October 23-24, 2025

Vilnius, Lithuania, Sinemateka

Deadline: April 15, 2025

Conference organisers: The DIGISCREENS team (University of Bergen, Örebro University, University of Granada, Cinema and Media Research Center at Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre)

Selection committee: Jono Van Belle (Örebro University, Sweden), Angela Rivera (University of Granada, Spain), Lina Kaminskaitė-Jančorienė (Cinema and Media Research Center at Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre)

The rise of streaming platforms has changed the production, distribution and consumption of films and TV series. On the one hand, streaming platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV, or Max have increased the possibilities for viewers to watch content produced in a wide variety of national contexts. On the other hand, some policies, such as the European Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVSMD), have sought to level the market between domestic and transnational platform suppliers and protect the production of film and television in Europe (Lobato 2019; Kostovska et al. 2020). This competition to preserve the European audiovisual sector raises a number of questions about programming, content, and viewing habits as well as how audiences negotiate their identities in relation to what they watch.

The DIGISCREENS’ team invites participants to focus on how digital audiovisual platforms contribute to transform social and cultural dynamics in Europe in the era of streaming. This conference, concluding our project, aims to connect researchers working with films and TV series on streaming platforms from the perspective of policy, production and distribution, social and cultural values on screen or audience reception. We hope to bring together industry actors and academics to assess how the current audiovisual media landscape affects (a) the construction of identity and understanding of the other through global, yet culturally specific, mediations of gender, race, class, sexuality, and other social aspects, and (b) the negotiation of democratic values such as equality, inclusion, and solidarity.

We welcome submissions on (but not limited to):

* (trans)national audiovisual media policy;

* impact of audiovisual policy on global and national streaming platforms;

* audiovisual policy and negotiation of democratic values (equality, inclusion and solidarity);

* audiovisual policy and negotiation of identity (gender, race, class, sexuality, etc.) and diversity;

* the impact of global streaming platforms for European national film or TV industries;

* representation of diversity and identity (gender, race, class, sexuality, etc.) in films and TV series distributed on streaming platforms;

* audience viewing habits and streaming platforms;

* audience reception and representation of diversity and identity (gender, race, class, sexuality, etc.) in films and TV series;

* audience preferences choosing content;

* identities and diversity of audiences and streaming platforms;

* streaming and research methods;

* streaming audiovisual media and data.

The project DIGISCREENS is supported by The Research Council of Norway, Research Council of Lithuania, FORTE: Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare, la Agencia Nacional de Investigación del Ministerio de Ciencia e Investigación, under CHANSE ERA-NET Co-fund programme, which has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, under Grant Agreement no 101004509.

For more info about the DIGISCREENS project: https://www.uib.no/en/digiscreens

Send your an abstract (max 300 words) and a short bio digiscreens.conference@gmail.com before Tuesday 15th of April. Participants will be notified by the 15th of May.