[Commlist] CfP: NECSUS Autumn 2024_#Enough

*CALL FOR PAPERS: NECSUS Autumn 2024_#Enough* – abstracts due 5 March
https://necsus-ejms.org/cfp-autumn-2024_enough/ 
<https://necsus-ejms.org/cfp-autumn-2024_enough/>
How much is enough? Who has enough and who is deprived of it? What is 
the use of limits – and of pushing past them? For this special section 
of NECSUS, we encourage more reflection about the *notion and meaning of 
#enough* and invite media scholars to problematize the notion from 
aesthetic, industrial, environmental, historical, economic and 
(socio)political perspectives.
Like other industries, the media sector runs on overproduction. Whether 
in news journalism, the music industry, or print magazines, media 
companies often put out large volumes of content or copies to maintain a 
competitive presence in the market. At the same time, these new releases 
are programmed to become obsolete in short seasonal cycles, requiring 
more production and faster consumption. Content libraries are constantly 
expanding and require bigger, more efficient data centres, pushing at 
the limits of storing, archiving, and accessing media. Between an 
increasing library of media content and an awareness of the 
environmental cost of hosting digital content, thinking about #Enough 
also connects the material and immaterial dimensions of media 
consumption. *Is there ever enough content? *The critique of 
growth-based economic models and the emergence of perspectives such as 
degrowth (cf. Hickel; Coyle), circular, or ‘doughnut’ economics has 
started to resonate in cultural policy and media sustainability 
discussions. How can these ideas transform media studies and industry 
research in particular? Are regulations like, for instance, carbon 
budgets for media productions viable ways to determine how much is 
enough? What could be the specific contributions of media, and of media 
studies, to broader discussions about limits and sufficiency? *#Enough 
is necessarily also a question about justice*. Global inequality extends 
to media representations and industries, where minoritised voices and 
experimental approaches struggle to break through the volume of 
repetitive content. This question also connects to practices of 
remaking, rebooting, and reusing existing narrative and formats, 
something Martine Beugnet has referred to as Hollywood’s ‘potential 
exhaustion of its own form’ (2017). In a more frugal media landscape, 
what spaces would open – or close – for new visions and underrepresented 
voices?
On the other side of overproduction, concerns about overconsumption 
underpin common anxieties about media and wellbeing. Digital 
technologies and social media have been held responsible for widespread 
mental health issues, prompting several European countries to attempt to 
curb media use, for instance by banning smartphones in schools. In doing 
so, the notion of enough traverses the line discourses of excessive 
media consumption and the construction of a sufficient – healthy – 
‘media diet’. Can a notion of enough help media scholars articulate 
critical stances towards these developments? Questions of excess trouble 
the border between morality and aesthetics, in representation and form. 
From Triangle of Sadness to White Lotus, The Menu to Succession, 
critically acclaimed and highly successful films and television series 
of the past years have highlighted themes of excessive wealth and 
luxury, while also centering characters that do not – but aspire to – 
belong to these worlds of privilege. In doing so, these media examples 
also challenge their own industrial conditions of possibility, in turn 
resonating with larger political discussions about taxation and the 
(re)distribution of wealth. *Can enough become too much? *Contrasting 
this mediated excess, the idea of a more ‘minimalist’ way of living 
resonates through diverse media examples. From television shows like 
Tidying Up with Marie Kondo to highly popular YouTube channels like 
Clutterbug, the mediation of decluttering and (re)organising constructs 
the idea that ‘less’ might be more than enough. At the same time, the 
suggestion to ‘own’ less is looped back into cycles of consumption and 
commodification through products, services, and media promoted as 
crucial in achieving a minimalist lifestyle.
Approaching enough from a labour perspective – beyond but entangled with 
questions of industrial production and consumption – also points to 
emerging strategies and structures of feeling that question the drive 
for endless self-optimisation and productivity. Individual interventions 
like the ‘Email Charter’ by Chris Anderson and Jane Wulf and public 
guidelines like France’s ‘Right to Disconnect’ move the discursive 
framing of work between expectation and exhaustion. Widely reported 
social media trends such as ‘quiet quitting’ and ‘lazy girl jobs’ are 
pitched against the ‘hustle’ or ‘grindset’ as forms of individualised 
resistance  to unrealistic expectations and absent structures of 
support. Rejecting (over)work opens up discussions about current 
economic practices and fits into broader reflections on the political 
value of refusal, recently affirmed by feminist scholar Bonnie Honig. 
*At what point have we worked enough? *Enough – with an exclamation 
point – can also be a resounding political statement, drawing a line 
against the perpetuation of systems of violence, exploitation, 
dispossession, and extraction. It can draw attention to historical 
injustice and start to imagine a different future beyond it. How have 
social movements and activist media understood this call? At the same 
time, the notion of #enough has also become entangled with the populist 
call for more (national) control of economies and borders.
For this special section of NECSUS we welcome contributions that engage 
with the theme #enough in varying media forms. As an interdisciplinary 
journal, we are interested in critical discussions on film, television, 
(audio)visual art, digital and social media, and other media, approached 
from different theoretical, academic, and methodological perspectives. 
Potential topics include but are not limited to:

  * (Over)Production in the media industry
  * Aesthetics of enough, for instance minimalism, reused/found footage,
    re-/upcycle aesthetics, repair culture, small-file media
  * Practices of excessive data collection and storage
  * Excess and restraint as aesthetic modes
  * Media and consumer culture (e.g. advertising)
  * Representations of excess and luxury in different media forms
  * (Over)consumption and its connection to mental health, for instance
    through information overload, choice fatigue, fear of missing out,
    and shortened attention spans
  * Alternative economic models, economies of enough
  * Degrowth and (un)sustainability in cultural sectors
  * Labour and exhaustion, for instance through discourses on overwork
    and ‘quiet quitting’ or the ‘right to disconnect’, downshifting
  * Politics of refusal, civil disobedience, protest

We also invite submissions on the intersection between academic research 
and artistic practice – especially ones drawing excess and scarcity 
conceptually or methodologically. *We look forward to receiving 
abstracts of 300 words, 3-5 bibliographic references, and a short 
biography of 100 words by 5 March 2024 via this **online form 
<https://forms.gle/V7vmYY9Qe4GLoh3z5>**.* On the basis of selected 
abstracts, authors will be invited to submit full manuscripts by 15 July 
2024 (5,000-8,000 words) which will subsequently go through a blind peer 
review process before final acceptance for publication. Please check the 
guidelines at: https://necsus-ejms.org/guidelines-for-submission/ 
<https://necsus-ejms.org/guidelines-for-submission/>
NECSUS also accepts proposals throughout the year for festival, 
exhibition, and book reviews, as well as data papers and proposals for 
guest edited audiovisual essay sections. *Please note that we do not 
accept full manuscripts for consideration without an invitation. *

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