Call for Papers: Communication Policy and Technology section
(CPT)
International Association for Media and Communication
Research (IAMCR)
Academic Conference, July 12-16, 2015, Montreal (Canada)
Hegemony or Resistance? On the Ambiguous Power of
Communication
The Communication Policy and Technology (CPT) Section of the
International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR) invites
submissions for the IAMCR 2014 conference to be held from July 12-16, 2015 in
Montreal (Canada). The deadline for submissions of abstracts for papers and
panel proposals is February 9, 2015.
The conference will be held under the general theme:
Hegemony or Resistance? On the Ambiguous Power of Communication. The latter
seeks to explore the ambiguous relationship of communication towards hegemony
and resistance. This ambiguity has prompted debates in academia about communication
being at the same time a value and a tool, a space of consent and one of
struggle, and having (more authentic) local and global dimensions. Many recent
events have triggered discussions and reflections about the utopia of
communication. However while multiple sites of resistance are spreading around
the world, much of the debates about communication technologies mark an
increasing suspicion towards the new media’s capability for empowerment. In
addition political reform promises, as well as the social, economic and
cultural prominence of new technologies seem to contribute to the maintenance
of a negotiated status quo, related to Gramsci’s notion of hegemonic domination
by consent.
Giving the central role of technology in these developments,
the theme closely links to the remit of the Communication Policy and Technology
section. Therefore we invite abstracts that take an interdisciplinary
perspective at how the empowerment and disempowerment of
users/citizens/consumers are configured by the co-evolution of (disruptive)
media technologies on the one hand and social, cultural, economic, and
political forces on the other hand. In what way can we identify paths for
exerting ‘democratic rationalisation’, defined – by Andrew Feenberg – as user
interventions that challenge undemocratic power structures rooted in modern
technology? Or are we entering a ‘post-hegemonic age’ – as defined by Scott
Lash – based on algorithmic power and datafication? Answers on these and
related questions can be found in media and communication studies, but also in
associated fields of science and technology studies (STS), computer science
(privacy, security, requirement engineering, etc.) and digital humanities
(software studies, platform studies, critical code studies, etc.). The question
is then to what extent and how researchers and civil society in these
disciplines can formulate answers to strengthen user empowerment and to
mitigate disempowerment on the levels of access, media literacy, privacy,
publicness and surveillance in the age of social, mobile and ubiquitous media.
The CPT section therefore invites submissions that
critically engage with these issues. In addition we welcome papers and panel
proposals addressing the following more particular themes that fit in the general
call for papers and are relevant to the section. They are organised by a focus
on governance, practices, and technologies:
1. Policies and governance
- Governance, control and (liquid) surveillance through technological infrastructures and algorithms
- Critical perspectives on big data, datafication, cloud computing, including ecological issues
- Social, economic and legal issues related to (new) regulatory initiatives in different regions of the world, on privacy, surveillance, and data protection
- Struggles over and issues related to anonymity and the dark net
- Public values, public sphere and the sharing economy
- Copyright issues and the commodification of culture
- Convergence and/or deconvergence of corporate strategies and value networks (platformisation)
- New intermediaries, community and user management, and cross cultural issues
2. Practices
- Domestication revisited, in a media-saturated private and professional sphere
- Tactics and strategies of resistance and protest in technology design and use (end-user programming, cheating, counterplay, hacking, hackathons communities of practice, etc.)
- Consumer/citizen awareness, attitudes, capabilities and practices towards privacy, surveillance and the commodification of personal data in digital marketing techniques
- Reconfiguring media literacy, digital literacy, digital inequalities and divides in online/offline social contexts
- Critical perspectives on labour in social, mobile and ubiquitous media (free labour, immaterial labour, emotional labour, prosumer, gendered structures, cultures of communication work, etc.)
- Ethics and data
3. Technologies
- Critical perspectives on social media and technology design, in particularly related to privacy and surveillance (e.g. PETs - Privacy Enhancing Technologies, Privacy Feedback and Awareness Tools)
- Creativity, transparency, privacy and control through social, local and mobile technologies, autonomous systems and ubiquitous computing (e.g. RFID, sensors, etc.)
- Interdisciplinary analyses of technologies for data inference, profiling, recommendations, and prediction of user behaviour (predictive analytics)
- Datafication of digital broadcasting (television and radio)
- Switch from analogue to digital radio and its consequences for community/local radio
- Assessing socio-technical ‘by design’ perspectives (privacy by design, data protection by design, fundamental rights protection by design, surveillance by design, etc.)
The CPT Section will also look for opportunities for hosting
joint sessions with other sections and working groups.
Submission information
The CPT section welcomes proposals for papers bearing on the
above or related issues by submitting an abstract. Abstracts should contain
title, main question or research problem, theoretical framework, method(s)
used, and – if applicable – (expected) empirical outcomes. Submitted abstracts
will be evaluated by a double blind review on the basis of: (1) theoretical contribution,
(2) methods, (3) quality of writing, (4) literature review, (5) relevance of
the submission to the work of the CPT section, and (6) originality and/or
significance of the work.
The scholarly presentation of accepted submissions can take
place in two types of sessions: paper presentation sessions (i.e. 4-5
presenters each with 12-15 minutes, requiring full paper submitted on time) and
high intensity sessions (i.e. 6-8 presenters each with 5-7 minutes).
Proposals for panels of 90 minutes are also welcome. A
complete CPT panel proposal must have 4 to 5 papers and include:
- The panel description text, including, the panel title, a framing text, the names of the panelists and the titles of their papers. The framing text (maximum 350 words) should contain the overall idea and goal of the panel, and how it responds to the CPT section call. A panel chair and a discussant should also be proposed.
- An abstract for each paper, including title and author(s).
The panel description text and the individual abstracts must
be submitted individually. Thus a panel with 5 papers involves making 6
separate submissions via the Open Conference System (OCS). Abstracts can be
submitted directly by the panel authors or the panel coordinator can submit
them on the authors’ behalf. All abstract submissions in a panel must indicate
“PANEL:” as the first word of their title and the complete title of the panel
must appear in the first line of each abstract. The panel proposal will be
reviewed and based on this review we will accept, accept with revisions, or
decline the panel.
Submission of abstracts, panel proposals and (if accepted)
full papers must be submitted through the online Open Conference System (OCS)
at http://iamcr-ocs.org from 1 December 2014
until 9 February 2015. Early submission is strongly encouraged. There are to be
no email submissions of abstracts addressed to any Section or Working Group
Head.
It is expected that for the most part, only one (1) abstract
will be submitted per person for consideration by the Conference. However,
under no circumstances should there be more than two (2) abstracts bearing the
name of the same applicant either individually or as part of any group of
authors. Please note also that the same abstract or another version with minor
variations in title or content must not be submitted to other Sections or
Working Groups of the Association for consideration, after an initial
submission. Such submissions will be deemed to be in breach of the conference
guidelines and will be automatically rejected by the Open Conference System, by
the relevant Head or by the Conference Programme Reviewer. Such applicants risk
being removed entirely from the conference programme.
Upon submission of an abstract, you will be asked to confirm
that your submission is original and that it has not been previously published
in the form presented. You will also be given an opportunity to declare if your
submission is currently before another conference for consideration. Presenters
are expected to bring fully developed work to the conference. Prior to the
conference, it is expected that a completed paper will be submitted to Section,
Session Chairs, and Discussants.
If a proposal is accepted, the presenter must also register
for conference participation in order to be included in the final conference
programme of the Section. A CPT best paper award prize may be awarded to one of
the paper presenters, based on the full papers submitted in time.
Please note following deadlines and key dates for the 2015
IAMCR Conference:
1 December 2014: Open Computer System (OCS) available for
abstract submission at http://iamcr-ocs.org
9 February 2015: OCS closes: Final deadline for submission
of extended abstracts and panels (submissions will be assessed by double blind
review)
23 March 2015: Notification of acceptances of abstracts
14 April 2015: Confirmation of participation by presenters
6 May 2015: Deadline for early bird registration
19 June 2015: Deadline for full paper submission via OCS
(around 7,500 words, excluding notes and references). There is no second round
of reviewing for acceptance.
12-16 July 2015: IAMCR UQAM 2015 Conference, Montreal
(Canada)
Additional questions about the CPT sessions (submission,
themes, panels etc.) at the IAMCR 2015 conference can be addressed to Bart
Cammaerts (b.cammaerts [AT] lse.ac.uk). For further
information, please consult the IAMCR conference website (http://iamcr.org/congress/montreal2015)
or the local UQAM conference website (http://congresiamcr.uqam.ca)
For general information on the CPT section (http://www.iamcr.org/cpt), you can
contact:
Chair: Jo Pierson (jo.pierson [AT] vub.ac.be),
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, BE.
Vice-Chair: Bart Cammaerts (b.cammaerts [AT] lse.ac.uk), London School of Economics and
Political Science, UK.
Vice-Chair: Aphra Kerr (aphra.kerr [AT] nuim.ie), Maynooth University, IE.
