ECREA WEEKLY digest ARTICLES

University of Calgary

Apply here: https://internal.careers.ucalgary.ca/jobs/13773335-assistant-professor-research-transdisciplinary-environmental-communication

Location: Main Campus

We would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the traditional territories of the people of the Treaty 7 region in Southern Alberta. The City of Calgary is also home to Métis Nation of Alberta, Districts 5 and 6.

Position Description

The Faculty of Arts at the University of Calgary invites applications for a tenure-track transdisciplinary position with a focus on Environmental Communication at the rank of Assistant Professor (Research). The successful candidate will be provided an initial five-year research-intensive term with reduced teaching commitments.

As part of the broader University of Calgary transdisciplinary recruitment program, 20 academic positions have been created to build capacity and provide leadership in support of the Ahead of Tomorrow Strategic Plan. These scholars see challenges as opportunities that spark our singular mission – to dare to imagine ahead of tomorrow.

We are seeking a forward-thinking scholar at the forefront of environmental communication to pursue a robust research agenda with a particular emphasis on climate change, water resources, and environmental sustainability. Over 30 years ago, the First Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned of impending crises facing the planet and yet the science predicting these crises was not heard across all nations and cultures. More recently, competing discourses of climate change denial further underscore the need for innovative and effective science communication that advances public conversations on environmental crises, notably water security. As one of today’s “wicked problems” (U.N. Sustainable Development Goals), the challenges of climate change require the creation of bold and engaging frameworks for understanding environmental justice to mobilize multi-stakeholder partnerships – among scientists, advocacy groups, Indigenous Peoples, citizens, and creative practitioners – and effect meaningful action on climate change.

The successful candidate will be engaged in transdisciplinary environmental communication research that examines the unequal access to critical resources, such as water, precipitated by climate change; focuses on communities affected by environmental injustice(s); and innovates communication and/or media-based interventions that challenge the economic, political, and social structures perpetuating these conditions.

The candidate will also establish effective means for knowledge sharing across multiple publics, including Indigenous Peoples and newcomers, who may conceive of having sustainable and healthy water systems differently, based on cultural context, personal circumstance, and previous experiences. Approaches may address environmental policy, Indigenous and/or critical approaches to environmental communication, or innovation in environmental communication (such as data visualization, participatory mapping, digital storytelling, transmedia).

The position will catalyze existing research strengths focused on knowledge sharing within the Faculty of Arts and beyond. Ideally, the candidate will also participate in one or more of the University’s transdisciplinary initiatives, such as One Health, the UNU Hub on “Empowering Communities to Adapt to Environmental Change,” and/or ii’taa’poh’to’p, the University’s Indigenous strategy.

The appointments will commence July 1, 2024, or at a mutually agreeable date.

We are seeking a scholar who will establish an active, transdisciplinary research program and demonstrate leadership in the field of environmental communication. Applicants must have a strong scholarly foundation in communication and media studies in conjunction with related disciplinary knowledge in climate science, sustainability, and/or water resources. Experience working with government, non-governmental institutions, Indigenous Peoples, and/or communities is considered an asset.

In addition to maintaining an active externally funded research program, the successful candidate will be expected to supervise graduate students and teach undergraduate and/or graduate courses in the Department of Communication, Media and Film and the Department of Geography, and collaborate with fellow transdisciplinary scholars. The candidate will also demonstrate leadership in service, collaboration, and mentorship within the University and the community. This is an excellent opportunity to build and develop an innovative research program within a dynamic and collaborative environment. A competitive salary and an attractive start-up package will be provided.

The successful candidate at the Assistant Professor (Research) level must demonstrate emerging strength in the field of environmental communication, as evidenced by impactful publications or other forms of scholarly activity, a record of securing competitive external research funding, and effectiveness in teaching at the university level.

Position Requirements:

• PhD in Communication and Media Studies, Geography, or related discipline
  
• A strong record of research and knowledge mobilization
  
• A proven ability to obtain research funding
  
• Demonstrated strengths in teaching in related areas
  
• Engagement with local, national, and international professional and other communities
  

How to Apply:

Interested individuals are encouraged to submit an application online via the `Apply Now’ link and include in one combined PDF:

• Curriculum vitae,
  
• Statement outlining a proposed transdisciplinary research program,
  
• Evidence of teaching effectiveness through a teaching dossier,
  
• Evidence of collaboration/engagement with professional and other communities
  
• Reprints of two (2) representative academic publications,
  
• Names and contact information for three referees.
  

Information about programs and research in the Department of Communication, Media, and Film can be found at our website.

Information about programs and research in the Department of Geography can be found at our website.

Closing Date: February 2, 2024

Questions about this opportunity shall be directed to: Dr. Andrea Freeman (geoghead@ucalgary.ca) and Dr. Samantha Thrift (cmfhead@ucalgary.ca).

The University of Calgary’s comprehensive benefits and pension program is designed to promote a productive level of health and well-being to staff members. To learn about our comprehensive benefits package for this Calgarybased, English-speaking position, please visit http://www.ucalgary.ca/hr/academic_benefits_pension.

The University of Calgary has launched an institution-wide Indigenous Strategy committing to creating a rich, vibrant, and culturally competent campus that welcomes and supports Indigenous Peoples, encourages Indigenous community partnerships, is inclusive of Indigenous perspectives in all that we do.

As an equitable and inclusive employer, the University of Calgary recognizes that a diverse staff/faculty benefits and enriches the work, learning and research experiences of the entire campus and greater community. We are committed to removing barriers that have been historically encountered by some people in our society. We strive to recruit individuals who will further enhance our diversity and will support their academic and professional success while they are here. In particular, we encourage members of the designated groups (women, Indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, members of visible/racialized minorities, and diverse sexual orientation and gender identities) to apply. To ensure a fair and equitable assessment, we offer accommodation at any stage during the recruitment process to applicants with disabilities. Questions regarding [diversity] EDI at UCalgary can be sent to the Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (equity@ucalgary.ca) and requests for accommodations can be sent to Human Resources (hrhire@ucalgary.ca).

All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority. In this connection, at the time of your application, please answer the following question: Are you a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident of Canada? (Yes/No)

Additional Information

To learn more about academic opportunities at the University of Calgary and all we have to offer, view our Academic Careers website. For more information visit Careers in the Faculty of Arts.

The University strongly recommends all faculty and staff are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

About the University of Calgary

UCalgary is Canada’s entrepreneurial university, located in Canada’s most enterprising city. It is a top research university and one of the highest-ranked universities of its age. Founded in 1966, its 36,000 students experience an innovative learning environment, made rich by research, hands-on experiences and entrepreneurial thinking. It is Canada’s leader in the creation of start-ups. Start something today at the University of Calgary. For more information, visit ucalgary.ca. 

About Calgary, Alberta

Calgary is one of the world's cleanest cities and has been named one of the world's most livable cities for years. Calgary is a city of leaders - in business, community, philanthropy and volunteerism. Calgarians benefit from a growing number of world-class dining and cultural events and enjoy more days of sunshine per year than any other major Canadian city. Calgary is less than an hour's drive from the majestic Rocky Mountains and boasts the most extensive urban pathway and bikeway network in North America. 

Deadline: January 22, 2024

https://iamcr.org/phd-webinars/call-for-convenors-2024

IAMCR invites PhD researchers to submit their applications to convene an IAMCR Presidential PhD Research Webinar with a topic of their choice. Read this information carefully if you are an IAMCR member PhD student and would like to convene an IAMCR Presidential PhD Research Webinar.

The IAMCR Presidential PhD Research Webinars provide a forum for critical dialogue for PhD researchers in the field of communication and media studies. The central goals of the webinars are to give visibility to doctoral research in the global field of communication and media studies and stimulate interaction and cooperation among PhD students. 

Eligibility  

The convenor(s) must be members of IAMCR and PhD students. The proposed topic must be relevant to communication and media studies, and it should be intellectually stimulating and potentially innovative.

How to apply  

If you want to organise a webinar, download and complete the application form (*).  

The completed application form should be emailed with the subject "IAMCR Presidential PhD Research Webinar:  {title of your webinar}” to Mazlum Kemal Dağdelen (**), the coordinator of the IAMCR Presidential PhD Research Webinar and the assistant of the IAMCR President, Nico Carpentier.  

If there are several convenor(s), each convenor is required to submit an application form. All forms must be sent in one application email to the coordinator of the presidential webinar. If there are similar proposals related to the selected topic, the convenors may be grouped as co-convenors in consultation with the applicants.

The topic and the convenor(s) are selected based on the academic quality of their proposal and its relevance to our field.

Timeline

Applications for hosting/convening a webinar should be submitted by 22 January 2024.

The webinar is expected to take place in April. The actual timeline for the organisation of the webinar will be decided together with the convenor(s).

Please do not send paper proposals in stage 1. This call is for hosts/convenors only. When the convenor(s) and their proposed topic are selected, the second open call for speakers and abstracts for presentations on that topic will be launched in collaboration with the selected convenor(s).

(*) https://iamcr.org/sites/default/files/convenor_topic_form_2024.docx

(**) mazlum@iamcr.org (mazlum /at/ iamcr /dot/ org)

Joke Hermes

https://www.routledge.com/Cultural-Citizenship-and-Popular-Culture-The-Art-of-Listening/Hermes/p/book/9781032265629 

Written in an accessible and engaging style, this book uses a series of case studies to show how popular media are important to us, as a source of pleasure and entertainment, but also in communicating about the world with others.  Social media platforms have changed how we talk about what we like and dislike in our popular media use. 'Cultural citizenship' shows how these discussions speak to 'belonging', to what we feel our rights and responsibilities are in today's polarized world. Cultural Citizenship and Popular Culture is based on audience-led research and does not privilege textual analysis as a starting point for taking popular media use's measure. Instead, it offers research tools to listen to others.  This book offers scholars and students of media and creative industries a means to understand their professional position as one in which they engage with rather than assume to know what users of popular cultural texts and products think and feel.

July 5-6, 2024

Bled (Slovenia)

Deadline: February 5, 2024

The 31st edition of International Public Relations Research Symposium (BledCom) will be held on July 5 & July 6, 2024, Lake Bled - Slovenia. The main theme of the jubilee 31st conference is Public Relations and Human Well-being.

When viewed from the prism of human well-being, our definition of, and orientation to, publics will invariably become broader and more holistic than it has been for almost five decades of public relations scholarship. A more holistic view of audiences will also include the well-being of the underprivileged and vulnerable groups of a society such as children, migrants, minority groups, and those disadvantaged economically and socially. For these and many similar reasons, mindfulness as a strategy for well-being has received a lot of attention lately helped by initiatives such as the International Day of Yoga suggested by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and adopted by the United Nations in 2014. This theme certainly has the potential to broaden the horizons of our field and thus contribute to better its reputation as well. 

Please note that the chances of your abstract being accepted are enhanced if you observe the following format in preparing it: Introduction and purpose of the study (and research question if there is one) – helps summarize the purpose and rationale of your study. Literature review – Helps place your work in context with the existing body of knowledge. Methodology – Define the main method used for gathering data including sample size, and state the rationale for using this method. Results and conclusions – Helps summarize the answers to the research questions while also outlining the implications of the results. Summarize the limitations of the study and offer suggestions for future research. Practical and social implications – Offer the potential implications both for practice and society. Also provide us with 3 to 5 keywords that highlight your study. Abstracts should come as blind copies without author names and affiliations, who are to be identified on on a separate cover page. Please use the suggested headings to structure the abstract. A list of literature is not necessary, but if it is provided it is included into the word count.

BledCom invites abstracts that are between 500 and 800 words (including title and keywords) with up to 5 references. We welcome ALL papers that are relevant to public relations and communication management and not just papers that discuss the conference theme. We also welcome panel proposals. Please submit paper abstracts and panel proposals via email to bledcom@fdv.uni-lj.si by February 5, 2024 (Midnight CET).

Decisions will be made by March 4, 2024 after peer review. Full papers not exceeding 6.000 words will be due by September 21, 2024 for inclusion in the conference proceedings.

BledCom 2024 Call for Papers is available here:  https://www.bledcom.com/my-post

Briony Hannell

https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/feminist-fandom-9798765101803/

Examines how fannish and feminist modes of cultural consumption, production, and critique are converging and opening up informal spaces for young people to engage with feminism. 

Adopting an interdisciplinary theoretical framework and bringing together media and communications, feminist cultural studies, sociology, internet studies and fan studies, Hannell locates media fandom at the intersection of the multi-directional and co-constitutive relationship between popular feminisms, popular culture and participatory networked digital cultures. Feminist Fandom functions as an ethnographic account of how feminist identities are constructed, lived and felt through digital fannish spaces on the micro-blogging and social networking platform, Tumblr.

Please consider requesting a copy via your university library. You can also use the following discount codes to save 35% on Feminist Fandom via Bloomsbury Academic: bloomsbury.com/9798765101803

UK and EU Customers: GLR TW2UK

USA: GLR BD8US

Canada: GLR BD8CA

Reviews of Feminist Fandom

“While the pedagogical value of digitally-mediated fandoms is often asserted, here Briony Hannell critically engages with the complexities and contradictions of how a feminist pedagogy functions in online fan spaces. Through its exploration of a range of practices and debates from reflexive un/learning to “SJW fatigue” in these communities, this book complicates exclusively celebratory claims about fandom’s links to rising feminist consciousness. While Hannell’s arguments are deeply attuned to the socio-technical features of Tumblr, her sophisticated theoretical, methodological and analytic approach is an exemplar of critical and nuanced digital feminist media analysis that makes this book a must-read in the field.”

— Alison Harvey, author of Feminist Media Studies (2019) and Associate Professor of Communications, York University, Canada

“Fandom as a pathway to feminism is understudied, yet after reading Feminist Fandom, the two seem inseparable. This book offers a compelling account of the intersection of digital cultures, feminisms and popular culture. As such, it is recommended reading for scholars in participatory culture, audience studies, gender studies, feminist studies and fandom studies. This is a book about the power of stories, the importance of Tumblr as a platform of first-person narration and the centrality of storytelling for social movements and their reinvention.”

— Katrin Tiidenberg, co-author of tumblr (2021) and Professor of Participatory Culture, Tallin University, Estonia

“Feminist Fandom is a rich, qualitative study of Tumblr as a site for social justice. It’s a deep dive into fandom and audience creativity. With its insights on feminist user cultures and pedagogies, Feminist Fandom explains why and how online platforms act as a space for identity construction and activism.”

— Nicolle Lamerichs, author of Productive Fandom: Intermediality and Affective Reception in Fan Cultures (2018) and Senior Lecturer in Creative Business, HU University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands

Gabriele Balbi

Link: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-digital-revolution-9780198875970?cc=us&lang=en&

The book is a history of the ways in which the digital revolution has been narrated, of the rhetoric, the narratives, and the overt or implied debates that have accompanied it and continue to accompany it today. It aims to tell the story of an idea, which I define as one of the most powerful ideologies of recent decades: that digitalization constitutes a revolution, a break with the past, a radical change for the human beings who are living through it. The four chapters investigate the origins of this idea, how it evolved, which other past revolutions consciously or unconsciously inspired it, which great stories it has conveyed over time, which of its key elements have changed and which ones have persisted and have been repeated in different historical periods, , how it can be considered a quasi-religion. All these discussions, large or small, have settled and condensed into a series of media, advertising, corporate, political, and technical sources and so, in the book, readers can also find new, previously-unpublished historical sources. The main aim of the book is to deconstruct what looks like a “natural” and incontestable idea and to help rethink digital societies today.

Joke Hermes and Linda Kopitz

https://www.routledge.com/The-Pocketbook-of-Audience-Research/Hermes-Kopitz/p/book/9781032325118 

Focusing on qualitative methods, The Pocketbook of Audience Research uses contemporary, global television and cross-media examples to explain essential approaches to audience research and outline how they can be employed.

This handy guide is divided into three parts: the first part, ‘Watching Post-Television’, offers ‘television’ as a shortcut to understanding today’s platform media and gives an introduction to key theoretical terms such as representation, identity and community. The second part, ‘Methods with Method’, introduces different methodological tools to study cross-media texts and practices from an audience-led perspective. With individual chapters covering ethnography, textual analysis and visual methodologies, this part also functions as a toolset and starting point for small research projects. The third part, ‘Methods in Action’, offers a variety of recent case studies to show how these methodological principles work in practice.

Drawing on different genres from drama to sports, The Pocketbook of Audience Research gives a sense of what audience-led cross-media research can achieve. This concise, accessible book gives students, early-career researchers and creative professionals the tools to do useful and inspiring audience research, whether for a paper, a proposal or a market survey.

We invite you to participate in a brief survey in the field of AI alignment. Through responses to 39 questions, we will record the sentiment of humans towards the futuristic concept of artificial general intelligence (AGI). On the other hand, we also examine the artificial intelligence itself (ChatGPT and other language models). Please first complete the survey and then forward it to anyone who might be interested, which includes online groups, mailing lists, etc. 

Link to the survey: https://forms.gle/npGBJf72ECwpSHV78 

Thank you! 

The research team from the AI Institute of Serbia, the Digital Society Lab, the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory at the University of Belgrade, the Faculty of Engineering Sciences at the University of Kragujevac and the Faculty of Media and Communications.

Media & Jornalismo, Vol. 24 N.º 45 (2024)

Deadline: March 15, 2024

Editors: 

• Maria José Brites - Universidade Lusófona, CICANT; maria.jose.brites@ulusofona.pt
  
• Teresa Sofia Castro - Universidade Lusófona, CICANT; teresa.sofia.castro@ulusofona.pt
  
• Paloma Contreras-Pulido - Universidade Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR); paloma.contreras@unir.net
  

Topics:

• Children, youth, and news
  
• Children, youth, and contexts of digital citizenship
  

Subtopics:

• Algorithms and datafication
  
• Audiences and news
  
• Socialisation, families, and peer influence
  
• News literacies
  
• Information disorders
  
• News resistance and avoidance
  
• Theoretical reflection and future perspectives of the field
  
• Methodological discussions
  
• Participatory media
  
• Decolonization of the field
  
• Glocal news contexts
  
• Glocal digital citizenship contexts
  

In this special issue, we aim to capture theoretical and empirical reflections that shed light on how, why, and where young people follow, understand and express what is currently happening in the world in the context of digital citizenship and information disorders (Wardle & Derakhshan, 2017). The COVID-19 pandemic and recent wars accelerated a torrent of fake news and other information disorders (Galan et al., 2019, Frau-Meigs et al, 2017), in which social media platforms revealed underlying ambivalences. This is why it is so pressing to consider diverse approaches in the investigation that identifies what, how and where young people from diverse contexts and geographies propose their views and expressions of what is happening in the world. By anticipating normative and/or decolonised definitions of news, we aim to apprehend research that assesses themes related with youth voices and views of the world, their (dis)connection with news and contexts of digital citizenship.

The research continually points to a shift from the traditional journalism environments to new opportunities for consumption and production (Clark and Marchi, 2017), fostering participative processes. By proposing the concept of “connective journalism”, Clark and Marchi (2017) highlight the need for sharing, having a self-view of the news stories, and considering making their stories. They also note a disruption between young audiences' needs and news outlets.

What are the social environments where these processes are grounded? Even if the peer group influence has an impact, family, and in particular parents, are at the centre of the socialisation process for seeking news and different views of the world (Brites et al., 2017; Edgerly et al, 2018a; Lemish, 2007; Silveira, 2019), including contexts for operating digital devices (Edgerly et al, 2018a). Self-socialization is found in other studies regarding youth information consumption: incidental and leisure (Boczkowski et al, 2018) and news avoidance and resistance (Brites e Ponte, 2018; Edgerly et al, 2018b).

These sociocultural environments pose additional challenges to news brands and the production of stories that fit young people’s interests and expectations. It is thus imperative to reflect on these timely issues, namely considering how young people regard and deal with algorithms (Swart, 2021), algorithmic literacy, and what are the implications for information selection and consumption processes in their everyday lives, and even to observe how in some cases this content is used for participatory, prosocial and citizen purposes, shaping initiatives that promote social change.

This special issue [under the project Youth, News and Digital Citizenship - YouNDigital (PTDC/COM-OUT/0243/2021); https://youndigital.com] invites articles that theoretically and/or empirically tackle these and other dimensions, considering youth layers in terms of social, educational, gender, and cultural diversity, which demands to be studied and analysed within their relationship with digital media, news, platforms, and digital citizenship.

IMPORTANT DATES

Deadline for submitting articles: March 15, 2024

Review process: March-June 2024

Editors' decision: July 2024

Expected publication date: October 2024

January 15, 2024

Webinar

Registration deadline: 13 January, 2024

Are you an MA/ PhD research student or Early Career Scholar in Communication & Media Studies?

Looking to participate in the upcoming IAMCR 2024 Annual Conference? (iamcr.org/christchurch2024/cfp)

Submitting/ reviewing for an international conference for the 1st time?

Please join us for the IAMCR Webinar Taming the butterflies: How to write good abstracts & constructively review for Early Career Scholars! (iamcr.org/webinars/tamingthebutterflies)

This webinar will:

1. familiarise the audience with IAMCR, Media Education Research (MER) & Emerging Scholars Network (ESN) Sections,

2. identify resources available to support people submitting to & reviewing for the IAMCR conference for the 1st time, &

3. discuss the nature of good abstracts & reviews to set expectations for the upcoming conference.

Speakers: Steph Hill, University of Leicester & Devina Sarwatay, City, University of London.

Co-sponsored by: IAMCR MER & ESN.

Date: 15 January, 2024.

Time: 2 pm UTC.

IAMCR members register: iamcr.org/webinars/register-taming-butterflies

Non-members: Email register4iamcrwebinar@gmail.com with subject "Taming the butterflies" to be added to the attendees list.

Join IAMCR: iamcr.org/join/individual