[Commlist] CfP - Discourse and Communication as propaganda

CfP - Discourse and Communication as propaganda: digital and multimodal 
forms of activism, persuasion and disinformation across ideologies
https://discourseanalysis.net/en/DN24
18-20 May 2020

This conference provides a forum for researchers who seek to analyze, 
challenge, and (re)think the concept and the practice of propaganda in 
the light of contemporary forms of discourse and communication across 
the ideological spectrum.

We invite authors to examine the relationship between concepts such as 
propaganda, ideology, hegemony and discourse in today’s digital 
environments. Both empirical and theoretical contributions are welcome.

The notion of propaganda was seminal to the field of communication 
studies in the beginning of the 20th century. It derives its negative 
connotations from the way mass media have been intentionally used by 
state and corporate actors for partisan interests. Even though the term 
‘propaganda’ may have grown out of fashion – both inside and outside of 
academia – its practices have not.

Notions such as ‘public relations’, ‘advertising’, ‘political 
marketing’, ‘public diplomacy’, ‘political marketing’ and ‘advocacy’ 
have now transplanted propaganda even though they often refer to similar 
discursive strategies of persuasion or (dis)information. As the term 
‘propaganda’ grew less popular new terms emerged up in order to label 
similar communication strategies that shape contemporary discourse and 
communication until this day.

Many critical approaches in discourse studies have treated 
propagandistic modes of communication through the lenses of ‘ideology’, 
‘hegemony’, ‘discourse’ and ‘power’. However, whereas all propaganda is 
ideological, not all ideology manifests itself as propaganda. Likewise, 
whereas all propaganda operates through discourse and communication, not 
all discourse or communication performs the function of propaganda.

Different forms of critical discourse studies have paid attention to 
ideological phenomena, but the term propaganda is remarkably absent from 
this field of inquiry. This may be explained with reference to 
underlying theoretical premises of specific discourse theoretical and 
discourse analytical approaches, a hypothesis that may also be explored 
at this conference.

In a global context marked by ‘a return of the political’, by an 
intensification of political debates across the political spectrum, and 
by a (re-)articulation of old and new political fault lines crossing 
local, regional, national and/or transnational contexts,  the seemingly 
outdated notion of propaganda may provide a useful entry point for 
examining the (partially) strategic modes of communication practiced by 
activists on all sides of the ideological spectrum.

If propaganda is no longer associated exclusively with traditional 
institutional actors such as the state or corporations, the political 
and communicative strategies of social and political actors such as 
eco-activists, AltRight trolls, neoliberal think tanks or the peace 
movement may be (re)thought in terms of propaganda. This brings us back 
to the old question whether (specific forms of) propaganda hinder or 
facilitate democracy. It also leads us to explore uses of digital and 
algorithmic propaganda in contemporary populist projects.

Regardless of the question whether and how the term propaganda is used, 
‘strategies’ of white, black and grey propaganda are practiced on an 
everyday basis while new ways of doing propaganda continue to be 
developed.  In fact, propaganda practices are constantly being adapted 
to specific social, political and technological developments. As new 
technologies become available, the range of actors able to practice 
propaganda expands.

We welcome contributions that focus on the multimodal propaganda 
strategies and material (text, images, video, digital content, digital 
education, algorithms, Virtual Reality) of states, political parties, 
and corporate actors. We equally welcome contributions focusing on the 
communicative activities of social movements, think tanks, algorithms, 
advertising agencies, social media and public relations counselors. All 
abstracts fitting one or more of the following themes will be considered 
but we also leave space for interesting contributions that may not be 
that easy to classify:

    Theme 1: Conceptual and methodological issues for studying activism 
and propaganda
    Theme 2: Historical and contemporary transformations in activism 
and/or propaganda
    Theme 3: Democratic and anti-democratic modes of discourse, 
communication and ideology
    Theme 4: Digital and multimodal forms of activism, persuasion and 
disinformation
    Theme 5: Transdisciplinary dialogues on discourse and communication 
as propaganda and/or activism
    …

We especially welcome papers that rethink the notions of propaganda and 
activism in relation to key concepts in discourse studies. Such notions 
include power, subjectivity, reflexivity, critique, identity, context, 
language use and multimodal communication. Papers may also focus on the 
ethical problems that come with propagandistic activities. For instance, 
what does propaganda mean for notions such as knowledge, political 
correctness, freedom of speech or critical awareness?

As the field of discourse studies is inherently transdisciplinary, we 
welcome authors from disciplines as varied as communication science, 
psychology, sociology, philosophy, literature, media studies and 
linguistics. Likewise, we seek to provide a forum for all methodological 
and theoretical orientations provided that the authors connect with the 
themes outlined in this call for papers.


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Nico Carpentier
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