[Commlist] CFP Beware of the Stereotype: Categories, Generalizations and Clichés in Journalistic Language and Journalism Practice

Call for papers
Beware of the Stereotype: Categories, Generalizations and Clichés in 
Journalistic Language and Journalism Practice

3-4 December 2026
Sixth biennial conference of the Brussels Institute for Journalism 
Studies (BIJU)
Department of Applied Linguistics, Faculty of Languages & Humanities
Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Belgium

Venue: Brussels, The AfricaMuseum (Leuvensesteenweg 13, 3080 Tervuren, 
Belgium)

Contact: (stereotypes /at/ vub.be)

Deadline for proposals: 30 June 2026

Plenary speakers
Rachel Sterken (University of Hong Kong)
Bruce Mutsvairo (University of Utrecht)

Building on its longstanding engagement with journalism theory and 
practice, the Brussels Institute for Journalism Studies (BIJU) launches 
its sixth international conference, devoted to the study of categories, 
generalizations and clichés in journalistic language and journalism 
practice. The conference is explicitly multidisciplinary and welcomes 
contributors from, among others, communication and media studies, 
discourse and conversation analysis, (cognitive) linguistics, corpus 
linguistics, translation studies, epistemology, social psychology, and 
the political and social sciences to share their insights with us on the 
way stereotypical representations, generalizations, and clichés occur in 
journalistic language and practice, and on how they are reproduced. True 
to tradition, we approach our central theme from two angles: 
communication studies and linguistics.

The relationship between ‘stereotype’ and ‘mass-mediated communication’ 
can be traced back to the term’s origins in the printing industry, a 
genealogy it shares with the notion of the ‘cliché’. Since then, 
stereotypes and clichés have come to signify processes of repetition, 
reduction and standardization in both everyday and scholarly discourse. 
Often credited with pioneering the idea of the ‘stereotype’ as a mental 
category – closely related to the concept of the ‘schema’ – Walter 
Lippmann, in Public Opinion, already engaged with the interaction 
between journalism, public discourse and what was famously described as 
‘the pictures in our heads’, over a century ago.

Alongside a descriptive understanding of stereotypes as cognitive 
shortcuts fundamental to human communication, a critical perspective has 
foregrounded their reductionist, evaluative and potentially exclusionary 
effects. In this view, stereotyping is closely tied to power, inequality 
and ‘us versus them’ narratives structured around markers such as 
gender, race, nationality, culture or class. So understood, stereotyping 
intersects with broader themes of identity politics, social or epistemic 
(in)justice, hegemony, pigeonholing and disinformation.

These issues persist in contemporary societies considering increasing 
affective polarization and antagonism as well as a heightened sense of 
(self-)reflexivity and critical awareness of positionalities and 
normative boundaries. Across both descriptive and evaluative 
interpretations, and whether occurring within or beyond news media, the 
meaningful yet complex relationship between stereotyping and social 
reality ultimately feeds into fundamental epistemological and ethical 
debates.

Given their intrinsic entanglement with processes of knowledge 
production, legitimation and public discourse, both descriptive and 
normative inflections of the ‘stereotype’ are closely entwined with 
journalism as an epistemic and socially situated meaning-making 
practice. From perspectives on news production, journalistic texts and 
audience reception, research has variously shown how standardized 
categories and generalizations function as structuring principles in 
news gathering, selection, representation and interpretation. These 
dynamics have acquired renewed urgency in a digital news environment 
characterized by speed, automation, algorithmic curation and 
efficiency-driven production processes.

Beyond – and closely related to – their role in journalism as a 
communicative practice, stereotypes also permeate the journalistic 
profession as a social field. As such, they variously affect newsroom 
organization, staff diversity and recruitment, shape (gendered) genre 
hierarchies of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ news, and confine role perceptions and 
task allocations. By the same token, at a meta-level, clichés about 
journalism and archetypical conceptions of journalists, are both 
reproduced and contested in the public imagination, influencing common 
perceptions of journalism and its public value, for better or worse.

For a linguistic approach of categorization and generalization, the use 
of generic language will be worth examining. From a linguistic 
perspective, categorization and generalization are fundamental to 
meaning making. Generic language enables speakers and writers to refer 
to categories, formulate general claims and abstract from individual 
cases. This naturally entails the risk of overgeneralization and 
stereotyping, or drawing inferences based on overly limited observation, 
experience or evidence.

This conference aims to critically examine how journalistic language 
contributes to the formation, circulation and contestation of 
stereotypes and overgeneralizations, as well as how such processes shape 
journalistic knowledge production and public discourse. Stereotypical or 
biased language in journalism, in connection with gender, religion, 
nationality, the generic use of pronouns like you and we, the way 
presuppositions and inferences are conveyed, these are just a few 
examples of what a linguistic approach to the topic of our conference 
can focus on.

We welcome submissions from all relevant disciplinary backgrounds 
approaching the central theme of ‘stereotypes in the news’ from a 
conceptual, empirical or methodological perspective; using quantitative 
and qualitative methods, or a mixed-methods design; and looking into 
journalism practices, products, or audiences.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

Generic language use in journalism
Presuppositions and inferences in journalistic language
The linguistic expression of stereotypes and generalizations in journalism
Possible stereotyping effects of LLMs on language use
Stereotypes in relation to epistemology and journalistic truth claims
Critical approaches to stereotyping, disinformation and social or 
epistemic justice
Standardization, professional routines, and efficiency as drivers of 
stereotyping
Stereotyping in digital news environments characterized by speed, 
automation, artificial intelligence, and algorithmic curation
(Visual and multimodal) stereotyping in coverage of gender, 
race/ethnicity, nationality, culture, and class
The effect of stereotyping on audience attitudes (perceptions of social 
groups, reinforcing prejudice)
Resonance, identification, and resistance among news audiences
Stereotypes within newsroom cultures and professional environments 
(homogeneity of staff and (epistemic) blind spots, diversity policies 
and inclusive storytelling)
Stereotypes about journalism and their impact on trust, legitimacy, and 
democratic engagement

After the previous conferences, we have edited special issues of leading 
journals in the research fields of journalism studies or linguistics, 
and a book volume with a renowned publisher. We intend to pursue similar 
publications opportunities following this conference.

Junior researchers are warmly invited to participate.

Conference fee (including reception, lunches, coffee):
€ 200 (regular participants), € 100 (PhD students).
Dinner will be organized on Friday 4 December and charged separately.

Please send a proposal of no more than 300 words (excluding selected 
references) together with your affiliation and a short biography (c. 100 
words) to (stereotypes /at/ vub.be) by 30 June 2026. Decisions will be 
announced by 15 July.

Questions about any aspect of the conference should be addressed to 
(stereotypes /at/ vub.be).

For updates on the practical organization, please check our website: 
https://www.vub.be/en/event/beware-stereotype

---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please use it responsibly and wisely. The commlist has no responsibility for any damage caused by its postings. Subscription to the list automatically implies agreement with this rule.
--
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
---------------