[ecrea] CFP--The Velvet Light Trap on Media Distribution

CFP: THE VELVET LIGHT TRAP #75 - MEDIA DISTRIBUTION
Deadline: January 15, 2014
Submit to: (velvetlighttrap.austin /at/ gmail.com)

Although distribution has long been known as the economic linchpin of 
the media industries, it remains the least studied aspect of that 
industry, conjuring images of dour economists combing through dusty 
ledgers. But scholarly attention is shifting.

As recent technologies upend older distribution models, they both 
facilitate alternative media cultures and drive traditional stakeholders 
into new conflicts. Media distribution, once the invisible link between 
production and exhibition/reception, increasingly reveals the major 
struggles over cultural and economic power that have long invigorated 
the field. Scholars studying contemporary media have energetically 
responded to the implications of the rapidly transforming landscape of 
media distribution, where new agents reroute industrial circuits and 
burgeoning networks of often “illicit” circulation form. As a result, 
the study of distribution now encompasses a range of methods and 
approaches including not only economic analysis but also cultural 
criticism, ethnography, and geo-mapping.

The last decade’s upheavals have sensitized media historians to the 
long-standing effects of and struggles over distribution. Scholars have 
re-explored historical subjects with newfound contemporary relevance, 
such as the emergence of copyright, film libraries, labor’s attempts to 
intervene in licensing content, and Hollywood’s analysis of its 
audiences. Moreover, new research tools have provided access to new 
sources and methods that encourage us to scrutinize received wisdom 
about the emergence of the commercial film industry, classical 
Hollywood’s mass audience and easy domination of world markets, and the 
formation of broadcast networks, as well as the historical existence of 
alternative distribution networks.

Issue #75 of VLT, “Media Distribution,” seeks to further address the 
complex effects of and determinations shaping forms of media 
distribution. The editors are particularly interested to bring together 
historical and contemporary case studies, as well as theoretical work, 
investigating the implications of struggles to control the conditions 
under which media circulates. To that end, we invite submissions that 
explore the economic, political, social, and aesthetic effects of media 
distribution.

Suggested topics include, but are by no means limited to:
The emergence, maintenance, and transformation of commercial distribution
Audience identification, segmentation, and marketing
Screen quotas, cultural difference, and international censors
Reformatting for new technologies and translating for foreign markets
Historical studies of noncommercial or alternative distribution networks
Infrastructures of distribution
Scales of distribution: global, regional, national, local
Subcultural networks, dispersed communities, and diasporic identities
Distribution workers
VOD, streaming video, web television
Geo-blocking and transnational online distribution
Peer-to-peer sharing, black markets, and pirated content
Self-distribution, viral video, and social networking


Submission Guidelines
Submissions should be between 8,000 and 10,000 words, formatted in 
Chicago style. Please submit an electronic copy of the paper, along with 
a one-page abstract, both saved as a Microsoft Word file. Remove any 
identifying information so that the submission is suitable for anonymous 
review. The entire essay, including block quotations and notes, should 
be double spaced. Quotations not in English should be accompanied by 
translations. Photocopies of illustrations are sufficient for initial 
review, but authors should be prepared to supply camera-ready 
photographs on request. Illustrations will be sized by the publisher. 
Permissions are the responsibility of the author. Send electronic 
manuscripts and/or any questions to (velvetlighttrap.austin /at/ gmail.com).


About the Journal
VLT is a scholarly, peer-reviewed journal of film, television, and new 
media studies. It publishes articles and interviews written with the 
highest scholarly standards yet are accessible to a broad range of 
readers. The journal draws on a variety of theoretical and 
historiographic approaches from the humanities and social sciences and 
welcomes any effort that will help foster the ongoing processes of 
evaluation and negotiation in media history and criticism. While the VLT 
maintains its traditional commitment to the study of American film, it 
also expands its scope to television and other media, to adjacent 
institutions, and to other nations' media. The journal encourages both 
approaches and objects of study that have been neglected or excluded in 
past scholarship.

Graduate students at the University of Wisconsin at Madison and the 
University of Texas at Austin coordinate issues in alternation, and each 
issue is devoted to a particular theme chosen by the graduate-student 
editors. VLT’s Editorial Advisory Board includes such notable scholars 
as Charles Acland, Richard Allen, Harry Benshoff, Mark Betz, Michael 
Curtin, Kay Dickinson, Radhika Gajjala, Scott Higgins, Jon Kraszewski, 
Diane Negra, Michael Newman, Nicholas Sammond, Beretta Smith-Shomade, 
Jacob Smith, Jonathan Sterne, Cristina Venegas, and Michael Williams. 
VLT’s graduate-school editors are assisted by their local faculty 
advisors: Mary Beltrán, Ben Brewster, Jonathan Gray, Michele Hilmes, Lea 
Jacobs, Derek Johnson, Vance Kepley, Charles Ramírez Berg, Thomas 
Schatz, and Janet Staiger.


Recent & Forthcoming in VLT

No. 72 - Useful Media: Industrial, Educational, Institutional (Fall 2013)
Patrick Feaster on the Phonograph as a business tool
Giles Taylor on military uses of early widescreen cinema
Sara Sullivan on US Steel’s public relations films
Benjamin Strassfeld on The Birth of a Baby (1938) in commercial theaters
Lisa Rabin on Human Relations Films in East Harlem

No. 73 - Media Cultures of the Early Cold War Era (Spring 2014)
Michael Baskett on Japan’s film festival diplomacy
Ken Provencher on runaway productions in Japan
Noah Tsika on corporate-sponsored films in West Africa
Abigail Hinsman on the U-2 Spy Plane and the epistemology of intelligence
Fred Turner on the Osaka EXPO 70 and the Pepsi Pavilion


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