and Social Justice, Global Communication and Social Change, Ethnicity and Race in Communication, and Popular Media and Culture with support from the University of Michigan.

Organizers: Matthew Bui (U of Michigan), Myria Georgiou (London School of Economics), Germaine Halegoua (U of Michigan), Dave Colangelo (Toronto Metropolitan U), Sherry Yu (U of Toronto)

This preconference convenes scholars and practitioners interested in topics such as the mediated representation of urban (sub)communities; digital rights and inequalities; datafication; and communication and social change. Participants will reimagine the role of urban communication research and praxis in effecting more equitable, sustainable futures amid multiple convergent crises including housing, poverty, and climate change. Work foregrounding questions of power and inequality from local, global, and/or transnational lenses, underrepresented regions and communities is encouraged.

Registration Fee: $75.00 USD, registration will open in January, by invitation-only.

Call for Papers

This full-day post-conference will convene scholars and practitioners to discuss and reimagine the role of urban communication and urban technology research and praxis. Participants are invited to engage with urgent and emerging questions about power and inequality amid multiple convergent crises, including but not limited to housing, poverty, discrimination, and climate change. The event aims to create an open and collaborative environment for discussing themes and challenges related to urban communication but also opportunities to advance ethical and equitable futures for and through urban communication, technology design, and policy through scholarship and activism. Work foregrounding questions of power and inequality from local, global, and/or transnational lenses, underrepresented regions and communities is strongly encouraged. The post-conference is driven by a number of key questions:

• How are digital and data-driven technologies embroiled with various political, social, and economic campaigns for change within local, transnational, and global urban contexts?
  
• What is the role of grassroots movements in exploring and articulating novel and creative interventions for urban technology and urban communication? How are such campaigns enmeshed in ongoing sociocultural and political struggles for power?
  
• What are the ethical and practical considerations for how to engage with marginalized groups and communities around urban technology and data? How are (urban and digital) policy and design implicated in these issues?
  
• What are the connections between datafication and digitalization and the persistence of–and alleviation of–“wicked problems” (e.g., poverty, homelessness, climate change)?
  
• What issues and themes shape the sub-field of urban communication and urban technology now and in the future? How can current and emerging scholarship and praxis re-imagine urban communication, infrastructures, and exchanges?
  

The ICA post-conference welcomes interdisciplinary conversations and participants from fields such as media, information, and communication; science and technology studies (STS); urban planning and architecture, sociology, and the urban humanities, among others.

Please submit 300-word abstracts, including your name, affiliation, and 150-word bio to the link below by 20 January 2023. Notifications will be sent out by 10 February 2023. Registration will open in March 2023. Please contact organizers for inquiries regarding travel and registration stipends.

The post-conference is co-sponsored by the Urban Communication Foundation (UCF) and supported by the ICA Activism, Communication and Global Change interest group; Ethnicity and Race in Communication division; and Popular Media and Culture division (with further support from the University of Michigan).

All presenters will be considered for inclusion in a special issue or other publication or venue to be discussed among participants and organizers during the conference. Beyond these intellectual exchanges, we also hope to use the post-conference as a space for networking and mentorship for researchers from a variety of disciplines and career stages.

Submission Details

Abstract submission and short deadline: 3 February 2023

Submit abstracts, short bios, and travel assistance (or fee waiver) requests to this link: https://forms.gle/Z2u2B6RySEAg1929A

Inquiries of submission should contact Dr. Matthew Bui, U. of Michigan, mattbui@umich.edu, subject line “ICA 2023 Postconference”

CICANT (Lisbon, Portugal)

CICANT - Research Centre for Applied Communication, Culture and New Technologies is accepting applications for 6 doctoral research scholarships.

Description

Between January, 16th and the 30th of April (11.59  p.m. lisbon time) a call is open for 5 (five) national research grants and 1 (one) mixed research grant, hereinafter referred to respectively as National Doctoral Research Grant and Mixed Doctoral Research Grant, in the area of Media Arts and Communication Sciences under the FCT Research Grant Regulations (RBI) and the Research Grant Holder Statute (EBI). The grants will be funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) under the Collaboration Protocol for the Funding of Doctoral Research Fellowships within the European Universities Alliance for Film and Media Arts (FilmEU), signed between FCT and the Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias. The work to be carried out under the scope of the grants will be hosted by the R&D Unit - CICANT - Research Centre for Applied Communication, Culture and New Technologies (ref: 5260), at Lusófona University - Lisbon University Centre.

Deadline for applications

The call is open from January 16th to April 30th 2023 (23h59, Lisbon time). 

Submissions

Applications and supporting documents for the application set out in this call for applications must be submitted by email to cicant@ulusofona.pt , with the subject of the email being "candidatura a bolsa de doutoramento - COFAC/ULHT/FilmEU-FCT/2023". Each candidate may submit only one application, under penalty of cancellation of all applications submitted. The provision of false statements or plagiarism by the applicants will lead to the cancellation of the application without prejudice to the adoption of other sanctionary measures.

More information

For more details and to apply: https://cicant.ulusofona.pt/careers-opportunities/opportunities/808-open-call-for-6-research-fellowships-for-doctoral-students-filmeu

Please direct questions to: cicant@ulusofona.pt

May 25, 2023

Toronto (Canada)

Deadline: January 31, 2023

Pre-conference at the International Communication Association conference, Toronto, 25 May 2023 (Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel)

The deadline is 31 January, 2023. Accepted participants will be notified by 28 February 2023.

As editors of the journal Media, War and Conflict we propose that this is the ideal time to assess how new actors, technologies, and global power struggles have challenged the relationship between media and conflict in the 15 years since our first issue was published in April 2008. Disinformation and propaganda studies have moved into the sphere of mainstream media and politics, where extant research in the field of war and media has not always been acknowledged. Journalistic institutions face continued pressures on their authority as the leading interpreters of unfolding events, while reporters on-the-ground are threatened, jailed or murdered with apparent impunity. The images and videos captured on ever-present smart devices not only serve as ‘weapons’ in the legitimation of military and political actions, they also transform the aesthetic and moral understandings of war for observing citizens. Notions of ‘participative war’ (Merrin 2018) and ‘radical war’ (Ford and Hoskins 2022) proffer new characterizations of the current era, understanding digital connectivity as intertwined with the conduct of war and the precarity of security (human, food, climate, national, transnational). 

It is important to remember the human lives at the center of these broader technological and conceptual shifts, raising questions regarding how (dis)information mobilizes and impacts the communities involved. Human rights organizations and open source investigation teams employ forensic techniques with a diverse range of imaging and computational technologies to expose war crimes and advocate for those seeking justice (Ristovska 2021; Smith and Watson 2022). Documentaries and creative research methods can bring activists, filmmakers and scholars together to raise awareness and generate solidarity for those facing insecurity and violence. But whose voices are being mobilized in processes such as these, why and how? Ordinary people are also using new technologies in unprecedented ways, bringing to question the relationship between agency and power, and yet inequalities persist. We encourage critical questions about the inequalities of war including the gendered nature of war, intersections of body and space, and the limitations and discriminations for expressions of voice and visibility enabled by supposedly democratizing communication technologies. Does accessibility to diverse ‘voices’ and counter-narratives actually have any discernable impact on decision-making and accountability in war planning and conduct?

This pre-conference intentionally does not refer to specific wars or locations, and encourages research from regions that traditionally receive less scholarly and media attention.

The Media, War and Conflict journal has a thriving community of contributors, many of whom participated in a 5th anniversary conference in London, a 10th anniversary conference in Florence, and we would use this 15th anniversary conference in Toronto to expand this community by bringing in new and early career scholars. ICA 2023 will be a milestone in this continuing journey. 

Potential subjects for papers could include:

-The visual economy of war, photojournalism, and emergent digital visual cultures

-Mediated forensics (Smith and Watson 2022), open-source intelligence (OSINT), surveillant technologies, and crowdsourcing in the visualization of war

-Grassroots and alternative media challenges to official narratives of war and peace

-The gendered and/or ethnocentric nature of war reporting

-Frameworks for understanding the new ecologies of war: ‘everywhere war’ (Gregory 2011), ‘participative war’ (Merrin 2018), ‘radical war’ (Ford and Hoskins 2022)

-Disinformation, ‘fake news’ or falsified imagery in war and conflict situations

-How the climate crisis is associated with conflicts around the world in media discourse

-How media platforms (TikTok, Telegram) are reimagining the way citizens encounter war experiences

-Creative, narrative and visual methods in war and peace research

-Artistic, film, performance and practice projects

-Decolonizing the field of war and media

-Witnessing, ethics and spectatorship

-Memory, commemoration and archives

-Strategic narratives and legitimation of war/peace

-Media coverage of political violence, uprisings, riots and terrorism

-Reporting of military scandals, abuse, and war crimes

We intend this pre-conference to be a welcoming space to forge new interdisciplinary collaborations across visual communication, journalism studies, digital culture, international studies, and beyond. We are keen to hear about artistic, film, performance and practice projects in addition to news and social media studies, and encourage research on conflicts and political violence from regions that traditionally receive less scholarly and media attention.

Two types of in-person participation are invited:

• 10 minute paper or practice presentation: We are interested in scholarly and practice contributions that speak to the above themes. Prospective presenters should submit an abstract of up to 300 words. Submissions will be selected by the conference committee on the basis of originality and relevance to the conference theme, and to ensure a diversity of viewpoints and geographic origins. Presentation submissions are open to people at any stage of career. Due to time constraints, practice-based submissions should primarily be spoken presentations about the practice (with possible clips or images). We hope to further promote practice work through our associated preconference website.
  
• Poster presentation: PhD researchers and early career scholars are also invited to submit an abstract of up to 300 words for a poster presentation addressing the preconference themes. This can be ‘work in progress’. The poster session will allow for feedback from an assigned mentor and other pre-conference participants and organisers.

We will be prioritizing in-person participation but can look into remote options if needed.

Abstracts, indicating which type of participation is requested (paper or poster), should be emailed to the organisers at: k.j.parry@leeds.ac.uk . The deadline for receipt of abstracts is 31 January, 2023. Accepted participants will be notified by 28 February 2023. 

Five travel bursaries of up to $120 will be available to qualifying participants. Bursaries will be available for participants from Tier B and C countries and ECRs to encourage a diversity of experience and expertise. Priority will be given to those from Tier B and C countries, before ECRs from Tier A. The Media, War and Conflict Journal, and the ICA Visual Communication Studies Division sponsor these bursaries. Details of how to apply for a travel bursary will be provided to accepted poster or paper presenters upon notification of acceptance. Bursary recipients will have to pay for registration, and the bursary will act as a waiver retrospectively. If this causes any problems, we can discuss with recipients.   

Provisionally, all presentations will be considered for inclusion in a special anniversary issue of Media, War & Conflict.

Registration will be via the ICA website and will open in March 2023. Non-participating delegates will be accepted within the capacity limitations of the venue. Registration fee will be $120 to cover the two refreshment breaks and lunch provided by the on-site conference hotel.

Note: you do not have to be an ICA member to attend a pre-conference, nor do you need to register for the main conference. Attendees will need to create an ICA profile to register.

Organisers:

• Katy Parry, University of Leeds (lead contact: k.j.parry@leeds.ac.uk)
  
• Piotr Cieplak, University of Sussex
  
• Sarah Maltby, University of Sussex
  
• Dina Matar, SOAS, London
  
• Tanner Mirrlees, Ontario Tech University
  
• Ben O’Loughlin, Royal Holloway, London
  
• Holly Steel, University of Leeds
  

Sponsors: This pre-conference is sponsored by the Media, War & Conflict Journal (SAGE) and the ICA Visual Communication Studies Division. It is also affiliated with the ICA Journalism Studies division.

June 14-16, 2023

University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

Deadline (EXTENDED): January 31, 2023

Doing Women’s Film and Television History is back in 2023! Join us at the University of Sussex for the 6th edition of this leading international conference on women’s film and television history.

Confirmed Keynotes:

• Professor Sally Faulkner (University of Exeter)
  
• Professor Terri Francis (University of Miami)
  

The sixth edition of the conference, will foreground the history of the distribution, marketing and promotion of women's work and how this shapes its visibility, significance and impact on audiences and on the work of other women directors and producers. Our title references both the technologies of broadcast and digital distribution as well as evoking the flows between women’s work in different spaces, times and places. Our definition of ‘women’ is an inclusive one.

Starting with the festival-based events of the early 1970s – such as the first New York International Festival of Women’s Films, the Women’s Event at Edinburgh Film Festival, the Toronto Women and Film Festival, the Washington Women’s Film Festival, etc. – feminist filmmakers, scholars and critics have sought outlets for the production, distribution and exhibition of women’s work. Since then, initiatives and programmes that aim to foster women’s film and media production and showcase their work have spread more widely and more recent campaigns addressing the persisting gender inequalities within film and media industries around the world have been continuing this historical project of claiming space. We ask ‘How can these calls for a change in the structures that perpetuate the marginalisation and/or exclusion of women’s work from mainstream channels of cultural production, distribution and exhibition be informed by historical perspectives?’.

We are particularly interested in the work of female-identified and feminist programmers, commissioners, critics, distributors, festivals and archivists, exhibitors of various kinds in promoting and showcasing women's work and making it available in specific periods and to future generations. We also suggest some emphasis on the way changing technologies, platforms and channels have been used by women or impacted women's roles in production and distribution in cinema, television and media more generally and in historical comparisons of how this has happened at different moments.

This three-day conference welcomes a variety of international and intersectional perspectives relating to experiences and histories of working practices, and/or researching the work of women film/media practitioners and its circulation within and across cultural spaces.

Our call for papers is geared towards, but is not strictly limited to, historical perspectives on the following topics:

• Intergenerational and transnational dialogues between filmmakers and programme producers, past and present
  
• Archiving and preservation
  
• Distribution and exhibition including new technologies and their impact on national production economies and initiatives and on access for new and diverse producers and audiences.
  
• The impacts and limitations of gender/equality initiatives and projects past and present e.g., the F-rated campaign, ACTT/BECTU/BFI /Directors UK campaigns, class actions etc.
  
• Intersectional approaches/challenges to the visibility of/in women’s work (class, race, ethnicity, sex, sexuality, disability, etc.)
  
• The marketing and/or self-presentation of women directors, producers, actors and other personnel across time.
  
• Educational programmes, curricula and the dissemination of women’s work – challenging canons and creating counter-histories.
  
• Feminist filmmaking within and outside mainstream channels and currents.
  
• Lesbian, bisexual, queer and trans women’s activism in media production, distribution and exhibition.
  
• Intersectional ecofeminism and sustainability in film and media production, distribution and exhibition

Proposals for twenty-minute presentations must include the title of the presentation, a 250-word abstract and a brief biography of the author(s). Pre-constituted panels of three speakers may also be submitted, and should include a 250-word panel rationale statement, as well as individual abstracts.  We welcome practice-led contributions which address women’s histories in film, television and audio/visual media; for these please submit a 250-word description, running time, display requirements and links to a 5 minute excerpt and full work. If accepted, practice-led contributions may be presented as part of panels or as a limited number of separate sessions/screenings and/or made available to delegates online.

Please submit your proposals here: https://app.oxfordabstracts.com/stages/4473/submitter

Deadline for proposal submission (EXTENDED): 31 January 2023

Please note the conference will be in person with some opportunities for remote participation.

Conference enquiries: womensfilmtvhistoryconference@sussex.ac.uk