[ecrea] communication/media and the sacred

Dear All

I was recentlly informed and invited to coordinate a special issue on
communication/media and the sacred for a French new journal which publish papers
in french and english (quite rare in France)
The deadline fixed by the French director of the journal is pretty short, but
maybe you can design an abstract from now in one month ...
If you are interested please send me the abstract on
(mcoman53 /at/ yahoo.com)
best
mihai coman

+++

Call for Papers for volume 4, n°8 (2011)
ESSACHESS – Journal for Communication Studies1
www.essachess.com
Communication and the sacred
Coordinators: Mihai COMAN (University of Bucharest)
et Céline BRYON-PORTET (University of Toulouse, LERASS)
Modern Western society is characterized by a gradual secularization, a weakening of faith and
of institutional frameworks of religion, a development which made Nietzsche declare towards
the end of the 19th Century that «God is dead». But what can be said about the sacred? If it is
admitted that the sacred sphere goes far beyond the religious sphere, it seems necessary to
separate the two phenomena. Faced with what Max Weber called «disenchantment of the
world», many contemporary sociologists claim to identify an inverse re-enchantment through
a re-emergence of the sacred under various forms. Therefore, it seems necessary to investigate
the very nature of the sacred, especially its function which is at the same time both unifying
(at the sub-group level) and dividing (at the supra-group level), as well as its possible
mutations.
This issue of ESSACHESS - Journal for Communication Studies proposes to investigate
two directions, distinct but complementary, with and emphasis first on the relationship which
the sacred has with the new technologies—particularly in relationship with what some have
called the information society—and second, on the relationship which the sacred entertains
with the phenomenon of communication, both at the interpersonal and institutional levels. The
sacred—which employs traditional forms of expression and translates them into the creation
of symbolic devices (myths, rituals, symbols, and so on) —is it able to keep in touch with the
world of mass media and the new technologies of information and communication? With
tools like the Internet—with their simultaneous availability everywhere—can individuals
reclaim the symbolic dimension of the sacred and overcome the diachronic dimension by
managing to transmit values from one generation to another? Moreover, how the sacred—
which involves a vertical mediation by providing transcendent meaning—is able to convey
also a horizontal mediation enabling humans to build communities? How does this doublesided
communication takes place today which involves both the invisible as well as the visible
represented by humans as part of organizations (businesses, institutions, universities, and so
on)?
All scholars and researchers with an interest in these subjects, are invited to submit papers.
Their contributions can be in the form of:
– theoretical studies or articles adding new insights to the debate in the literature;
– original empirical research;
– case studies.
1
The journal „ESSACHESS” has been indexed in the databases ProQuest CSA International and EBSCO Publishing.
Important Deadlines
– July 5, 2011: submission of the proposition of article in the form of a summary of
400-500 words;
– July 15, 2011: acceptance of the proposal;
– October 10, 2011: full paper submission;
– November 1st, 2011: full paper acceptance.
Papers should be around 6000-10000 words in lenght. Papers can be submitted in English or
French. The abstracts should be in English and French, max. 200-250 words followed by 5
keywords. Please provide the full names, affiliations, and e-mail addresses of all authors,
indicating the contact author. Papers, and any queries, should be sent to:
(mcoman53 /at/ yahoo.com), (celine.bryonportet /at/ ensiacet.fr) et (essachess /at/ gmail.com)
Authors of the accepted papers will be notified by e-mail. The journal will be published in
December 2011.

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