[csaa-forum] Call for Papers (Special Issue of MIA - Public Spheres and the Media in India)

[Sukhmani Khorana]

Call for Papers
Media International Australia No. 152 (August 2014)
Public Spheres and the Media in India
Theme Editors: Sukhmani Khorana, Vibodh Parthasarthi, and Pradip Thomas
The concept of the public sphere has travelled widely, and the mediation of the public sphere has attracted much scholarly attention: the concept has been critiqued, and there have been attempts to invest it with meanings inflected by context or to propose understandings shaped by global and local challenges.
This special issue of MIA will take a variety of approaches to apprehending mediated public spheres in India, which remains a large, imperfect democracy that is home to one of the most diverse media environments anywhere in the world. The history of the public sphere there has followed a trajectory very different from its Habermasian views, characterised less by individual participation than by caste groups and vernacular associations, and the acceptance and legitimisation of colonial authorities. Colonial governmentality and the post-independent state have played an important role in shaping the public sphere - although the market increasingly provides opportunities for multiple mediations of public spheres.
A variety of public spheres have emerges that reflect the diversity of Indian publics, who contribute to and are in turn shaped by a variety of mediations - from televised talk and music shows to news shows, citizen journalism and community radio. There are also opportunities to explore the communicative basis for the development of public spheres nurtured by mass movements such as the Right to Information movement in India, which arguably has spawned a nationwide awakening of the information rights of citizens.
This issue of MIA will explore the complex nature of evolving, emerging, mediated public spheres in India. Papers addressing any of the following questions are welcome:

 *   What are some of the features of emerging, mediated public spheres in India?
 *   What is the nature of mediated publics in India?
 *   What is the relationship between mediated publics and social change in India?
 *   Is the 'argumentative' Indian, represented by talk show audiences, representative of a public sphere or does this characterisation represent a diluted notion of the public sphere?
 *   How are public spheres being formed in the context of online media?
 *   What is there to read into pirate public spheres in India?
 *   What is the relationship between communication and information rights movements in India and public spheres?
 *   What role does the state play in forming or inhibiting the growth of public spheres in India?
 *
Please send a 200-300 word abstract and a brief bio note to Sukhmani Khorana (skhorana at uow.edu.au<mailto:skhorana at uow.edu.au>) by 15 October 2013.
Final articles (of no more than 5,000 words) will be due by 30 January 2014.


Dr. Sukhmani Khorana
Lecturer, Media and Communication
Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts
University of Wollongong
NSW 2522, Australia

E: skhorana at uow.edu.au<mailto:skhorana at uow.edu.au>
W: +61 2 42213810


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