[ecrea] "The Unacceptable" Conference April 29 - May 1 2011

> Conference Call for Papers:
>
> “The Unacceptable" 
>
> 29th April - 1st May 2011
>
> Host: Department of Media, Music and Cultural Studies, Macquarie
> University 
> Venue: Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
>
> It wasn’t so long ago that with heroin chic and SM clubbing, what had
> been considered unacceptable became a voguish pretext for mass marketing.
> Now, with global hysteria about paedophilia and violent computer games
> and increasing calls for internet censorship, the unacceptable is being
> reinvented as an object of policing.
>
> The issue of what is ‘fit to present’ has always haunted culture,
> especially in its relationship with social institutions: the proscription
> of heresy, the erasure of bodies (because of their age, race or gender),
> the silencing of sexualities, the purging of languages, the
> classification of desires as pathologies . . . marking things as
> unacceptable has been a key strategy in governing the media, education,
> the arts as well as the practice of everyday life. Conversely, resistance
> to the banning of texts and practices has long been one of the hallmarks
> of movements for liberalisation.
>
> Understanding how bodies, images and practices are judged unacceptable is
> key to understanding how culture, communication and creativity fit into
> society.
>
> Issues: 
>
> • What is now unacceptable? 
> • Did the unacceptable ever go away or did it merely shift from what was
> outlaw to an object of voyeurism? 
> • How does what is deemed unacceptable reflect the racial, gender and
> sexual fault-lines of a society?
> • From incineration to pathologization: how have strategies for policing
> the unacceptable evolved?
>
> Abstracts are sought that engage with topics such as (but not limited
> to): 
>
> • Body modification
> • Pornography
> • Transgression in the Arts
> • Political censorship
> • Youth Culture and Behaviour
> • Free speech
> • Hate speech
> • Excommunication
> • Sexual Subcultures
> • Outlaw Fashion
> • Social Networking sites
> • Political and aesthetic avant-gardes
> • Gangs
> • Imposture
> • Homophobia
> • Drug culture
> • Infidelity
> • Secret Lives
> • Welfare dependency
> • Internet censorship
> • Religious cults
> • Violence
> • Worklessness
> • Control of school and higher education curriculums
> • Obesity
> • Behaviour in Public Space
> • Racism
>
> Please send abstracts of 300 words, or panel proposals, via email to
>
> (unacceptableconference /at/ gmail.com) by Friday, 30th September
> 2010.
>
> Sponsored and hosted by the Department of Media, Music, Communication and
> Cultural Studies, Macquarie University, Australia.