Apologies for any cross-posting.
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*FROM*: Asiascape – Digital Asia
*TOPIC*:Revisiting the Emancipatory Potential of Digital Media in Asia
23-25 January 2014
Leiden University
The academic journal Asiascape – Digital Asia (DIAS), in collaboration
with the Goto-Jones VICI project “Beyond Utopia” funded by the
Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), welcomes
scholars from the area studies, communication sciences, cultural
studies, humanities, and social sciences, as well as from
multi-disciplinary backgrounds, to this international conference on
digital media in Asia.
Abstract
Over the past decade, new forms of information and communication
technologies have shaped the way people relate to each other, engage in
social activities, conduct commerce, and participate in political
processes. The inception of so-called Web 2.0 services such as Facebook
in 2004, Youtube in 2005, and Twitter in 2006, has introduced a degree
of interactivity to communication processes that surpasses that of
previous technologies.
Numerous companies from around the world have since imitated the success
of these large networking, video-sharing, and micro-blogging sites. The
popularity of such interactive digital media has meanwhile generated
much debate regarding the emancipatory potential of these tools – a
debate that has largely focuses on American and European experiences,
and that in its extreme revolves on the one hand around the arguments of
liberal scholars like Clay Shirky or Yochai Benkler, who emphasize the
potential of such technologies to empower citizens, and on the other
hand around the concerns of cultural critics like Evgeny Morozov or
Sherry Turkle, who see these innovations as exploitative, domineering,
and potentially damaging.
This international conference moves such debates to Asia, and confronts
them with the realities of digital media usage in this vibrant region.
How does citizen journalism work in countries like China, Malaysia, or
Singapore, where citizens have constructed information networks through
blogs and tweets that run parallel to official mainstream media, and
where states and ruling parties attempt to control such processes
through sophisticated information and communication technologies? What
are we to make of citizen consultation in light of the Indonesian case,
where politicians use social media to shore up support from online
communities by prompting them to take over social responsibilities that
were originally part of the state’s social service portfolio? How should
we assess the contentious nature of digital media in light of Indian
examples, where such media help coordinate anti-corruption movements
while at the same time entrenching the middle-class interests that
inform these movements? Meanwhile, in Japan how do we gauge the
political and social impact of alternative forms of journalism and novel
forms of protest facilitated by digital media in the wake of the March
2011 triple disaster, as well as the subsequent use of social media as a
platform for revisionist politicians? In South Korea, how do youth
groups come together on international social networking sites and on
local alternatives like Cyworld or me2day as they develop alternatives
to mainstream Korean culture, and what role do smartphones and other
mobile technologies play in these processes?
By analysing such cases, this conference critically asks how we can
overcome dichotomies such as emancipation vs. domination in the study of
digital media, and how we can instead explain the transformative role of
such media in all its complexity.
Conference Themes
The conference will address the questions regarding the emancipatory
potential of digital media in Asia by focusing in particular on issues
such as:
* Citizen journalism in the forms of blogs and micro-blogs,
* Social and political participation through global as well as local
social networking services,
* Coordination of cultural and political activities through new ICT,
such as smartphones, tablet computers, portable gaming devices.
* Knowledge construction, information sharing, and social
bookmarking through wikis and media sharing,
* Social and political critique in digital networks,
* Social and political control through Web 2.0 architecture.
DIAS particularly encourages contributions that approach these issues
from a theoretically informed and empirically grounded perspective, and
that use digital methodologies to study these digital issues.
Deadlines for Abstracts and Papers
Scholars working in the above-mentioned fields are invited to submit
abstracts of proposed papers along with a short biographical note by *1
October 2013*. The organizers will inform applicants of their decision
by mid-October. Conference papers should be submitted by *6 January
2014*, and should not exceed 8000 words, including notes and references.
Publication:
Papers that distinguish themselves through their academic rigor may
later also be submitted for peer-review and publication in Asiascape:
Digital Asia. For submissions, please visit the DIAS editorial
management system.
Registration and Travel
While DIAS does not subsidize travel and accommodation, conference
registration fees will be waived for paper presenters.
*LINK:*
http://www.politicseastasia.com/research/digital-nationalism/international-conference-call-for-papers-revisiting-the-emancipatory-potential-of-digital-media-in-asia/
*
CONTACT:* For questions and submissions, please contact the conference
organizer Dr. Florian Schneider
<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
or the conference manager Mrs. Esther Truijen
<mailto:[log in to unmask]>.
_________________________________________________________________
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Dr Sarah Dauncey
British Academy Mid-Career Fellow & Lecturer in Chinese Studies
School of East Asian Studies
University of Sheffield
http://www.shef.ac.uk/seas/
Honorary Secretary, British Association for Chinese Studies
Co-Editor, Journal of the British Association for Chinese Studies (JBACS)
http://www.bacsuk.org.uk/
6-8 Shearwood Road
Sheffield, S10 2TD
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0)114 22 28436
Fax: +44 (0)114 22 28432
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