[Commlist] Call for Papers – Counter-Research Symposium*

📢 *Call for Papers – Counter-Research Symposium*

*King’s College London | 27 February 2026*
*Deadline for abstracts: Friday 21 November 2025*
NB: This is an in-person event to be held in London. Due to the 
sensitivity of the topics discussed, the symposium will not be recorded.
*About the symposium*
The /Counter-Research Symposium/ is a one-day event organised by 
*CRIMSON (Counter Research in Media Studies Organized Network)*, a new 
cross-institutional research network that centres research on 
marginalised, precarious, contentious, and often silenced communities. 
It supports media scholars and activists undertaking politically and 
emotionally complex work in challenging environments, including closed 
authoritarian regimes, and whose research directly confronts state and 
institutional power.
The symposium will bring CRIMSON members together with invited 
participants to explore the meaning and stakes of /counter-research/ in 
global media and communication studies - particularly in the context of 
rising right-wing populism and intensifying attacks on critical theories 
and DEI initiatives. It will also serve as a space for collective 
reflection on the methodological, ethical, and emotional challenges of 
conducting research that unsettles and confronts structures of the 
state, establishment, and academy.
We welcome contributions that engage with the concept of 
/counter-research/ and examine its diverse dimensions - epistemological, 
methodological, and practical. We are especially interested in work that 
explores positionality and vulnerability in counter-research; 
interrogates the risks shared by researchers and participants and how 
these may be entangled; and work that complicates the very idea of the 
/counter /and//considers how counter-research methods might unsettle 
conventional approaches to media and communication. We also invite 
contributions that propose new frameworks for sustaining such 
scholarship in precarious times, and that reflect on the role of 
institutions in promoting more inclusive and reflexive scholarly cultures.
*We welcome papers related to any of the following topics:*

  * Researcher vulnerability in conflict-ridden contexts
  * Researcher vulnerability in state-critical research
  * Conducting research on authoritarian regimes (fieldwork challenges
    and strategies of resistance or workaround)
  * Researching the ‘other’: ethics, representation, and power
  * Researcher–participant relationships in counter-research contexts
  * Intersections of gender, race, sexuality, class, coloniality, and
    caste in counter-research
  * How institutions (universities and beyond) respond—or fail to
    respond—to the challenges of counter-research
  * Emotional labour, care, and precarity in counter-research
  * Counter research as a contentious concept (thinking about who is
    claiming to produce counter discourse or research, why and for what
    ends)
*Submission details*
Please submit an abstract of no more than 250 words and a short 
biographical note (up to 100 words) to (crimsonsymposium /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(crimsonsymposium /at/ gmail.com)> by *Friday 21 November 2025*.
We encourage submissions from PhD students, Early Career Researchers, 
and scholars in precarious positions or from underrepresented backgrounds.
*Key dates*

  * *21 November 2025*: Deadline for abstract submissions
  * *19 December 2025*: Notification of decisions
  * *19 January 2026*: Full programme released
  * *27 February 2026*: Symposium at King’s College London
*Organising Committee*
*Munira Cheema*, King’s College London
*Anna Khlusova, *King’s College London
*Yuval Katz, *Loughborough University
*Matthias De Bondt, *KU Leuven
*Woori Han, *University of Exeter
*Jiali Fan*,**University of Cambridge
*Hong Yu Liu, *University of Sussex




---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please use it responsibly and wisely.
--
To subscribe or unsubscribe, please visit http://commlist.org/
--
Before sending a posting request, please always read the guidelines at http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ commlist.org)
URL: http://nicocarpentier.net
---------------