Major International Communications Conference to be held in Dublin June 2013

Crises, ‘Creative Destruction’ and the Global Power and Communication Orders

IAMCR 2013 Conference, Dublin City University, Dublin, 25-29 June 2013

The conference theme centres round the concepts of crisis and “creative destruction”, with connotations of historically-rare periods of intensified flux and challenge, accompanied by all-round or multi-dimensional processes of innovation.

Thus, this theme invites reflections and papers addressing whether or how the current deep economic/financial crisis and its attendant gales of “creative destruction” may engender various shifts in the geo-political and communication order. Examples include considerations of whether and how the current crisis may serve to:

.a) Reshape the roles, operations and key features of mediated communication services,institutions and practices, as well as enhancing the role of social media forms and practices;

.b) Amplify tendencies or shifts towards new geo-political configurations, including, including an enhanced role for the communication and cultural industries in the operation of global power and hegemony.

.c) Accelerate change in the nexus of ‘new’ and ‘mature’ media institutions and their associated practices, cultural forms, and and policy frameworks;

.d) Accelerate the search for new and more relevant theories and concepts in the expanding and rapidly diffusing field concerned with the study of mediated communication.

For more information:

http://iamcr2013dublin.com/
Call for papers:

http://iamcr2013dublin.com/call-for-papers

Challenging Orthodoxy – The Political Economy of the Left Press: Content, Distribution and Audience

Round Table Discussion – Anarchist Bookfair 2012

The 2012 anarchist bookfair hosted an interesting discussion on the Irish alternative media, entitled ‘Old Media in the Age of the Internet‘ the talk focused on the continued relevance of left wing print media in the internet age.  The discussion looked at issues of production, including content and aesthetics, the role of radical publications, the relationship between the publication and its audience, and distribution. The session also included some discussion on Irish mainstream journalism and the lack of space therein for left wing ideas or working class representation.  This is a brief report of some of the major issues of the  discussion, focusing on content, audience and distribution, the entire discussion can be watched below.

Kicking off the 2011 Revolts in the age of the Networked Individual: Andrew Flood (Workers Solidarity Movement)

In an long review of  Paul Mason’s new book  Why It’s Kicking Off Everywhere Andrew Flood of the WSM discusses some important aspects of the changes in communications structure  in the last number of years, and his reflections of how those changes have affected politics and activism. This review is extremely interesting not only for the insights into the book itself but also for the examples of the activist use of communications tools as experienced by the author himself.

Here critical media review will highlight some of the more communication specific aspects of the review, including Andrew’s own experiences and the theoretical section on the ‘networked individual’. The original review is of course much less media centric than these short extracts and as such should be read to be fully appreciated.