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ECREA WEEKLY digest ARTICLES

  • 12.12.2019 16:00 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    May 15-16, 2020

    Goldsmiths, University of London

    Keynote speakers: Gary Younge (former editor-at-large of the Guardian and author of Another Day in the Death of America), Ghada Karmi (author of Return: A Palestinian Memoir), Alan Rusbridger (author of Breaking News and former editor-in-chief of the Guardian) and Mark Curtis (author of Secret Affairs and Dirty Wars)

    Opening panel: Friday, 15 May with Gary Younge, Bev Skeggs and Richard Seymour

    Main conference: Saturday, 16 May. Sessions include the Guardian's relationship to: empire and history; liberalism; Brexit and populism; foreign coverage; bias and balance; feminism; regulation and the state; and philanthropy and funding.

    Full programme coming soon.

    For more information, email goldsmithsleverhulmecentre@gmail.com or contact the conference organisers Des Freedman (d.freedman@gold.ac.uk) and Becky Gardiner (b.gardiner@gold.ac.uk)

    In May 2021, the Guardian turns 200. From its inception in Manchester in 1821 as a response to the murder of ordinary people by soldiers in the 1819 Peterloo Massacre to its historic identification with centre-left politics, the Guardian has long been a key institution in the definition and development of liberalism. The stereotype of the ‘Guardianista’, an environmentally conscious, Labour-voting, progressively minded public sector worker remains part of the popular mythology of British press history.

    Yet the title has a complex lineage.

    The Guardian advocated the abolition of slavery in the US, criticised the Boer War, backed women’s suffrage and supported the Republican cause in the Spanish civil war; it has published some of the most celebrated examples of investigative journalism – from the breaking of the phone hacking scandal to Edward Snowden’s revelations of US and UK surveillance programmes.

    Yet it owes its existence to a cotton merchant determined to head off more radical ideas at the start of the Industrial Revolution; it opposed direct action by the suffragette movement; has at various times called for a vote for the Conservatives, Social Democrats and Liberal Democrats; supported the First Gulf War and the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia; and has been accused more recently of consistently denigrating Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party. It has both fiercely defended the need for fearless, independent journalism and handed over documents and hard drives to the authorities; it has carved out a niche for itself in the UK press market as a progressive voice but has also consistently diminished more radical projects to the left.

    Its business model is equally distinctive. It has been owned by the Scott Trust since 1936 and has been partially protected from the proprietorial interference that its counterparts have always faced; it has led the way in innovative design and formats and it now champions a membership model with some one million people signed up to the scheme.

    Its forthcoming anniversary provides an opportunity for academics, researchers, historians and journalists to assess the contribution of the Guardian to British politics, society and culture through a major conference. We are looking for a range of contributions from more theoretical reflections on its foundational principles to empirical assessments of specific features of its coverage. In particular, we are looking for papers on:

    • Historical and theoretical accounts of liberalism
    • Issues of balance, bias and sourcing in Guardian journalism
    • Press power, partisanship and propaganda
    • The history of the Guardian with an emphasis on its founding in 1821
    • Its party political affiliations and election endorsements
    • Its reporting of women’s liberation and gender issues
    • Its coverage of race and empire
    • Foreign reporting with a particular interest in its coverage of UK military interventions
    • Its reporting of Israel and Palestine
    • Its business model: critiques of Trust ownership, Guardian membership and international expansion
    • Its commitment to investigative journalism
    • Newsroom culture and internal democracy
    • The shift from ‘hard news’ to comment and opinion
    • Philanthropic funding and branded content
    • The Guardian, surveillance and national security

    Selected papers will be invited to submit to an edited collection to be published in 2021 ahead of the Guardian’s anniversary.

    The conference is organised by the Goldsmiths Leverhulme Media Research Centre and will be held in the Professor Stuart Hall building at Goldsmiths, University of London in New Cross, South East London on Saturday 9 May 2020.

  • 12.12.2019 15:47 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    University of the West of England

    Deadline: January 27, 2020

    The University of the West of England are delighted to announce the availability of fully-funded Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) funded PhD studentships as part of the South, West & Wales 2 Doctoral Training Partnership (SWW2)*.

    UWE Bristol invites applications to undertake doctoral research that focuses on any area of:

    • Digital culture
    • Film and media
    • Design
    • Heritage
    • The creative economy

    As well as welcoming proposals relating to individual supervisors’ specialist expertise, we also encourage applications within these focus areas that relate to the research of one of the following four research centres:

    Each research centre has a track record of supervising interdisciplinary research projects and, in particular, practice-led research.

    *The South West and Wales 2 Doctoral Training Partnership is made up of ten institutions (Aberystwyth University, Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales, Bath Spa University, University of Bristol, Cardiff University, Cranfield University, University of Exeter, University of Reading, University of Southampton, and UWE Bristol), and funded by those institutions and by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the South, West and Wales Doctoral Training Partnership [https://www.sww-ahdtp.ac.uk/] offers opportunities to Arts and Humanities PhD students for cross-institutional supervision in both disciplinary and cross-disciplinary projects. Together with our multiple arts, heritage, cultural, and creative economy partners [https://www.sww-ahdtp.ac.uk/about/our-partners/non-hei-partners/], the SWW DTP2 aims to develop researchers who will be equipped for a wide range of careers through the acquisition of research-based, employability, entrepreneurial, and interpersonal skills that are vital to the 21st-century knowledge economy.

    The deadline for SWW2 applications is 27 January 2020.

    For full details of eligibility, funding and research supervision areas please visit the SWW DTP 2 webpage or the UWE SWW2 webpage

  • 12.12.2019 15:45 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    Simon Fraser University

    The School of Communication at Simon Fraser University invites applications from candidates for a tenure-track position at the rank of Assistant Professor in the area of Critical Algorithm Studies.

    Areas of research and teaching may include, but are not limited to, critical data studies; machine learning; socio-cultural informatics; social implications of data systems and infrastructures; algorithmic bias; content moderation; and/or platform studies. The successful candidate will foreground critical approaches, such as critical race studies; intersectional feminism; queer theory; trans studies; disability studies; post/colonial studies; Indigenous studies; science and technology studies; critical information studies; and/or socio-legal studies. We welcome candidates who use qualitative, quantitative, computational, digital methods, applied practices or a combination of approaches.

    Situated in the Faculty of Communication, Art and Technology, the School of Communication's research and teaching is internationally recognized. Grounded in a critical tradition of the study of communication we are developing new and diverse research and teaching strengths to reflect contemporary and emergent issues of media and communication. For further details, see: http://www.sfu.ca/communication.html

    The successful candidate will demonstrate potential for research funding and publication, for collaborative initiatives, and for working with students from diverse backgrounds. The candidate will be expected to teach and supervise students at all levels. Candidates are expected to have a completed Ph.D. (or near completion) in Communication, Media Studies, or a related discipline.

    All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadian citizens and permanent residents will be given priority.

    SFU is an equity employer and encourages applications from all qualified individuals including women, persons with disabilities, visible minorities, Indigenous Peoples, people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, and others who may contribute to the further diversification of the university.

    Candidates should submit:

    • A cover letter with indication of citizenship and/or residency status
    • A curriculum vitae
    • Research statement
    • Teaching dossier (examples of applied pedagogy are welcome)
    • One (1) sample of published work
    • Contact information for three referees. (Letters of reference may be requested at a later date.)

    All documents should be combined into a single PDF file with bookmarks.

    Please send applications directly to Brenda Baldwin, Director's Assistant, at cmnsdsec@ sfu.ca, addressed to:

    Dr. J. Marontate, Director School of Communication Simon Fraser University 8888 University Drive Burnaby, BC

    V5A 1S6

    Review of applications will begin on January 29, 2020 and continue until the position is filled. The start date for the successful candidate is expected to be July 1, 2020.

    Under the authority of the University Act, personal information that is required by the University for academic appointment competitions will be collected. For further details, please see: http://www.sfu.ca/vpacademic/faculty_openings/collection_notice.html

  • 12.12.2019 15:40 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    Simon Fraser University

    The School of Communication at Simon Fraser University invites applications from outstanding candidates for a tenure-track position at the rank of Assistant Professor in the area of Media, Communication, and Public Engagement.

    Specific areas may include, but are not limited to: social media; activism and social movements; popular culture; political communication and public opinion; advocacy; civic engagement; environmental and risk communication; global communication and social change; theories and philosophies of publics; visual communication; popular music; media storytelling; documentary and community media production and research.

    We welcome approaches that include but are not limited to intersectional feminisms, transcultural studies, decolonization and postcolonial studies, critical race, governance and policy, and indigenous studies. We are searching for candidates who address these or other issues using qualitative, quantitative, computational, digital methods as well as applied practices, or a combination of approaches.

    Situated in the Faculty of Communication, Art and Technology, the School of Communication is a national and global leader in the discipline. The School is a dynamic site of research and teaching. Our critical tradition to the study of communication includes approaches such as media and culture, technology studies, global communication, culture industries and policy, history of communication, and applied media production, among others. This position will build on the School's history of critical engagement while developing new directions to reflect contemporary and emergent issues of media and communication. We seek an innovative colleague who will challenge traditional distinctions between critical analysis and applied approaches.

    The successful candidate will have interdisciplinary and transnational/global links in their research program, demonstrated potential for research funding and publication, a track record for collaborative initiatives and experience working with students from diverse backgrounds. The candidate will be expected to teach and supervise students at all undergraduate and graduate levels and to work with partners inside and outside the University. Candidates are expected to have a completed Ph.D. (or Ph.D. near completion) in Communication, Media Studies, or a cognate discipline.

    All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadian citizens and permanent residents will be given priority.

    SFU is an equity employer and encourages applications from all qualified individuals including women, persons with disabilities, visible minorities, Indigenous Peoples, people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, and others who may contribute to the further diversification of the university.

    Candidates should submit:

    • A cover letter with indication of citizenship and/or residency status
    • A curriculum vitae
    • Research statement
    • Teaching dossier (examples of applied pedagogy are welcome)
    • One (1) sample of published work
    • Contact information for three referees. (Letters of reference may be requested at a later date.)

    All documents should be combined into a single PDF file with bookmarks.

    Please send applications directly to Brenda Baldwin, Director's Assistant, at cmnsdsec@sfu.ca, addressed to:

    Dr. J. Marontate, Director School of Communication Simon Fraser University 8888 University Drive Burnaby, BC

    V5A 1S6

    Review of applications will begin on January 29, 2020 and continue until the position is filled. The start date for the successful candidate is expected to be July 1, 2020.

    Under the authority of the University Act, personal information that is required by the University for academic appointment competitions will be collected.

    For further details, please see: http://www.sfu.ca/vpacademic/Faculty%20Openings/Collection%20Notice.html

  • 12.12.2019 15:39 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    Communicar Journal

    Deadline: December 30, 2019

    Thematic Editors

    • Dr. Antonio García-Jiménez, Rey Juan Carlos University (Spain)
    • Dr. Cristina Ponte, Nova University of Lisboa (Portugal)
    • Dr. Félix Ortega-Mohedano, University of Salamanca (Spain)

    Main Focus

    Children and adolescents are increasingly turning to mobile media devices and smart displays, the smartphone in particular –at home, at school or on the move– to stay connected with family and friends, for schooling activities and to access a variety of digital media contents and services, including social media, music, videos, and games. The everytime-and-everywhere-access to mobile media has changed children’s and adolescents’ everyday life with potential implications on their socialization, consumer patterns, schooling orientated behaviour, teaching and learning… among others. This monograph wants to address these issues both from a theoretical and methodological perspective.

    We welcome original articles and research results with strong theoretical and methodological approach on the following issues:

    • Role of mobile media in children and adolescents at school, and in everyday life.
    • Methodological challenges of research on mobile media and smart-screens
    • Teacher and parental mediation and monitoring of mobile media use.
    • Impact of mobile media on children’s and adolescents’ social development and consumer behaviour.
    • Mobile media and children’s and adolescents’ risks, threats and opportunities.
    • Mobile media contents and activities, cultural and educational consumption: games, video, music consumption, education, democracy, social interaction, marketing-publicity…, new phenomena or old habits in new screens.
    • Uses and consumption of mobile media at "school" at "home" or "on the move", filling the gap between children use of smartphones and tablets at school, is there one?
    • Regulation and protection of children in mobile media devices, apps, social networks, and gaming activities, marketing… and others.
    • Children´s approaches to opportunities, risks, safety, literacy, entertainment in smartscreens and other devices.

    This monograph aims to contribute to the analysis and discussion of the theoretical and practical aspects related to children-adolescent audiovisual consumption and its impact on education, teaching, media and socialisation in smart-screens and other devices.

    Descriptors

    • Parental and teacher competence in the implementation of smart screens.
    • Digital media literary in education.
    • Education, children, youth and mass media.
    • Media regulation and child protection-ethics.
    • Cibersecurity and child protection in Smartscreens.
    • Research and collaboration networks on Children Youth and Media.
    • Teaching innovation in Smartcreens.
    • Risks, threats, weaknesses and opportunities for children and adolescents in Internet and media.
    • Research results and country-regional cases on the indicated themes within this monograph.

    Questions

    Questions and reflections raised in this monograph in relation to the thematic lines are among others:

    • What do researchers and teachers understand by smart-screens and their point of view about the use of smartphones and tablets in their educative and communicative practice?
    • How are the risks, threats and opportunities of the Internet and smart-screens currently being evaluated with the different models and theoretical approaches? What problems does this diversity of approaches pose?
    • What models and how do they evaluate the digital competency of children and adolescents? Evaluating the usefulness in the current communicative and educational context? 
    • What indicators, scales and methodologies can we use to measure the digital competence of students, teachers and parents, as well as risks and opportunities? What tools and methodologies are necessary for this purpose?
    • What aspects not included in the traditional educational and communicative designs of the media would be necessary to incorporate and which are not present nowadays?
    • What challenges and opportunities do the transformation that the smart-screen present in the current contexts of teacher training capacitation?
    • What aspects are fundamental for the capacitation of teachers in education that have to do with the promotion of opportunities, but also preventing risks and fostering security and the protection of minors?
    • What aspects related to children and the media should be addressed for its potential influence and consequences in the future?

    Thematic Editors Profile

    Dr. Antonio García-Jiménez, Rey Juan Carlos University (Spain)

    Professor of Journalism at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (Spain). Ph.D. in Information Sciences from the Universidad Complutense (1996).He has held the position ofDean ofthe Faculty of Communication Sciences at the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos University (2008-14). Director of the Master in Communication and Sociocultural Problems (2015- 2018). His research and teaching interest are connected to “new media, society and Internet” and “information retrieval in media”. He has led and/or participated in more than 18 different competitive research projects, in particular related to cyberspace uses among adolescents and youth. Some of the recent projects are: “Social networks, adolescents and young people: media convergence and digital culture” (CSO2016-74980-C2-2-R) and “Program of Activities on Digital Vulnerability” (PROVULDIG). He has published more than 45 indexed papers, 24 contributions in the form of book or book chapters. Some of his recent research are: “An approach to the concept of a virtual border: identities and communication spaces” (2010); “Comunicación, infancia y juventud. Situación e investigación en España” (Communication, childhood and youth. Situation and research in Spain) (2012); “The influence of social networks in adolescents´ online practices” (2013); “Problematic Internet use among Spanish adolescents: The predictive role of Internet preference and family relationships” (2015); Adolescents and YouTube. Creation, participation and Consumption (2016); Teen videos on YouTube: Features and digital vulnerabilities(2018) among others.

    E-mail: antonio.garcia@urjc.es ResearchGate: https://bit.ly/2TecSpP Google Scholar: https://bit.ly/2BPY9Ys

    Dr. Cristina Ponte, Nova University of Lisboa (Portugal)

    Associate Professor with Habilitation in Media and Journalism Studies (2011), she holds a PhD in Communication (2002). Currently she is Executive Coordinator of the Department of Communication at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa (NOVA FCSH), Portugal. She has a wide experience on leading international and large teams of researchers: she was member of the Steering Group in the COST Action IS0906, Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies (2010-14), in which she coordinated the Working Group ‘Audience Transformation and Social Integration’ (40+ participants from 17 countries); she has been responsible for Dissemination and Global Cooperation in the EU Kids Online network, in which she has contributed to the Latin American Kids Online. She led two funded projects - Children and Young People in the News (2005-07) and Digital Inclusion and Participation (2009-11), the later with the University of Texas at Austin - both involving interdisciplinary teams of more than 10 senior and junior researchers. She was vice-chair of the Audience and Reception Section (2008-12) and of the Temporary Working Group of Children, Youth and Media, at ECREA. Among her main interests are media and family generations with a focus on children and media, from representations to children’s practices. She has published extensively on children and media and on training students as young researchers. Recently, she coordinated the first Portuguese representative study on screens in the life of young children, Growing up among screens, funded by the Portuguese Authority for Communication (ERC, 2017). She is member of the Editorial Board ofseveral journals, among them the Journal of Children and Media (JOCAM). Among her most recent publications is the co-edited book Digital Parenting. The Challenges for Families in the Digital Age (Nordicom, 2018) and the co-authored chapter ‘Parental Practices in the era of smartphones’, in Smartphone Cultures, edited by Jane Vincent and Leslie Haddon (Routledge, 2018).

    E-mail: cristina.ponte@fcsh.unl.pt ResearchGate: Google Scholar: ttps://bit.ly/2Xm0hAh

    Dr. Félix Ortega-Mohedano, University of Salamanca (Spain)

    Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology and Communication at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Universidad de Salamanca, Spain. Director of the Master in Communication: Research and Innovation, since 2017 to present, mucaii.usal.es, Academic Secretary of the IUCE, University Institute for Research in Educational Sciences from 2008 to the present (http://iuce.usal.es). He holds a Phd. in Communication, Culture and Education, (2006), member of the Observatory of Audiovisual Content (OCA), Research Group of Excellence (GIE-GR319) (www.ocausal.es). He has participated in 17 competitive research projects internationally, nationally and regionally. He has been principal investigator at COST Action IS1004 Individuals, Societies, Cultures and Health Web-based data-collection - methodological challenges, solutions and implementations (Webdatanet). He has published more than 25 indexed papers, 20 contributions in the form of book or book chapters. Some of his recent works are: “Audiences in revolution. Use and consumption of mass media groups´ for tablets and smartphones” (2015, RLCS). “Communication studiesresearchwithinSpanishuniversitiesspanning the years 2007 to 2014” (2017, EPI), “Cultural industries and character composition in children´s animated television series broadcast in Spain” (2018, RLCS) “Communication research in Spain: Weaknesses, threats, strengths and oppotunities” (2018, Comunicar); “The Invisibility of Latin American Scholarship in European Media and Communication Studies: Challenges and Opportunities of De-Westernization and Academic Cosmolitanism” (2019, International Journal of Communication) among others.

    E-mail: fortega@usal.es ResearchGate: https://bit.ly/2tBtwRT Google Scholar: https://bit.ly/2GMNKki

    Instructions and proposals

    Editorial Guidelines: http://www.revistacomunicar.com/index.php?contenido=normas&idioma

    Contributions to the Special Issue should be submitted through the OJS platform: https://revistacomunicar.com/ojs

    Deadlines

    Starting date for proposal articles: 2019-06-01

    Deadline for proposal articles: 2019-12-30

    Publishing dates:

    Preprint version: 2020-05-15 / Print version: 2020-07-01

    Journal website: http://www.revistacomunicar.com

  • 12.12.2019 15:33 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    The AHRC-funded Midlands4Cities Doctoral Training Partnership (M4C) in England brings together eight leading universities across the Midlands to support the professional and personal development of the next generation of arts and humanities doctoral researchers. M4C is a collaboration between the University of Birmingham, Birmingham City University, University of Warwick, Coventry University, University of Leicester, De Montfort University, Nottingham Trent University and The University of Nottingham.

    M4C is awarding up to 94 doctoral studentships for UK/EU applicants for 2020 through an open competition and 15 Collaborative Doctoral Awards (CDA) through a linked competition with a range of partner organisations in the cultural, creative and heritage sector.

    The Birmingham School of Media at Birmingham City University in collaboration with the University of Nottingham and the Media Archive for Central England is inviting applications to a CDA titled The Political Economy of Screen Archives: Innovation, Sustainability and the Value of Screen Heritage.

    This research project is concerned with the archival institution and questions of cultural value and sustainability. It is grounded in theoretical, historical and practical interest in the film and television archive – a subject rarely touched upon in contemporary accounts of policy (e.g. Doyle,2015). The researcher will aim to identify meaningful solutions in policy and practice for preservation and sustainability in the sector. Based at MACE yet outside of the everyday determinants and demands on the space of its personnel, the doctoral student will pursue lines of enquiry and provide a model of reflexive research and development in order to produce impactful insights for policymakers, intermediaries as well as those who make use of film and television repositories.

    The doctoral researcher will thus devise a project that addresses, extends and adapts the following indicative research questions that seek to direct the research:

    • What is the cultural value and purpose of a publicly funded film archive?
    • What is the role of the archivist in meeting contemporary policy expectations, securing funding and managing the business of the archive?
    • How might the proposed research understand tensions and trade-offs between the ideals and ambitions of professional cultural workers and the pressures of economic expediency in order to assess and model new opportunities for institutional identities and sustainability in the screen archive?

    The research will examine the nature of past and current film archive policy, of its promises, expectations and obligations for the sector, paying particular attention to the relationship between national and regional priorities. It will explore financing for the sector – of the rationale and mechanics in how funding is apportioned and income generated – and will explore specific case studies at MACE that enable an examination of business models and ideas for innovation. It will also work with concepts of cultural labour, expertise and value in assessing the role of the archivist and indeed, the constitution of user-audiences.

    The doctoral researcher will engage with archivists and practices across the sector. The research project will be empirically focussed on the role of MACE as a regional screen archive, and engage with its partners as part of a wider landscape through its relationship with BFI and national policy objectives alongside the role of MACE’s Director as Chair of the national representative organisation for the sector, Film Archives UK. Research will commence in September 2020. It is envisaged that the researcher will be on site at MACE for up to 50% of the four years of study with the opportunity for activity articulated in blocks as month-long work placements and/or on a day/week basis. Research methods will include policy analysis, organisational ethnography, interviews with cultural workers and audiences. There is potential for practice-based work and innovation will take place in the approach to secondary research in scoping out and synthesising grey literature, archival theory and current work across several disciplinary fields that is concerned with cultural organisations, policy and economics.

    To find out more:

    Go to the Midlands4Cities website.

    Contact Dr Oliver Carter: oliver.carter@bcu.ac.uk

  • 05.12.2019 22:46 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    HALAC

    Deadline: May 30, 2020

    Editors:

    • Ayelen Dichdji (CONICET/CEAR-UNQ, Argentina)
    • Nataša Simeunović Bajić (Faculty of Philosophy, University of Niš, Serbia)
    • Rosalind Donald (Columbia University, United States)
    • Márcia Franz Amaral (UFSM - Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Brasil)
    Submit here: https://www.halacsolcha.org/index.php/halac/announcement/view/14

    Proposal

    The main attribute that transforms environmental history into a multidisciplinary field capable of successfully integrating nature into human history is its variety of approaches. This attribute enables a re-reading of environmental imbalances in a historic light. Environmental research as an object of historical study is still in development, and the transformations produced over time through man’s interactions with nature determine, in part, the growing socio-environmental conflicts linked to the exploitation of the natural resources.

    On the other hand, today the world faces major environmental problems as the result of social, demographic, political and economic factors. Climate change, lack of safe water, and air pollution are among major environmental problems. Due to the great technological progress and increased use of ecological resources, the human population is responsible for both present and future generations in terms of sustainable development. Environmental crises are certainly consequences of inadequate management of the environment. However, its deepest root could be seen in the anthropocentrism that in the long historical period fully objectified nature. Very correctly and at the beginning of the new millennium, Plumwood states that a "radical discontinuity" was made between the active subject, human being, and passive object, i.e. nature (Plumwood, 2002). This particularly applies to Western culture and its technological progress, which is moving towards growing nature destruction. The consequences are evident in the unevenresource exploitation in developed and underdeveloped countries. When taking into account the ecological footprint, there are many countries with biocapacity deficit like Singapore, Barbados, Israel, UAE etc. (Global Footprint Network, 2019) Ecological footprint reports indicate that the human population on Earth is living above the capacity of its planet. According to the WWF Living Planet Report of 2018, humanity's ecological footprint has increased by about 190% over the past 50 years (WWF, 2018).

    The current ecological situation at the global level shows the non-harmonized interaction between man and nature. One of the most important measures for establishing a more humane interaction with nature is the raising of environmental awareness. Sustainable development is not possible without the existence of environmental awareness among all subjects concerning nature-society-culture ties. And this can not be achieved without adequate environmental communication. Environmental awareness implies knowledge of the preservation of the natural environment, values ​​that affirm the healthy natural environment and citizens' right to a healthy life. However, the development of this kind of awareness depends on many factors and we should take into account the specificities of a particular social context and the achievements of environmental journalism. In the modern world, if we exclude environmental experts, citizens' knowledge of climate change and the protection of the environment is most often based on personal experience and information provided by media. But in this area, we also can perceivemedia hegemony that is not recognized in the statement what to think about, but rather in articulation what not to think about (Katz, 1987). Therefore, it often happens that it is impossible to establish a public debate on issues that are not presented in the media because we do not have to think about them. The importance of some other issues (about which we have the illusion of choosing what is important and what is irrelevant) is emphasized permanently.

    The media constitute an inexorable reference in establishing a public agenda in which citizens make political, economic and environmental decisions based on the information they receive. As a consequence, the media’s behavior is not just a minor detailing the creation of environmental awareness. The media have a great social responsibility in selecting which topics to cover and how to cover them. In this sense, the social perception of environmental problems comes into play, a perception that, for Garcia (2011), is comprised of three dimensions: concern, which is understood as the degree of consideration that society gives to environmental problems; willingness to act, which involves the determined attitudes that citizens take based upon the information they have about environmental issues; and meaning, which is the association of environmental protection with other values ​​(p.276). These three dimensions must be taken into account when developing an analysis of environmental problems or conflicts, especially when studying how they have been addressed by the media. Consequently, these dimensions will be present in society to greater or lesser degrees, depending on the amount of information a given society has received, the issue’s media presence, the direct or indirect impact that it has on citizens’ daily lives, the level of uncertainty it brings, etc. (García, 2011). There is no doubt that environmental emergencies, disasters, problems and conflicts are newsworthy, and, therefore, have their place in the media. Consequently, media outlets have the responsibility to do reporting that is serious, ethical and scientific in order to transcend the sensation of alarm, and that is also in-depth in order to give account of the context and background of each particular case, without omitting the obligations of the social actors involved.

    If we look at the global social context, environmental awareness can not be fully developed unless environmental topics are largely represented in media reporting and if environmental communication is not at an enviable level. It is the basis for forming the public and directing its attention to the most important environmental problems. Therefore, it is very important to investigate the complex and contemporary media conditions, whether there are similarities between countries and how much environmental communication promotes public debate about the consequences of climate change.

    Taking this into account, our proposed for this special number are sought to contribute to the study of cultural representations of the environment. Our proposed considers media outlets to be bearers of symbolic power and sources of historical information about social and environmental dynamics, as well as the cultural repercussions that these dynamics have had in the recent past. Thus, our research proposal is based on a holistic and multidisciplinary approach that interconnects several disciplines, such as: environmental history and environmental communications.

    Reference:

    García, E. (2011). Medio ambiente y sociedad: la civilización industrial y los límites del planeta. Madrid: Alianza Ensayo

    Global Footprint Network(2019), available at https://data.footprintnetwork.org/#/

    Katz, E. (1987). Communication research since Lazarsfeld. Public Opinion Quarterly, 51, 525–545.

    Plumwood, V. (2002). Environmental Culture: The Ecological Crisis of Reason. New York: Routledge.

    WWF. (2018). Living Planet Report - 2018: Aiming Higher.

    Grooten, M. and Almond, R.E.A.(Eds). WWF, Gland, Switzerland.

  • 05.12.2019 22:41 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    European Journal of Healt Communication

    Deadline: March 31, 2020

    Guest Editors: Sarah Geber, Tobias Frey, and Thomas Friemel

    Health and health-related behaviours are embedded in social contexts in various ways, which comprise both risks and opportunities for individual’s health (Sallis & Owen, 2015). Communicable (i.e., infectious) diseases, such as HIV or influenza, are spread through social contacts between persons (e.g., Rothenberg et al., 1998), and unfavorable health behaviours might be reinforced in one's social network (Valente, 2010). On the other hand, social support can ease the coping with diseases in everyday life (e.g., depression; Peirce, Frone, Russell, Cooper, & Mudar, 2000), and social norms may promote favorable health behaviours (e.g., eating healthily; Mollen, Rimal, Ruiter, & Kok, 2013). In the course of the digitalisation, new platforms have emerged that intensify known social processes or enable new ones. On social networking sites, people can directly observe health-related behaviours and thus norms of relevant others (e.g., Beullens & Vandenbosch, 2016); apps allow users to track their health behaviours and share their obtained health goals (e.g., Kristensen & Ruckenstein, 2018); and various online forums provide platforms for exchanging experiences and support regarding specific health issues (e.g., Barak, Boniel-Nissim, & Suler, 2008). Since these social processes unfold their effects through communication, they deserve special attention by health communication scholars to maintain and improve individual and public health.

    The special issue aims to address the complexity of individuals’ social contexts and the full breadth of communication — ranging from interpersonal communication to mass media, online to offline, intended to unintended etc. It therefore calls for papers analyzing the interrelations between social aspects, different forms of health-related communication, and health at the individual, interpersonal, and societal level. Submissions can address but are not limited to the following questions and concepts.

    Individual level:

    Which health behaviours are especially susceptible to social influence (e.g., private vs. public health behaviour) and what role do different means of communication play in these contexts?

    How are individual social-related characteristics, such as traits (e.g., need to belong), cognitions (e.g., perceived norms), and motives (e.g., need for social integration) associated with health behaviour and health-related communication?

    How are media messages elaborated that address social aspects of health behaviour (e.g., social frames)?

    Interpersonal level:

    Which relevance do different settings have for health communication (e.g., family, colleagues, self-help groups)?

    Which role do different actors (e.g., doctors, patients, bystanders) and social roles (e.g., opinion leaders, influencers, followers) play in the context of health communication?

    How does health-related interpersonal communication differ depending on the channel and platform (e.g. face-to-face vs. mediated)?

    Societal level:

    Which sociocultural aspects (e.g., collectivistic vs. individualistic societies) and characteristics of the media system are relevant regarding health and health communication?

    What kind of divides related to health communication exist in societies and what are their consequences (e.g., digital divides)?

    How can societal inequalities and health-related stigmatization be addressed by health communication and what guidelines are helpful for journalists to ease these issues?

    The special issue calls for basic research describing and explaining these aspects but also refers to applied research seeking to solve practical health communication issues. It is interested in theories, methods, and study designs that allow studying social aspects of health communication at different levels as well as the integration of various levels within a single approach.

    Submission format

    We welcome submissions that fit any of the EJHC formats: original research papers, theoretical papers, methodological papers, review articles, brief research reports. For further information on the article types, please see www.ejhc.org/about/submissions.

    Manuscript should be prepared in accordance with the EJHC author guidelines (http://www.ejhc.org/about/submissions) and be submitted via the journal website (www.ejhc.org).

    Deadline for submission is 31 March 2020.

    Review process

    All articles will undergo a rigorous peer review process. Once the paper has been assessed as appropriate by the editorial management team (with regard to form, content, and quality), it will be peer-reviewed by at least two reviewers in a double-blind review process, meaning that reviewers are not disclosed to authors, and authors are not disclosed to reviewers. To ensure short publication processes, EJHC releases articles online on a rolling basis, expected to start in December 2020.

    Contact guest editors

    • Sarah Geber, University of Zurich, s.geber@ikmz.uzh.ch
    • Tobias Frey, University of Zurich, t.frey@ikmz.uzh.ch
    • Thomas N. Friemel, University of Zurich, th.friemel@ikmz.uzh.ch

    References

    Barak, A., Boniel-Nissim, M., & Suler, J. (2008). Fostering empowerment in online support groups. Computers in Human Behavior, 24, 1867–1883. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2008.02.004

    Beullens, K., & Vandenbosch, L. (2016). A conditional process analysis on the relationship between the use of social networking sites, attitudes, peer norms, and adolescents' intentions to consume alcohol. Media Psychology, 19, 310–333. https://doi.org/10.1080/15213269.2015.1049275

    Kristensen, D. B., & Ruckenstein, M. (2018). Co-evolving with self-tracking technologies. New Media & Society, 20, 3624–3640. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444818755650

    Mollen, S., Rimal, R. N., Ruiter, R. A. C., & Kok, G. (2013). Healthy and unhealthy social norms and food selection. Findings from a field-experiment. Appetite, 65, 83–89. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2013.01.020

    Peirce, R. S., Frone, M. R., Russell, M., Cooper, M. L., & Mudar, P. (2000). A longitudinal model of social contact, social support, depression, and alcohol use. Health Psychology, 19, 28–38. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-6133.19.1.28

    Rothenberg, R. B., Potterat, J. J., Woodhouse, D. E., Muth, S. Q., Darrow, W. W., & Klovdahl, A. S. (1998). Social network dynamics and HIV transmission. AIDS, 12, 1529–1536. https://doi.org/10.1097/00002030-199812000-00016

    Sallis, J. F., & Owen, N. (2015). Ecological models of health behavior. In K. Glanz, B. K. Rimer, & K. Viswanath (Eds.), Health behavior: Theory, research, and practice (5th ed., pp. 43–64). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

    Valente, T. W. (2010). Social Networks and Health: Models, Methods, and Applications. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.

  • 05.12.2019 22:38 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    June 15-16, 2020

    Rome (Italy)

    Deadline: February 15, 2020

    It is our great pleasure to invite you to the two-day International Conference “What People Leave Behind: Marks, Traces, Footprints and their Significance for Social Sciences” that will be hosted by the Department of Communication and Social Research and the Ph.D. Program in Communication, Social Research and Marketing – Sapienza University of Rome on June 15-16, 2020.

    The conference focuses on a significant theme in the social sciences: the concepts of “footprint” and “trace”. Usually associated with the digital world, the very idea of footprints clearly gives the image of what one leaves behind without being aware of it. Trace-like information, i.e. information that was not meant to be informative, is much sought after, and this is particularly true in the age of digital capitalism.

    Partners of the Conference: Italian Association of Sociology; Sociology, Culture, Communication – Italian Scientific Society; Italian Association of Semiotic Studies; ESARN20 Qualitative methods; ESARN21 Quantitative methods.

    Call for panels and papers

    The purpose of the conference is to encourage inter- and cross-disciplinary fields of research, with particular attention to sociology, communication studies, data science, anthropology, computational social science, history, semiotics, media and Internet studies.

    When submitting paper presentations, the following information is required:

    • Title;
    • Abstract (500 words maximum);
    • Author’s name, affiliations, appointment and email address;
    • 5 keywords.

    The conference is also open to a small number of proposals for pre-constituted panels: panel conveners are invited to suggest a two-hour themed panel of five/six speakers. All panel submissions should be gender balanced and include authors from at least two different countries. When submitting panel proposals, the following information is required:

    • Panel chair’s name, affiliations, appointment and email address;
    • Title of the panel;
    • Abstract of the panel (300 words maximum);
    • Paper titles and short abstracts (200 words maximum), with authors’ names, affiliations and appointments for each paper.

    Panels and papers proposals should be sent to wplb2020.coris@uniroma1.it

    For more information please visit the conference website: https://web.uniroma1.it/whatpeopleleavebehind/

  • 05.12.2019 22:34 | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    June 11-12, 2020

    Liverpool (UK)

    Deadline: January 20, 2020

    This conference aims to forge interdisciplinary links between those working in Television and Media Studies, Modern Languages and Gender Studies. Television and media research is changing, the rapid evolution of this medium has been theorised in terms of the technological advances that changing modes of distribution bring, its textual, narrative and aesthetic developments, and its role as a mediator of cultural identity. Scholarship in this area has produced prolific studies of US and, to a lesser degree, UK television to exemplify the ways in which constructions of gender are mediated through different televisual formats and genres. This conference will refocus this research through analysis of television made beyond these English-speaking territories and consider the important work being done in Modern Languages to understand and analyse the ways in which transcultural and transnational mediations of gender are made visible, produced and understood through popular television.

    This conference aims to explore this cultural specificity that will provide an important intervention into Gender Studies and Cultural Studies more broadly, as it works at the interface of Area Studies and these other disciplines. As a response to a global political landscape, in which power and gender have been brought into sharp focus, it will examine the way in which these structures of power play out in these ‘other’ television cultures. We will consider television as a key cultural mediator in the transcultural understanding of gender and a significant interlocutor in social change. If we consider TV one of the most influential agents of value construction, then TV shows can be considered a powerful tool to guide viewers through the moral climate of their time, attesting to a collective process of working through social issues.

    Themes and research questions may include but should not be limited to:

    • How is gender made visible on television?
    • How are gendered subjectivities negotiated in different TV genres?
    • How are gendered subjectivities framed by the format of the TV genre?
    • To what extent is character engagement dependent on genre, hybridisation or actors?
    • How do critics deal with gender on TV? What other extra textual discourses contribute to the production of meanings surrounding gender on television?
    • To what extent is the continued application of Anglophone theory in a non-Anglophone context useful?
    • Can the analysis of the geo-specific productions contribute to the theorisation of the media representation of gender?
    • How does the reception of international productions compare to that of indigenous television?
    • How has the transmedial configuration of television altered the ways in which configurations of gender and nationality are understood?
    • How have streaming platforms changed the ways in which gender is mediated transnationally?

    Confirmed keynote speakers:

    • Professor Milly Buonanno, La Sapienza University, Rome
    • Professor Aniko Imre, Prof of Cinema & Media Studies, University of Southern California

    Organisers:

    • Dr Anja Louis, Reader in Cultural and Intercultural Studies, Languages and Cultures, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield S1 1WB
    • Dr Abigail Loxham, Senior Lecturer in Hispanic Film, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, L69 3BX

    Conference Formats:

    • Individual papers: Oral presentations on original research by one or more authors.
    • Full panels: Three thematically connected papers on original research by several authors.
    • Posters: A0-size academic posters, which will be displayed during a dedicated poster session. A digital version of the poster must be sent via email 72 hours prior to the conference and submitted physically to the registration desk on the morning of the conference.

    All papers consist of a 20-minute presentation by the author(s), with an extra 10-minute slot allocated for discussion at the end. Proposals for papers should include an abstract under 350 words and a bio of no more than 100 words. Panel proposals for three or four paper panels should combine the abstracts and bios of speakers in one document, and should also include a short rationale and panel title. Poster proposals should include an abstract of no more than 250 words and a 100-words speaker bio. All proposals should be submitted to the organisers: a.louis@shu.ac.uk and abigail.loxham@liverpool.ac.uk

    The deadline for proposals is 20 January 2020. Accepted papers will be notified by 15 February 2020. Selected papers will be invited to submit for a peer-reviewed volume.

    Registration fees: £100 | Concessionary rate (postgraduates): £60

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