The Fan Studies Network

** Call for Papers for the 5th Edinburgh International Film Audience Conference (EIFAC), 27th – 28th March 2014, Edinburgh **

Edinburgh International Film Audience Conference (EIFAC) returns in 2014 with a new conference team but still upholding its predecessors’  focus on exciting audience research taking place within academic film studies and within the film industry. The two-day conference will shine the spotlight on film cultures and film audiences by showcasing an expanding pool of scholarship, which moves away from classical textual modes of research to include empirical fieldwork. The event will debate how different methodologies and perspectives can help further our understanding of the most important people in the world of film – the audience. There is a lot to be learned from other subject areas, therefore, this year sees the call for papers reach out to non-film disciplines by encouraging scholars in television and game studies to share their empirical research.The conference has been praised for creating an arena where new and experienced researchers in academia can come together to share their enthusiasm for audience research in a friendly and supportive environment. Whilst the conference may well appeal primarily to academics, it invites contribution from those working in the film industries (production, distribution, exhibition, policy-making).

** Papers **
All papers should be concerned with empirical research on screen audiences. We are particularly interested in papers that explore the following issues/themes, however, we also welcome papers on other interesting topics:

– The challenges facing the empirical researcher
– Film festival audiences and communities
– Statistical literacy in empirical research
– Researching child and youth audiences
– Rethinking cinephilia, developing audience taxonomies
– Contemporary cinema audiences
– Film, fandom and merchandise
– Cult film and cult audiences
– Digital and online film cultures
– Transnational film audiences
– Film exhibition and the construction of audience
– Film policy and audiences
– Exhibition and/or consumption of short film
– Empirical research methods in television studies
– Empirical research methods in game studies
– Work in Progress

We continue to offer a showcase for work in progress. This is a great opportunity for Masters and PhD students to share research they are working on and receive helpful feedback from their peers. This work will be displayed in our social area throughout the conference in either printed poster or electronic poster format (a short PowerPoint slide show or similar multimedia format).

THE CFP DEADLINE IS: 5pm on Friday 29th November 2013

** Submitting Abstracts **
Paper proposals should include title, abstract, 3-5 key bibliographical references, and the name/s of the presenter/s and institutional affiliation/s, which collectively should be no more than 300 words. We also ask potential presenters to include a short biography (maximum 100 words).  Work in progress proposals should include title, short abstract, 2 key bibliographical references, and the name of the presenter and institutional affiliation, which should collectively be no more than 200 words. We also ask work in progress presenters to include a short biography (maximum 50 words).

Abstracts should be submitted as virus-free Word or rtf attachments to Ana Moraes (abstracts@filmaudiencesconference.co.uk) no later than 5pm on Friday 29th November 2013.  Please note the category you are submitting for in the email subject line (‘Paper Proposal’ or ‘Work in Progress Proposal’). External referees will review abstracts and all contributors will be notified of the outcome by early January 2014. Abstracts that are longer than prescribed will not be considered.

We differ from many other conferences by providing delegates with copies of all papers. Therefore, we require papers all papers in advance of the conference by 5pm on Friday 14th March 2014. If you are unable to commit to this date, we ask that you do not submit an abstract. Further details of the final paper submission process will be sent to successful presenters.

For more information visit: http://www.filmaudiencesconference.co.uk
A printable version of the CfP is available here: http://www.filmaudiencesconference.co.uk/images/eifac2014_cfp.pdf
Abstracts to be submitted to: abstracts@filmaudiencesconference.co.uk

The politics and law of Doctor Who

 Symposium Announcement and First Call for Papers

 Friday 5^th September 2014

University of Westminster

Doctor Who is the BBC’s longest-running drama television series and the world’s longest-running science fiction series.  The massive public attention devoted to the show’s 50^th anniversary and to its choice of new lead actor confirms that the programme merits serious academic attention.  Politics, law and constitutional questions often feature prominently in Doctor Who stories, whether in the form of the Time Lords’ guardianship of the universe, the Doctor’s encounters with British Prime Ministers, or the array of governance arrangements in Dalek society.   The show’s politics is also an adventure through time, from the internationalising moralism of the Barry Letts-Terrance Dicks years, the dark satire of Andrew Cartmel’s period as script editor and the egalitarianism of the Russell T. Davies era.  Yet the politics and law of Doctor Who have yet to be the subject of wide-ranging scholarship.  Proposals for 20 minute papers are therefore invited for a symposium on 5^th September 2014, to be held in the University of Westminster’s historic Regent Street building just metres away from BBC headquarters.  Possible subjects for papers might include, but are by no means limited to:

• Doctor Who’s ideology
• The Doctor’s political morality
• Comparison of politics of Doctor Who with politics of other science fiction
• The merits/demerits of Harriet Jones as Prime Minister
• Doctor Who and devolution
• Portrayals of British sovereigns in Doctor Who
• Doctor Who’s politics of class, gender and sexuality
• Fan responses to “political” Doctor Who stories
• International law, intergalactic law and non-interference
• Globalisation and corporate domination
• Satire in Doctor Who
• Politics and law in audio adventures, comic books and novels
• War crimes and genocide
• The politics of UNIT and Torchwood
• The will of villains to secure power
• Political history and political nostalgia in Doctor Who
• Doctor Who’s construction of British national identity

Abstracts should be 250 words in length, and should be accompanied by a 100-word biography of the author.  Abstracts should be sent to nicold@wmin.ac.uk – deadline for receipt of abstracts 17 January 2014.

Call for Papers: Producers and Audiences

International Conference

Media and Communication Research, Lund University, Sweden, March 20th 2014.Organisers Professor Annette Hill, Dr Tina Askanius, Joanna Doona and Carolina Martinez.

Media production and culture are intricately connected. Producers create, produce, distribute and sell content, formats and brands for international audiences.  We engage and disengage with creative content, formats and brands, as publics, viewers, listeners, fans, consumers and participants. And media producers and audiences can switch roles, leading a double life as creators and consumers, producers and users. Yet despite these connections, production and audience studies traditionally remain separate spheres. Recent developments in the business of media and cultural industries highlight shifts in production, distribution, economics and cultural experiences across a range of content from television, film, radio, music, print, digital and mobile media. How can production and audience research allow space for broader questions about culture and our engagement with it? This conference explores challenges for production and audience research, theory and practice. The aim is to examine the complex interplay between production and culture in global, political, industrial and social contexts.

The conference follows three areas of enquiry in media, communication and cultural studies: relations between producers and audiences; theories, methods and practices; and creative content for contemporary mediascapes. Areas of research enquiry include:

1.     Political, social, economic and cultural relations between producers and audiences

2.     Production and audience theories, methods and practices

3.     Empirical research in production and/or culture across diverse genres and content, including television, film, radio, music, print, digital and mobile media

4.     Fans and anti-fans

5.     International formats for global audiences

The schedule includes a combination of keynote addresses, pre-constituted panels, and open panels. Confirmed speakers include Professor John Corner (Leeds University, UK), Professor Peter Dahlgren (Lund University, Sweden), Julie Donovan (International Formats Consultant), Professor Annette Hill (Lund University, Sweden) Professor Vicki Mayer (Tulane University, USA), Jane Roscoe (Head of International Content for SBS Australia), Professor Jeanette Steemers (University of Westminster, UK), Douglas Wood (Head of Research, Shine Group).

Please submit abstracts of 300 words in English by December 9th 2013 topac2014@kom.lu.se. For further information please consult our websitewww.kom.lu.se/pac2014. There is a registration fee of 650 SEK (70 Euros) that covers food and drink for the day and an evening buffet.

CFP: 

The call for papers for the “V Congreso Internacional Latina de Comuncación Social” is now open. We would like to invite you to send your proposals for the session on Fandom Generated Content that will take place the 4th of December in Tenerife (Spain).
In the contemporary media landscape, the figure of the fan as a new communicative agent is becoming more prominent. In an age marked by the web 2.0, the hybridization of forms and contents, and the technological convergence, the fan is an active player who participates, creates and collaborates in the construction of any type of media content.
Through a multidisciplinary approach to Fandom Studies, this session aims to explore the discursive production of this collective of people from different perspectives of Communication Studies as a framework. We would like to answer questions such as: What is the role of fans in the commercial communication of brands? In which ways can the fandom of a particular fictional work contribute to the expansion of the original text? What types of works and sources are used by fans in order to construct their own messages?

We would like to receive contributions on these and any other topics related to contents generated by fans. The deadline for the submission of abstracts is the 31st October, 2013. If you are interested, please send a 300-word abstract with your name and university affiliation to jlozano@uloyola.es.
For more information, please visit the website of the congress:  http://www.revistalatinacs.org/13SLCS/2013_convocatoria_5_congreso.html#512