[ecrea] CfP: Protest Participation in Variable Communication Ecologies

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Protest Participation in Variable Communication Ecologies: Meanings, 
Modalities and Implications



This is a quick reminder about our call for papers to the upcoming 
Information, Communication and Society Symposium (24-26 June 2014, 
Sardinia, Italy). See Call for Papers below. The deadline for abstracts 
is 30 January 2015. For more information please visit the conference 
website (http://protestcommunicationecologies.com/) or get in touch via 
social media (@protesteco; Facebook: 
www.facebook.com/protestcommunicationecologies).



Contemporary collective action, social movements, civic and political 
protests are characterized by a growing complexity of actors, contents, 
repertories, contexts, and effects. Grappling with the implications of 
late modernity, scholars worldwide have reflected on the 
cross-fertilization of individual practices and collective 
mobilizations. They have foregrounded unconventional forms of 
engagement, through reflexive, expressive and embodied acts of dissent 
cutting across the cultural, political, and social domains, in 
persistent as well as increasingly transient modes of organisation and 
belonging. Within this field, some accounts graft social media as an 
independent variable that would mitigate the democratic deficits of 
mass-mediated and institutionalised politics. Others would warn of the 
power imbalances and the inequalities in participation particularly 
social media reinforce or heighten.



Keynote speakers: Lance Bennett (University of Washington, USA); Natalie 
Fenton (Goldsmith College, University of London, UK); Zizi Papacharissi 
(University of Illinois at Chicago, USA); Bev Skeggs (Goldsmith College, 
University of London, UK)



Seeking to kindle an imagination that situates social media in lived 
experience and practice, this conference intends to unpick the history 
and the present of linkages but also of any signs of a conscious 
uncoupling of network technologies, broadcasting media and physical 
places where protest participation is enacted. In doing so, we aim to 
tackle the significant challenges posed to democratic politics, social 
theory and research by resultant variable communication ecologies.



The organizers invite theoretical reflections and empirical analyses 
tracking continuities and changes in protest participation arising in 
the blurred lines between social media, broadcasting media and physical 
places. In particular, the conference welcomes contributions that 
address the following questions:



What forms of civic/uncivic protest participation are (de)activated in 
contemporary communication ecologies?



What are the effects of these different forms of participation on 
institutional politics, political culture, civic education, collective 
identities and the media?



Which structural – both societal and technological – elements of 
contemporary communication ecologies enable, accentuate or discourage 
protest participation?



Which type of content converges and is hybridized in the practices of 
protest participants, of protest-covering media or of the organizations 
that are targets of protest?



Which forms of exclusion are being overcome or heightened in the 
communication ecologies where protest participation is instantiated?



What are the conceptual challenges ahead of us? As we query 
communication ecologies, do concepts old and new, e.g. “mediatization”, 
“convergence”, “remediation”, “boundary publics”, “connective action” 
continue to be analytically informing for mapping the nature and meaning 
of participation in protest as well as in the civic life beyond it?



Which methodological obstacles arise for research oriented towards 
analysing protest participation in variable communication ecologies? And 
how do we overcome them?



We invite 500 word abstracts that outline the envisaged potential to 
tackle such questions in innovative ways. Abstracts should be 
accompanied by a 100-word biography of the presenter(s) together with 
contact details. Abstracts/biographies/contact details should be sent to 
(protest_ecologies /at/ uniss.it).



Proposals will be reviewed on a rolling basis by the scientific 
committee. The final deadline for submission is 30th January 2015. 
Without compromising scientific standards, the Conference aims for a 
wide geographical representation of scientists. Notifications of 
acceptance will be sent out at the earliest opportunity and no later 
than March 2015.



Following the conference, participants will be invited to submit their 
papers for consideration by the journal iCS – Information, Communication 
& Society which will dedicate a special issue to the conference 
proceedings. At that time, contributions will also be invited to an 
edited collection.



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