[Commlist] CFP 100 Years of the BBC

CFP: One Hundred Years of the BBC

In 2022, one hundred years will have passed since the formation of the 
British Broadcasting Company, later to become the pioneering public 
service broadcaster best known as the BBC. The BBC has had an enormous 
impact on television culture in its first one hundred years, providing a 
blueprint for independent publicly funded broadcasting. The BBC has been 
a testing ground for new developments in broadcasting technology and 
infrastructure. It has provided space for programme makers to innovate 
new forms, as well as to display national traditions - and invent some 
of its own. It has offered important public space to playwrights, 
scientists, politicians, musicians, historians, performers and many more 
thinkers to enlighten, to amuse, to infuriate. Its formative mantra of 
‘inform, educate, entertain’ has undergone many modifications over time 
but these aims remain core to its contemporary ethos. Its goal of 
providing impartial and balanced news, current affairs and analysis has 
been tested numerous times in divisive political climates. It was born 
of a patriarchal, colonialist and elitist view of cultural uplift. How 
has it changed over its long life?

/Critical Studies in Television/ will be marking the centenary of this 
television institution with a series of themed special issues throughout 
2022. Each will explore a distinct feature of the BBC and its work in 
television, providing historical contextualisation, critique and new 
debates on the output, culture and influence of this important 
televisual institution.

We are looking for contributions to these themed issues in one of these 
formats:

  * /Original research articles /(6000 – 8000 words): articles that
    present fresh textual analysis of BBC programmes or content,
    empirical research that can provide a new perspective on the history
    or culture of the BBC, or innovative methodologies or theorisations
    for understanding the historic and contemporary influence of the 
BBC. //
  * /Provocations /– (up to 3000 words) pithy essays that stimulate
    debate on an aspect of the BBC’s television programming, history or
    culture. These do not have to present new research but should
    inspire new ways of thinking about the BBC.//
  * /Interviews – /(up to 5000 words) an edited interview with industry
    professionals who have worked within or alongside the BBC, past or
    present.//
  * Publishers and authors who are planning to publish books relating to
    the BBC in the run-up to and during 2022 can contact Christine
    Geraghty, editor of the book review section, about possible reviews.

The themes for the issues will be as follows:

*Volume 1: BBC Nations and Regions*

In the BBC’s current charter, one of its five public purposes is to 
‘reflect, represent and serve the diverse communities of all of the 
United Kingdom’s nations and regions’. The recent combination of Brexit 
and a global pandemic have revealed deep divisions between the nations 
and regions of the UK. In this febrile context, how might we assess the 
BBC’s current and historical reflections of these diverse communities? 
We are particularly interested in contributions that explore the BBC’s 
role in serving (or not) underrepresented communities within the UK.

*Volume 2: BBC Channels and Brands*

The BBC’s creation of programming and channel brands has been a 
long-term feature of its survival strategy, spreading its public 
purposes further and wider than its original broadcast contexts. This 
volume will explore the ways in which BBC brands are meaningful and 
functional in both UK and in global contexts. We welcome contributions 
that focus on BBC channel brands, or analysis of other forms of branding 
across the BBC, within and between programming.

*Volume 3: Women and the BBC*

Recent controversies around equal pay, misogynistic abuse towards BBC 
personalities and a lack of female representation at the top of the 
corporation suggest that the institution has far to go in matters of 
gender equality. How might we characterise the relationship between 
corporate and on-screen representation of women? And how has the BBC 
responded to changing socio-cultural attitudes and discourses defining 
women over time? We are particularly interested in contributions that 
address the historical and contemporary stories of female workers at the 
BBC, analyses how BBC programming give representation to women's lives 
and serve female audiences, or explore experiences or representations of 
genders and sexualities at the BBC.

*Volume 4: The BBC In the World*

The fifth public purpose in the BBC’s current Charter is that the 
institution should ‘reflect the United Kingdom, its culture and values 
to the world’. This volume will cast a critical eye over this facet of 
the BBC, critically appraising its global reputation. For this volume, 
we are especially interested in submissions that explore the BBC’s 
historical and current relationship with television cultures outside of 
the West. We welcome submissions that explore and critique the BBC in 
post-colonial contexts and in BRICS nations.

Editor for the volume is Dr. Hannah Andrews; if you have any questions, 
then please contact her at (hannah.andrews /at/ edgehill.ac.uk) 
<mailto:(hannah.andrews /at/ edgehill.ac.uk)>. For initial expressions of 
interest in contributing to any of these issues, please senda short (250 
words) abstract and biographical note to Dr. Andrews by *18 December 
2020*.Please make sure you indicate which format (see above) you would 
like your contribution to take. As part of CST’s ongoing commitment to 
publishing new voices, we are particularly interested in expressions of 
interest from Early Career Researchers who would like to submit work 
from PhD projects completed or nearing completion.



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