[csaa-forum] CFP: The Ends of Television

[Melissa Gregg]

> Apologies for cross-posting
>
> ***
>
> The Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA) and the  
> Department of Media Studies of the Universiteit van Amsterdam  
> invite papers for a 3-day conference on
>
> The Ends of Television
>
> Logics/Perspectives/Entanglements
>
>
> Monday June 29 – Wednesday July 1 2009 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands
>
> Keynote speakers:
> Joke Hermes (InHolland, Universiteit van Amsterdam)
> Toby Miller (University of California Riverside)
> Anna McCarthy (NYU)
>
> Conference theme:
> Is TV as we know it dead? Does TV Studies have any relevance in a  
> world of media convergence? Are we at risk of becoming gravediggers  
> of an obsolete medium rather than innovators in a cross-medial  
> regime? The conference will address some of the central frames  
> through which TV has been analyzed to test their relevance in an  
> age where digitalization and convergence is redrawing the  
> boundaries of media and of disciplines. Rather than accept the  
> narrative of obsolescence or the nostalgia of seclusion, the  
> conference aims at seriously analyzing both the contemporary  
> specificity of TV and the challenges thrown up by new developments  
> in technology and theory. For example: What is the specificity of  
> the TV image in an environment suffused with moving images? Has the  
> spectator of TV changed in a media world that begs “interaction”?  
> How does the relevance of ideology-critique and propaganda fare in  
> the age of surveillance? Is the educational role of TV obsolete  
> with the triumph of market logics?
>
> Depending on how these and other questions are answered, TV Studies  
> must rethink its own status as a discipline, beginning with its own  
> position vis-à-vis Film Studies and New Media Studies. Do such  
> separations still hold analytical purchase? What old concepts need  
> reformulation, and what areas of study (e.g. cultural studies,  
> philosophy, sociology, anthropology, political science, art  
> history) can we both borrow from and enrich?
>
> Contributions are invited which take a stand on the relevance of  
> TV, and TV Studies, through substantial and close analyses of  
> specific dimensions of television:
>
> (Medium) Specificity
> If we are witnessing the end of TV as we know it, what is it being  
> replaced with? What form will TV take in the future, and what are  
> its aesthetic qualities? What is the ontology of the televisual  
> image and sound once it has been digitized?  How does the aural  
> experience of contemporary television sets enhance or affect  
> television watching? If “flow” and “liveness” was what  
> distinguished TV from film in the 20th century, how does this hold  
> true in the 21st? What effects does the change from flow and  
> liveness to the archive have for our understanding of the medium?  
> How do TV, film and new media relate to each other in the new  
> constellation?
>
> (Functional) Logics
> How does TV function? Questions of broad and narrow-casting, the  
> blurring of genres and media (cross media), the fluidity of  
> audiences, the multiple settings of TV reception, etc – all these  
> dimensions point to an acceleration of change in the logics of TV’s  
> mode of functioning. What broad changes can be identified in the  
> logics of TV, and how do they relate to larger shifts in  
> contemporary societies, technologies, and communication patterns?  
> More specifically, what is the impact of these changes when we  
> consider the purposeful use of TV? What will become of advertising  
> when television goes digital? What is the relationship between  
> branding and television’s functional logics? What becomes of  
> propaganda in a multi-channel environment? In what sense has TV’s  
> governmental logic changed during the last decade? How does media  
> literacy function in knowledge societies?
>
> (Conceptual) Changes
> If the logics of TV are shifting, how might they be studied in the  
> contemporary context? What new, or different perspectives can be  
> brought to bear in intellectually engaging with the medium? Do the  
> established (analytical) distinctions of production, reception,  
> textual analysis, suffice? Do more dimensions need to be added, or  
> do the existing distinctions need to be broadened, sharpened or  
> reviewed, keeping in mind the changing logics of television? – e.g.  
> in the context of convergence, and multimedia interaction, such as  
> UGC, how do terms like “production” and “reception” change their  
> meaning?
>
> (Transdisciplinary) Entanglements
> Given that the logics of television’s mode of functioning, and the  
> perspectives of TV Studies need analysis and change, in what way do  
> these changes suggest an entangled and cross-fertilized re- 
> definition of the field itself, its ends (goals), and its future  
> development? On the one hand, how might a reviewing of television  
> and its modes of analysis enrich other disciplines (for example  
> Visual Culture, a re-defined Art History, Film History, Media  
> Archaeology)? On the other, what might TV Studies gain from  
> strategically borrowing and re-working theories and concepts from  
> other fields (Sociology, Political Philosophy, Philosophy of Law,  
> Cultural Analysis)? What contributions can more recent paradigms  
> like cognitivism or network theory make? Can TV studies borrow  
> terms from chaos theory like emergence, non-linearity, or  
> attractors, and what do they contribute to the already existing  
> theoretical vocabulary?
>
> Proposal deadline: proposals for papers and/or panels should be  
> sent to asca-fgw at uva.nl before February 26 2009.
>
> Organising committee: Sudeep Dasgupta, Marijke de Valck, Jaap  
> Kooijman, Jan Teurlings.
>
>
>
> Jan Teurlings, PhD. • Lecturer Television Studies • Department of  
> Media and Culture • University of Amsterdam • Turfdraagsterpad 9 •  
> 1012XT Amsterdam • The Netherlands • Tel: +31 (0)20 525 73 26 • Fax: 
> +31 (0)20 525 45 99 • Email: j.a.teurlings at uva.nl • http:// 
> www.mediastudies.nl
>
> "In many respects we are closer today to the questions of the 19th  
> century than to the revolutionary history of the 20th"
>
> (A. Badiou, 2008)
>
>
>

Dr. Melissa Gregg
ARC Australian Postdoctoral Fellow
Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies
Fourth Floor, Forgan Smith Tower
The University of Queensland
QLD Australia 4072
CRICOS provider number: 00025B

p  + 61 7 3346 9762
m + 61 4 0859 9359
f   + 61 7 3365 7184

<http://cccs.uq.edu.au/index.html?page=16194&pid=61040>




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