The Official Newsletter for the Media Ecology Association
July 2020 Newsletter
MEA Successful Convention
Last month we had our first online Convention of the MEA, and it was a full success thanks to the hard work of convention organizer and Vice President Peggy Cassidy and her excellent team at Adelphi University, along with Paul Soukup, MEA Treasurer and now Zoom captain, plus Matt Thomas, MEA Historian, who turned our website into a convention space. Thank you to our online convention subcommittee and everyone who participated in and attended #MEA2020.
The subcommittee which helped move the convention online consisted of Carolin Aronis, Julia M. Hildebrand, Lance Strate, Mike Plugh, Thom Gencarelli, Fernando Gutierrez, Matt Thomas, Paul Soukup, and of course Peggy Cassidy.
Thank you to all who organized, presented, contributed, and joined our first virtual convention!
MEA President’s Address at the 21st Annual Convention
Watch the recording of MEA President Paolo Granata’s Address, Navigating the Waters: Choices and Challenges for an Equitable and Inclusive Techno-Human Ecosystem.
The Twenty-Second Annual Convention of the Media Ecology Association - Call For Papers
THE MEDIA ECOLOGY ASSOCIATION (MEA) invites the submission of abstracts of papers and proposals for panels for presentation at its 22th Annual Convention, which will be held from 8 to 11 July, 2021 at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The deadline for submission is 1 November 2020.
The MEA convention provides in its annual meeting an opportunity for the community of academics and professionals to exchange experiences and ideas in a friendly environment. MEA convention addresses a wide diversity of topics in thematic sections, panels and working groups. We encourage submissions that explore approaches from different fields of knowledge and social practices. We are interested in papers, thematic panels, roundtable discussion panels, creative projects, performance sessions, and other proposals of interest to media ecologists.
We also propose a single central theme to be explored throughout the conference with the aim of generating and exploring multiple perspectives. This is accomplished through plenary and special sessions. The central theme for 2021 focuses on Dystopic Futures. Not all submissions have to address the central theme.
THE THEME OF THE 2021 CONVENTION is Dystopic Futures: Media Ecology in an Algorithm Society. Dystopian societies are represented in a variety of science fiction works as an effort to predict pessimistic consequences of our current practices. Films, books and other forms of art set their narratives in the future, but not in our present culture. However, nowadays we are living in a sort of dystopic present with undesirable and frightening realities. In addition to our natural, environmental, political, ethical, cultural, health and social problems, we have to deal with issues brought by technological advances. We are living in a Technopoly (Postman, 1992), or in what some recent authors call Algorithmic Society, “a society organized around social and economic decision-making by algorithms, robots, and AI agents, who not only make decisions but also, in some cases, carry them out.” (Balkin 2016). What kind of dystopia can we envisage as consequence of our dystopic present?
General topics of interest related to the convention theme (but not limited to):
- Fake news, and social media: discursive breakdown and political consequences.
- Robots and transhumanism
- Algorithmic media: data mining, subjectivity modelling and decision-making
- Big Data, machine learning, AI, and society
- Limits of AI development: is it reasonable to talk about an AI take over?
- Movies and literature: mapping different kinds of dystopias.
- Pandemics, economical crash, irreversible climate changes and other disasters: what now?
- Any new (and better) world order on the horizon? Is not being dystopian nowadays possible?
- Media regulation is still at stake? In what sense and by what means?
- Discourse and education in the era of technology hegemony.
- Politics, Health, Citizenship, and Media
- Disinformation, censorship, and propaganda
- Crazy talk, Stupid talk in digital media
- Orality and digital literacy in a dystopic world
- Arts, technology, and cultural legacy
- Utopia, dystopia and Media Ecology studies
GUIDELINES FOR SUBMISSION
Please submit paper and panel proposals, in English, by November 1, 2020 to MEA2021Convention@gmail.com. A maximum of two submissions per author will be accepted.
Authors who wish their papers to be considered for the Top Paper or Top Student Paper award must indicate this on their submission(s).
Submission Guidelines for paper and panel proposals:
- Include title(s), abstract(s) (maximum 250 words), and contact information for each participant.
- Outline, as relevant, how your paper or panel will fit with the convention theme.
- Authors with papers submitted as part of a panel proposal or as a paper proposal that wish to be considered for Top Paper or Top Student Paper must send the completed paper to the convention planner by May 15, 2021.
Submission guidelines for manuscripts eligible for MEA award submissions:
- Manuscripts should be 4,000–6,000 words (approximately 15 to 25 double-spaced pages)
- Include a cover page with your institutional affiliation and other contact information.
- Include an abstract (maximum 150 words).
INFORMATION
Please direct questions to Adriana Braga, MEA2021Convention@gmail.com. For more on the Media Ecology Association, visit https://www.media-ecology.org.
“Gender and Media Ecology” - Call for Papers: Special Issue of Explorations in Media Ecology
Call for Papers: Invited Special Issue on Gender and Media Ecology, Explorations in Media Ecology
Guest Editors: Julia M. Hildebrand (hildebjm@eckerd.edu), Julia C. Richmond (richmondj@rowan.edu)
We welcome contributions for an invited Special Issue on “Gender and Media Ecology” to be published in Explorations in Media Ecology: https://www.intellectbooks.com/explorations-in-media-ecology.
This special issue seeks research contributions that explore the intersections of gender and media ecology. According to McLuhan, “the hybrid or the meeting of two media is a moment of truth and revelation from which new form is born” (1964: 63). The analytical bridging of media ecology and gender studies can be such a revelatory meeting. Here, we also include related research in feminist theory and feminist technoscience for producing fruitful frictions. What could the resulting subfields of “gendered-media ecology” and “feminist media ecology” contribute to our understanding of media as environments and environments as media? This special issue aims to establish a forum for media ecologists, in which the gendered dimensions of media extensions and environments can be explored.
For more information, including relevant topic areas, please consult the full Call for Papers available here: https://www.media-ecology.org/Gender-and-Media-Ecology-CFP
Important Dates:
- Abstract submission (300 words): August 20, 2020
- Manuscript submission: October 15, 2020
- Notifications: November 30, 2020
- Final manuscript submission: January 15, 2021
- Target publication date: May, 2021
Please email your abstract (300 words) and a short biographical note to Julia M. Hildebrand via hildebjm@eckerd.edu by August 20; subject line: “Gender and Media Ecology.”
Women & Media Ecology
Women & Media Ecology had several successful organized sessions through the convention: Women and Media Ecologies, Reshaping Home and Families, Experiences of Women in the Field of Media Ecology, Women in Media Ecology Coffee, the Womxn, Language, Technology virtual exhibit, and Meet the Artists.
Big thanks to all sessions’ presenters and organizers (by alphabetic first name order): Adriana Braga, Angelina Malenda, Adeena Karasick, Bernadette Ann Bowen, Carolin Aronis, Elaine Kahn, Jacqueline McLeod Rogers, Julia Hildebrand, Laura Trujillo Liñán, Sarah Falco, and Susan B. Barnes.
Thanks also to many supportive attendees.
Interested to join such initiatives in the 2021 convention or become part of this evolving community? Please see the PowerPoint, available here, that was presented at the Women & Media Ecology Coffee for sources and ways to connect.
Working Group for Increasing Inclusivity
A Working Group for Increasing Inclusivity within Media Ecology and MEA has started to form in the last few weeks. Following a special workshop in the convention, organized by Carolin Aronis (University of Colorado, Boulder), Peggy Cassidy (Adelphi University), Rachel Armamentos (Fordham University), and Bernadette Ann Bowen (Bowling Green State University) — sixteen MEA members volunteered to become new members of this group. Three of them stepped forward to lead the group. The new group members include board members, faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, all from different institutions and countries, and some are more new to the MEA while others are long standing members.
Multiple issues to strengthen MEA and the Media Ecology as a field of study were identified through the convention session (thank you for all contributors!). Currently, the three leaders are meeting with board member Carolin Aronis to create goals and objectives that will align with the vision of MEA. The Working Group is expected to start its work and activities in August 2020. More details will be shared in the August Newsletter.
MEA members who would like to volunteer, or provide any insight, please write to carolin.aronis@colostate.edu.
Internet Officer Report
The Internet Officer Report, provided by Carolin Aronis, is available in full here (Keynote file). For feedback and comments, please email carolin.aronis@colostate.edu.
2020 Massey Lectures
Ronald J. Deibert — one of the keynote speakers at our 2014 convention and winner of both the MEA Jacques Ellul and Neil Postman awards — will deliver this year’s Massey Lectures, titled Reset: Reclaiming the Internet for Civil Society. Deibert is the founder and director of Citizen Lab, a research outfit based at the University of Toronto, which studies technology, surveillance and censorship. His Massey Lectures will focus on the societal impact of the internet and social media.
Are you interested in media ecology and have some questions about it? Are you working on a study related to media ecology and searching for advice? Are you an instructor looking for a media ecology expert to invite as a virtual guest speaker to one of your classes?
Get in touch with us! We are happy to schedule a “virtual coffee” appointment with you. Simply fill out the form below to set up a short call or virtual meeting with a scholar from the MEA.
The format is open to all. We especially encourage students and early-career scholars interested in media ecology to get in touch with us.
Do you have a background in media ecology and would like to volunteer for virtual coffee meetings with those looking to learn more about it? Send an email to Julia M. Hildebrand.
Arrange a Virtual Coffee appointment on our website.
Call for Submissions for Explorations in Media Ecology Vol. 19
All articles submitted should be original work and must not be under consideration by other publications.
Explorations in Media Ecology, the journal of the Media Ecology Association, accepts submissions that extend our understanding of media (defined in the broadest possible terms), that apply media ecological approaches and/or that advance media ecology as a field of inquiry.
As an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary publication, EME welcomes contributions embracing diverse theoretical, philosophical and methodological approaches to the study of media and processes of mediation through language, symbols, codes, meaning and processes of signification, abstracting and perception; art, music, literature, aesthetics and poetics; form, pattern and method; materials, energy, information, technology and technique; mind, thought, emotion, consciousness, identity and behavior; groups, organizations, affiliations, communities; politics, economics, religion, science, education, business and the professions; societies and cultures; history and the future; contexts, situations, systems and environments; evolution and ecology; the human person, human affairs and the human condition; etc.
EME publishes peer-reviewed scholarly articles, essays, research reports, commentaries and critical examinations, and includes several special features. Our Pedagogy Section focuses on teaching strategies and resources, pedagogical concerns and issues relating to media ecology education; we are particularly interested in articles that share great ideas for teaching (GIFTs) media ecology in the classroom. The Probes Section features short items that are exploratory or provocative in nature. Creative writing on media ecological themes can be found in our Poetry Section. Questions and matters of concern to media ecology scholars are taken up in our Forum Section. And our Review Section includes individual book reviews and review essays.
EME is a refereed journal. Strict anonymity is accorded to both authors and referees. References and citations should follow the Harvard Referencing system, and the journal otherwise follows standard British English for spelling and punctuation.
Submissions can be uploaded online at: https://callisto.newgen.co/intellect/index.php/EME/submissions
Direct inquiries to
MEA @ NCA 2020
The convention, “Communication at the Crossroads,” is scheduled to be held in Indianapolis, IN from November 19–22, 2020.
The 2020 NCA convention theme, “Communication at the Crossroads,” suggests an emphasis on intra-disciplinary collaboration and exploration. Media ecology is situated to explore communication in this way as a metadiscipline that studies the ways in which human action shapes and is shaped by our media environments. The term “media” is broadly construed in the field and includes but is not limited to communication, technology, technique, orality and literacy, the arts, economics, education, ethics, etc. Thus, media ecology explores the conditions of human experience made possible by the complex patterns of interaction within and among our symbolic-material environments. These complex patterns of interaction represent a crossroads of sorts in an environment Neil Postman characterized by the phrase “information glut.”
“Communication at the Crossroads” also suggests the importance of our many human connections during uncertain times. The present circumstances are indeed a sort of crossroads, and we find ourselves navigating a very uncertain path together. The many ideas represented in media ecology may help our communities to address these challenges and choose a better path forward. Submissions related to our current circumstances, be they related to pandemic and public health, news coverage, online education, or the symbolic and ritual practices of community, are welcome.
Call for the 2022 Annual Convention Host
The MEA is currently looking for a host for the Twenty-Third Annual Convention of the Media Ecology Association in 2022. If you are interested in hosting, please visit our website and email our Executive Secretary Fernando Gutiérrez at secretary@media-ecology.net.
Donate to MEA through AmazonSmile
When you order through AmazonSmile, the AmazonSmile Foundation will donate 0.5% of the purchase price of eligible products to the charitable organization of your choice.”
To use it, go to smile.amazon.com and sign in as you usually do. Directly under the search bar, you will find a pull-down for supported charities. Search for and select Media Ecology Association.
MEA Member News and Achievements
Monday Night Webinars - The McLuhan Institute
Hosted by MEA president, Paolo Granata, these webinars run from 8:00–10:00 Eastern Time on Monday nights.
The idea is simple. In response to the state of physical distancing and isolation, it’s time to bring back the McLuhan’s tradition of weekly Monday Night sessions in a brand new format: The Monday Night Webinars!
In a playful, relaxed, and experimental online format, a panel of participants — academics, artists, designers, raconteurs, innovators, and thinkers — will explore the mosaic of the metaphoric global village in light of the current global crisis, as a source of knowledge and inspiration.
Marshall McLuhan Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1394898027486287
The McLuhan Institute YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjVLgst11Hs
CALL FOR NEWSLETTER CONTENT
To submit your news to In Medias Res, the official monthly newsletter of the Media Ecology Association, members can click here for the submission form.
We are looking for news that is relevant to the members of MEA. This might include member achievements (e.g., journal publications, books, creative works, etc.), awards received, upcoming relevant conferences, recent books that MEA members should be aware of, web content that might interest MEA members, news about upcoming EME issues, calls for submissions, etc.
The deadline for submissions to be included in the next month’s newsletter is the 28th of every month at 5 p.m. Eastern Time.
