CALL FOR PAPERS
International Conference
Making Culture Count: Rethinking measures of cultural vitality, wellbeing and citizenship
3 - 4 May 2012
Woodward Conference Centre, University of Melbourne
Presented by the Cultural Development Network and Centre for Cultural Partnerships, Faculty of the VCA and Music, University of Melbourne.
In recent years, culture and cultural development have become internationally recognised as important dimensions of contemporary governance and public policy. As in other policy areas (economic, social, environmental), the production of accurate and relevant data has become central to cultural policy and how the cultural lives of citizens are understood. Conceptual and practical developments in measurement tools, such as new forms of cultural indicators, have the potential to enrich our understanding of culture's role in wellbeing, vitality and citizenship. From UNESCO’s benchmarks for cultural freedom, through comparative measures of states’ cultural provision and creative cities indices, to indicators for community arts evaluation, diverse approaches to quantifying cultural value and measuring societal progress now exist. But how useful are all these measures? Are they helping us to keep track of what matters? What opportunities exist to contest, refine or democratise these systems of cultural measurement?
This international conference brings together diverse perspectives from international guest speakers and leading local practitioners to explore the burgeoning field of cultural indicators. Participants will engage in a critical dialogue on various approaches to monitoring, evaluating, planning, advocating, predicting, and simply understanding, cultural change. Presentations will cover a range of theoretical and practical approaches to quantifying cultural values often considered intangible, including vitality, wellbeing, citizenship, sustainability and heritage.
Keynote speakers will include: Associate Professor Eleonora Belfiore, Director of Graduate Studies, Centre for Cultural Policy Studies, University of Warwick.
Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson, Senior Research Associate and Director, Creativity and Communities Program, Urban Institute, Washington DC, USA.
Contributors and audience: This conference will be of interest to a wide range of stakeholders: policy analysts, decision-makers and staff in national, state and local government, staff and volunteers in community organizations, artists and administrators of arts organizations, as well as academics in cultural studies, politics, economics and cultural development fields.
Call for papers: The submission of abstracts for presentations at this conference, on diverse aspects of cultural measurement, are invited. In particular, proposals that address the following topics are welcome:
- Critical accounts of forms of cultural measurement, including cultural indicators.
- The emergence of new cultural measures, such as categories of cultural vitality, wellbeing, citizenship, sustainability and heritage.
- Cross-cultural measurement, the relationship between mechanisms and categories of measurement and cultural difference.
- Community-driven cultural indicators, including attempts to democratise the processes of cultural measurement.
- The use of arts-based processes in the measurement of culture.
- The implications of new technologies, digital research methods and information visualisation for the measurement of culture.
Proposals invited: A wide range of presentations including theoretical papers, case studies and the use of creative media are invited. Proposals for panels or participatory workshops will also be considered. Please submit a 300-word abstract plus 100-word bio.
Closing date: Friday 9 December 2011 to (kim.dunphy /at/ culturaldevelopment.net.au).
Date of advice to presenters: Papers will be reviewed by the conference committee and authors will be notified of the outcome of their submission by December 19, 2011.
Post conference publication: Following the event, selected presenters will be invited to submit a chapter based on their paper for a publication on the theme of the conference.
For more information: www.culturaldevelopment.net.au
Kim Dunphy, Cultural Development Network (kim.dunphy /at/ culturaldevelopment.net.au)
--
Emma Blomkamp
Joint PhD Candidate
Centre for Cultural Partnerships, Faculty of VCAM, University of Melbourne, 234 St Kilda Road, Southbank, VIC 3006 | +61 450 109 579
Department of Political Studies, University of Auckland | +64 9 373 7599 ext. 87768 | http://auckland.academia.edu/EmmaBlomkamp
