[ecrea] Call for Papers (Special Issue of MIA - Public Spheres and the Media in India)

Call for Papers

Media International Australia No. 152 (August 2014)

Public Spheres and the Media in India

Theme Editors: Sukhmani Khorana, Vibodh Parthasarthi, and Pradip Thomas

The concept of the public sphere has travelled widely, and the mediation 
of the public sphere has attracted much scholarly attention: the concept 
has been critiqued, and there have been attempts to invest it with 
meanings inflected by context or to propose understandings shaped by 
global and local challenges.

This special issue of MIA will take a variety of approaches to 
apprehending mediated public spheres in India, which remains a large, 
imperfect democracy that is home to one of the most diverse media 
environments anywhere in the world. The history of the public sphere 
there has followed a trajectory very different from its Habermasian 
views, characterised less by individual participation than by caste 
groups and vernacular associations, and the acceptance and 
legitimisation of colonial authorities. Colonial governmentality and the 
post-independent state have played an important role in shaping the 
public sphere – although the market increasingly provides opportunities 
for multiple mediations of public spheres.

A variety of public spheres have emerges that reflect the diversity of 
Indian publics, who contribute to and are in turn shaped by a variety of 
mediations – from televised talk and music shows to news shows, citizen 
journalism and community radio. There are also opportunities to explore 
the communicative basis for the development of public spheres nurtured 
by mass movements such as the Right to Information movement in India, 
which arguably has spawned a nationwide awakening of the information 
rights of citizens.

This issue of MIA will explore the complex nature of evolving, emerging, 
mediated public spheres in India. Papers addressing any of the following 
questions are welcome:

* What are some of the features of emerging, mediated public spheres in 
India?
* What is the nature of mediated publics in India?
* What is the relationship between mediated publics and social change in 
India?
* Is the ‘argumentative’ Indian, represented by talk show audiences, 
representative of a public sphere or does this characterisation 
represent a diluted notion of the public sphere?
* How are public spheres being formed in the context of online media?
* What is there to read into pirate public spheres in India?
* What is the relationship between communication and information rights 
movements in India and public spheres?
* What role does the state play in forming or inhibiting the growth of 
public spheres in India?
*

Please send a 200-300 word abstract and a brief bio note to Sukhmani 
Khorana ((skhorana /at/ uow.edu.au)) by 15 October 2013.

Final articles (of no more than 5,000 words) will be due by 30 January 2014.





Dr. Sukhmani Khorana

Lecturer, Media and Communication

Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts

University of Wollongong

NSW 2522, Australia



E: (skhorana /at/ uow.edu.au)

W: +61 2 42213810





---------------
ECREA-Mailing list
---------------
This mailing list is a free service from ECREA and Nico Carpentier.
--
To subscribe, post or unsubscribe, please visit
http://www.ecrea.eu/mailinglist
--
ECREA - European Communication Research and Education Association
--
Postal address:
ECREA
Chaussée de Waterloo 1151
1180 Uccle
Belgium
--
Email: (info /at/ ecrea.eu)
URL: http://www.ecrea.eu
---------------