October 2011 - Air-L - lists.aoir.org

Canadian Postdoc Fellowship in Online Social Media for International Candidates
by Anatoliy Gruzd 18 Oct '11

18 Oct '11

The Social Media Lab (http://SocialMediaLab.ca) at the School of Information Management, Dalhousie University in beautiful Halifax, Canada is expanding our research of how online social media and other web 2.0 technologies are changing the ways people communicate and disseminate information. We are looking for a post-doctoral candidate in Library and Information Science, Computer Science, Communication Studies or a related discipline. Candidates with experience and/or interest in infographics, online data visualizations and web apps are encouraged to apply. The focus of the post-doctoral research will be on how the advent of social media is changing and shaping modern political discourse online and on how, in general, it is changing the way people communicate, gather and disseminate information online. The total value of the fellowship is CAN $36,500 (taxable in Canada). If selected, the Social Media Lab and Dalhousie University will issue you a Letter of Invitation which will allow you to apply for this fellowship. Final approval of this 1-year, non-renewable fellowship is subject to a decision by the Canadian Government. To Qualify Applicants must: - be citizens of one of the following countries: Mexico, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Norway, Russia, or Switzerland. (Applicants who have obtained Canadian citizenship or applied for permanent residency in Canada are not eligible for an award.) - have completed a Ph.D. degree within the last 3 years or have completed the Ph.D. degree requirements before the beginning of the award. Any interested and qualified candidates must first contact Dr. Anatoliy Gruzd (gruzd(a)dal.ca) and attach a copy of their CV for review by Monday, October 24, 2011. If selected, Dr. Gruzd will work with you to draft your research proposal and help you submit the final application by November 12, 2011. -- Anatoliy Gruzd, PhD Assistant Professor School of Information Management Faculty of Management Faculty of Computer Science Dalhousie University Canada Phone: 902-494-6119 Fax: 902-494-2451 E-mail: gruzd(a)dal.ca Research Lab: http://SocialMediaLab.ca Homepage: http://AnatoliyGruzd.com Twitter: http://twitter.com/dalprof

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2nd Call for Papers MEA Convention, June 7-10, 2012, Manhattan College, Riverdale, NY
by Janet Sternberg 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Second Call for Papers The Thirteenth Annual Convention of the Media Ecology Association The Crossroads of the Word June 7-10, 2012 Manhattan College Riverdale, New York *Extended Deadline for Submissions:* *December 15, 2011* Times Square, at the junction of Broadway and Seventh Avenue in New York City, has often been referred to as the "Crossroads of the World." In fact, New York City itself can be considered a crossroads of the world. New York Harbor is home to Ellis Island, the main point of entry for the "huddled masses" who came to the United States in search of a better life, particularly as part of the "great immigration" of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and who became part of America's great "melting pot." The city's five boroughs are home to the most diverse population of any city on earth, with virtually every culture and language group represented. New York is also a crossroads of the media/mass media world: home to the U.S. corporate headquarters of almost all of our major multinational media conglomerates; home to Silicon Alley; and the indisputable news and information capital of the United States. It must be added, too, that the way we understand, analyze, and make sense of our world and all things in it is through our human language, in its spoken, written, and print forms. That is to say, our world is all about words. And at this juncture in the history of human civilization, in which people speak of a "post-literate culture," after media ecologist Walter J. Ong, S. J., subtitled his book /Orality and Literacy/ "the Technologizing of the Word," and media ecologist Jacques Ellul wrote /The Humiliation of the Word/, we can perhaps say that we stand at a "Crossroads of the /Word/." The Thirteenth Annual Convention of the Media Ecology Association invites papers, thematic panels, roundtable discussion panels, creative projects, performance sessions, and other proposals exploring, extending, and interpreting the convention theme. We are interested in submissions that address matters of intercultural, transcultural, and transnational communication and mass communication, immigrant cultures, diasporas, and languages. And we are interested in submissions that address our digital age and future, the possibility that we are living through the /incunabula/ of a digital revolution, and what all of this might mean for the future and the conservation of the word. In addition, as 2012 marks the centenary of the birth of both Ong and Ellul, we greatly welcome submissions in honor and celebration of them and their works. And, as always, submissions on any topic of interest to Media Ecology are also welcomed. Submissions should be sent, as e-mail attachments in Microsoft Word, rich text, or plain text format, to the Convention Coordinator: Thom Gencarelli (thom.gencarelli(a)manhattan.edu ). *Extended deadline for submissions: December 15, 2011*. http://www.media-ecology.org

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Fwd: Call for Papers: Fandom and/as Labor
by Mel Stanfill 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Please forward widely * * *Fandom and/as Labor* Call for papers Special issue of *Transformative Works and Cultures* ( http://journal.transformativeworks.org/) March 2014 Edited by Mel Stanfill and Megan Condis (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) CFP online: http://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/announcement/view/21 http://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/announcement/view/21 It has long been recognized both within academia and in the various communities organized around fandom that the practice of being a fan does not merely consist of passive consumption. Rather, fans are also productive: they generate interpretations of their favorite television shows, extratextual products like fan fiction and fan videos, and data about their own consumption habits and those of their peers that will be used to market new products. Whether labors of love or value extracted from unaware fans, this productivity is rarely conceptualized as labor. Given recent events like the 2011 Wisconsin labor protests, however, broader questions of labor and fair compensation have been reinvigorated, such that taking these productive fan activities seriously as labor seems to be particularly vital in the current moment. In this special issue on Fandom and/as Labor, we invite contributions that ask after how labor relates to fandom, how labor happens in fandom, and what happens when we reconceptualize fandom as labor. We welcome submissions dealing with, but not limited to, the following topics: - Case studies of how fans negotiate/conceptualize the labors that they perform. - Analyses of the ways in which popular texts present/narrate the labor involved in participating in fandom. - Examinations of how fan labor is gendered, raced, classed, and/or related to sexuality, ability, and nation. - Analysis of the monetization of existing fan labor and/or the production of profitable new types of fan labor. - Theoretical or experiential accounts of the tension between freely given fan labor or the fan gift economy and exploitation through the extraction of surplus value. *Submission guidelines* TWC accommodates academic articles of varying scope as well as other forms that embrace the technical possibilities of the Web and test the limits of the genre of academic writing. Contributors are encouraged to include embedded links, images, and videos in their articles or to propose submissions in alternative formats that might comprise interviews, collaborations, or video/multimedia works. We are also seeking reviews of relevant books, events, courses, platforms, or projects. *Theory:* Often interdisciplinary essays with a conceptual focus and a theoretical frame that offer expansive interventions in the field. Blinded peer review. Length: 5,000–8,000 words plus a 100–250-word abstract. *Praxis:* Analyses of particular cases that may apply a specific theory or framework to an artifact; explicate fan practice or formations; or perform a detailed reading of a text. Blinded peer review. Length: 4,000–7,000 words plus a 100–250-word abstract. *Symposium:* Short pieces that provide insight into current developments and debates. Nonblinded editorial review. Length: 1,500–2,500 words. Submissions are accepted online only. Please visit TWC's Web site ( http://journal.transformativeworks.org/) for complete submission guidelines, or e-mail the TWC Editor (editor AT transformativeworks.org) *Contact* We encourage potential contributors to contact the guest editor with inquiries or proposals: *Mel Stanfill **and Megan Condis* (fandom.labor AT gmail.com) *Due dates* Contributions for blinded peer review (Theory and Praxis essays) are due by *March 1, 2013*.** Contributions that undergo editorial review (Symposium, Interview, Review) are due by *April 1, 2013*. Mel Stanfill PhD Candidate Teaching Assistant Institute of Communications Research University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign https://sites.google.com/site/melstanfill/home

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CFP Convergence special issue on mobile media in Brazil
by Adriana de Souza e Silva 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Convergence: The international journal of research into new media technologies SPECIAL ISSUE CALL FOR PAPERS Cell phones and communities: The use of mobile media in Brazil Edited by: Adriana de Souza e Silva (North Carolina State University) Isabel Froes (IT University of Copenhagen) Important dates: Abstracts: February 15th, 2012 (500 words). Notification of accepted abstracts: March 15th, 2012. Full papers: June 15th, 2012 (8000/9000 words). Notification of accepted papers: September 15th, 2012. By the second decade of the 21st century, mobile phones have reached saturation levels in many countries in the world, surpassing the number of landlines and personal computers. Although initial scholarly interest on the social use of mobile phones focused on Europe, Asia, and the United States, the impact of mobile phone on the developing world (or Global South) is increasingly evident and perhaps much more profound. As Ling and Horst (2011) note, “the mobile phone has quietly provided people at the bottom of the income pyramid access to electronically mediated communication; often for the first time.” For many, the mobile device is the first phone, the first internet connection, the first TV set, and the first global positioning system. Among developing nations, Brazil is a key site for studying the social dimension of mobile technologies. The country is part of the so-called BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China), an acronym that refers to fast-growing developing economies. Brazil is the fastest growing economy in Latin America, and has over 217 million mobile phones, which represents an average of 111 working devices per 100 inhabitants . The country has also experienced one of the fastest mobile phone growth rates in the world since 2005 (averaging 16.6% annually); is the largest mobile phone market in Latin America; and is the fifth-largest mobile market in the world in absolute numbers, with roughly 217 million subscriptions as of September 2011. However, numbers alone reveal little if not analyzed within a broader social, cultural, and economic framework. The focus on a homogeneous large-scale market leads to overly sanguine perspectives that often obscure how socioeconomic diversity causes and reflects mobile phone use. As in many developing countries, Brazil has astounding income gaps among different sectors of the population which influence and are influenced by technology development and use. For example, the use of high-end services such as mobile banking, and location-based services like Foursquare and Yelp is an intrinsic part of the daily mobile practices of the high-income population in the country. Conversely, the lower-income population in Rio de Janeiro is familiar with the diretão—a mobile phone that allows users to make clandestine calls to anywhere in the world with the use of an illegal sim card. However, Brazil has also been at the forefront of an experimental and innovative approach towards new technologies, forecasted in cultural events that focus on art, music and film festivals dedicated to new and creative uses of mobile technologies, such as the Mobilefest and Arte.mov. Despite this cultural and socio-economic diversity, and the relevance of its marketing, the social use and development of mobile phones in Brazil is largely under theorized and poorly studied. With the goal of contributing to bridge this gap, this special edition invites essays that critically investigate the inter-relations among mobile technologies, culture, and social development within the Brazilian society. Submitted manuscripts are encouraged (but not limited) to focus on four main areas: (1) History of mobile phones in Brazil. Essays are encouraged to explore the development of mobile phones in Brazil, comparing them to the landline infrastructure and internet growth within the Latin America socio-economic and political framework. Authors may explore the development and use of new mobile services, such as the mobile internet, text messaging, mobile apps, etc. (2) Social uses and appropriation of mobile phones. We welcome essays as empirical or theoretical studies dealing with the use and appropriation of technology by low-income communities. Of special interest are essays that explore how mobile and wireless technologies reconfigure the life of community dwellers and how people find new and unexpected uses for existing technologies. (3) Mobile art and games. We invite essays that investigate mobile phones as artistic and gaming interfaces, including essays that explore uses of hybrid reality, location-aware and pervasive activities in educational contexts, media arts, and gaming. (4) Location-based services. Submitted essays should investigate the uses and development of location-based services in Brazil, such as mobile annotation, location-based social networks, and mobile mapping. Proposed abstracts (500 words) are due by February 15th, 2012. The authors will be notified about accepted abstracts by March 15th. Those accepted will be requested to submit full papers by June 15th, 2012. Full papers will undergo a double blind-review process. Submissions may be in the form of empirical research studies or theory-building papers and should be 8000/9000 words in English. Papers must also include a brief biography of the author(s). Proposals and inquiries should be sent electronically to Isabel Froes (icgf(a)itu.dk) About the editors: Adriana de Souza e Silva is Associate Professor at the Department of Communication at North Carolina State University (NCSU), affiliated faculty at the Digital Games Research Center, and Interim Associate Director of the Communication, Rhetoric and Digital Media (CRDM) program at NCSU.Dr. de Souza e Silva's research focuses on how mobile and locative interfaces shape people's interactions with public spaces and create new forms of sociability. She teaches classes on mobile technologies, location-based games and internet studies. Dr. de Souza e Silva is the co-editor (with Daniel M. Sutko) of Digital Cityscapes—Merging digital and urban playspaces (Peter Lang, 2009), the co-author (with Eric Gordon) of the book Net-Locality: Why location matters in a networked world (Blackwell, 2011), and the co-author (with Jordan Frith) of Mobile interfaces in public spaces: Control, privacy, and urban sociability (Routledge, 2012). Isabel Fróes has received her Masters degree from the Interactive Telecommunications Programme at New York University (NYU) and a Bachelor’s degree in psychology from Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, PUC-RJ in Brazil. She is a lecturer at the IT University of Copenhagen (Denmark), where she works both as a practitioner and scholar in the fields of communication, mobility, art and design. With a focus towards valuable interactions between people and technology, her research analyzes the future implications and current uses of digital media. In her courses she taps into the value of interactive elements in every arena and explores how they could affect the ways new concepts and activities are developed in distinct fields. She has presented some of these thoughts at various events such as the AAM conference (2009), and the IXDA South America (2010). She has taught various courses at Danish institutions such as IT University of Copenhagen, University of Copenhagen and Kolding School of Design as well as Tecnológico de Monterrey, Campus Querétaro in Mexico. Proposals and inquiries should be sent electronically to Isabel Froes (icgf(a)itu.dk) ________________________ Adriana de Souza e Silva, Ph.D Associate Professor of Communication Interim Associate Director, Communication, Rhetoric, & Digital Media Ph.D program North Carolina State University http://www.souzaesilva.com

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naches
by Barry Wellman 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

I'm astonished but one academic doesn't know what "naches" is. Pleasurable enjoyment; feeling good by doing good. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________

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Re: [Air-L] [CITASA] naches
by Barry Wellman 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

yiddish. the language of sociology Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________ On Sun, 16 Oct 2011, Robert E. Phelan wrote: > Date: Sun, 16 Oct 2011 19:28:50 -0400 > From: Robert E. Phelan <rphelan(a)choiceonemail.com> > To: 'Barry Wellman' <wellman(a)chass.utoronto.ca>, > 'communication and information technology section asa' > <citasa(a)list.citasa.org>, 'aoir list' <air-l(a)aoir.org> > Subject: RE: [CITASA] naches > > OK, make that two.... I'm having trouble figuring out the etiology of the > word. Latin? Greek? Sumerian? I speak Chinese and am pretty sure it is not > of Sino-Tibetan origin. > > -----Original Message----- > From: citasa-bounces(a)list.citasa.org [mailto:citasa-bounces@list.citasa.org] > On Behalf Of Barry Wellman > Sent: Sunday, October 16, 2011 7:10 PM > To: communication and information technology section asa; aoir list > Subject: [CITASA] naches > > I'm astonished but one academic doesn't know what "naches" is. > > Pleasurable enjoyment; feeling good by doing good. > > > Barry Wellman > _______________________________________________________________________ > > S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director > Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 > University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman > http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 > Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php > _______________________________________________________________________ > > > _______________________________________________ > CITASA mailing list > CITASA(a)list.citasa.org > http://list.citasa.org/mailman/listinfo/citasa_list.citasa.org > > >

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Digital Humanities at Sussex - Warren Sack
by Aristea Fotopoulou 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Please circulate: DIGITAL HUMANITIES at SUSSEX Friday 21st October 2011 2:00 - 5:00, Attenborough Centre Creativity Zone, University of Sussex. Warren Sack (University of California, Santa Cruz) "Digital Methods and Software Studies after Narrative Intelligence" All Welcome! Aristea Fotopoulou School of Media, Film and Music University of Sussex http://www.sussex.ac.uk/mfm/people/mediaandfilm/person/206365

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How many Friends online = one offline?
by Barry Wellman 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Academic riend asks "how many internet friends = one f2f friend". He's getting grief f2f and naches with his internet relationships. Reliable answers, anyone? Either ethnographic, quant. I told him that it is hard to disentangle becuase most online relationships are also in-person. But like many of us, he is involved in organizing conferences etc online with people he rarely sees. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________

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Digital Divide
by Katy Pearce ucsb 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

Hi all. Hope that you've all gotten back home safely! I'm going to be teaching an MA-level course on Digital Divide/Inequality next term. Anyone taught this sort of course before and willing to send me a syllabus? I'd appreciate it. And of course I'd be happy to compile some things and send them back to you. Thanks, Katy Pearce

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impact of online versus f2f contacts on mood, affect...
by Barry Wellman 17 Oct '11

17 Oct '11

The person who sent me the request for research findings has further specified what he wants to know. Saddened that all respondent to date have either shown off their "cleverness" or asked for further specification. Not one even tried to answer the question. Concomittantly, I am reading _I'm Feeling Lucky_ by Douglas Edwards: an insider's ethnography of the early Google days. A repeated thought is that the developers kept moving forward with partial procedures. PS: Anyone else old enuf to have the phrase "Douglas Edwards and the News" resonate? Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________ Barry -- Thanks...I can make the request more formal, ie the impact on mood or affect (if any) measured today of the number of internet and text messages received in the last few days, compared with the impact on affect of the number of f2f encounters during the same time frame, controlling for appropriate factors such as age, gender, education and so on. It would be nice to remove people who contacted ego both ways...there must be a way to do this without making the questions unduly cumbersome... A repeated panel of course could help to clarify issues of causality, since presumably both mood and the number of recent contacts vary over time... Experience sampling as developed by the Chicago psychologist Csikszentmihalyi might specify the matter in terms of contacts within the last hour or two and its impact on current affect. It would be nice to know if somehow has already some this or something like this.

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