February 2012 - Air-L - lists.aoir.org

Contacting bloggers - ethics and practicalities
by Donnelly, Karen 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

I am carrying out a study on blogging about what could potential be described as a sensitive subject. Many of the bloggers I wish to contact do not have email addresses on their profiles and I have been careful not to follow/post/lurk prior to gaining their consent (as per my ethics protocol). Does anyone have any suggestions for the best method of making initial contact without alienating these bloggers or creeping them out? All suggestions welcome, thanks in advance. Karen Donnelly ESRC PhD Student Department of Linguistics and English Language Lancaster University

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CFP: Panel: Digital Transitions, Comparative Literature Association of Ireland, 28-30 June 2012, Cork
by Nina Shiel 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

Apologies for cross posting ------------------------ Call for Papers Panel: Digital Transitions Comparative Literature Association of Ireland, First International Conference, Transitions in Comparative Studies; 28-30 June 2012, University College Cork, Ireland In the wake of the explosive arrival of the internet and associated new media in the general public consciousness and use during the past decade, comparatists find themselves presented with a vast number of new possibilities, but also with new challenges. Visual art is no longer confined to forms such as painting and sculpture, but can now also be produced digitally. Virtual worlds call for questions about our understanding of space. Electronic literature weaves word and image together in new, innovative ways. New forms of storytelling take place in video games, on interactive websites and on social media. As an example, in 2010, the Royal Shakespeare Company, together with the production company Mudlark, staged a modern adaptation of Romeo and Juliet on the micro-blogging site Twitter. Despite the surge of such experimentations and developments, the comparative field has been slow to respond to them. Cultural and communication studies have addressed the digital worlds, but literary studies in particular have mostly refrained from engaging with them. This panel situates the encounter of the digital by/with/in literary scholarship in the wider context of intermediality, with its issues and challenges. This panel welcomes papers on both theory and practice of digital intermediality. It invites comparative analyses of intermedial works such as interactive narratives, video/online games, electronic literature or digital art, or the representation of the above in literature. Equally, it encourages more theoretical approaches to the topic. Examples of potential frameworks might include applications of narratology, relationship between word and image, space theory, the role of comparative literature in digital studies, and issues of availability and approachability of the digital world. Please submit your abstract of 300 words and a short biography to Ms Nina Shiel at nina.shiel3(a)mail.dcu.ie by 16 March 2012. More information about the conference is available at http://www.complit.org/cfp.html . -- Nina Shiel PhD Researcher in Comparative Literature Research supported by the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies Dublin City University, Dublin 9, Republic of Ireland http://vividdescription.wordpress.com/

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Applications sought for Digital Communication Specialist at Assistant or associate professor level:
by Klobucar, Philip A. 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

The Department of Humanities at New Jersey Institute of Technology (Newark, NJ) invites applications for a Digital Communication Specialist. Appointed at the assistant or associate professor level, this tenure-track position seeks outstanding candidates with special emphasis on digital communication that leverages the web, social networking, and mobile apps. The successful candidate will have working knowledge and understanding of a wide range of current and emerging digital technologies and an ability to integrate them into online teaching. Also required is a strong research agenda with potential for solid publications. To assist with our highly regarded master's program<http://msptc.njit.edu/>, candidates must have strong leadership potential and embrace the demands of recruiting, maintaining, and assessing a completely online student population. She or he should demonstrate willingness for collaboration within NJIT while providing outreach to professional communities. The position requires the Ph.D. in technical or professional communication or related disciplines. NJIT is dedicated to recruiting and retaining women and underrepresented minority candidates to help the university achieve its mission of education, research, economic development, and service. Submit letter of application, c.v. and relevant URLs by March 15, 2012 to our online application site at https://njit.jobs/applicants/jsp/shared/frameset/Frameset.jsp?time=13285583… Review of applications will begin immediately and the position will remain open until filled. If you have any questions about this position, please contact Nancy Coppola (coppola(a)njit.edu<mailto:coppola@njit.edu>), Norbert Elliot (elliot(a)adm.njit.edu<mailto:elliot@adm.njit.edu>), or Andrew Klobucar (philip.a.klobucar(a)njit.edu<mailto:philip.a.klobucar@njit.edu>) Dr. Andrew Klobucar Assistant Professor Communication and Media Department of Humanities New Jersey Institute of Technology Office: Cullimore 428 Phone: 973.596.5724 Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere. (G.K. Chesterton)

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CFP: 4S/EASST 2012, Copenhagen, open panel "New Media, digital identities and transformations of surveillance"
by Anders Albrechtslund 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

Apologies for cross posting *Call for papers* Open panel: "New Media, digital identities and transformations of surveillance" at: Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) and the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) 2012: October 17-20, 2012, Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark Organized by Jason Pridmore (Zuyd University, The Netherlands) and Anders Albrechtslund (Aarhus University, Denmark) New Media, digital identities and transformations of surveillance The increasing use and presence of forms of new media and social networks has created an unprecedented level of data about everyday interactions, relationships, and personal perspectives on products, politics, and people. These data produce personal profiles in the form of digital identities that are both available for corporate and governmental surveillance of consumers and citizens and enables mutual or lateral surveillance by family, friends, and colleagues. This has had and continues to have significant implications for ‘privacy’, something which itself is continually being reshaped in light of transitions in technology. A majority of research connecting surveillance with the use of new media and social networks takes as its starting point a critical assumption about the power inherent in corporate strategies and governmental intrusion. The papers in this panel instead focus on the differing ‘configurations’ that exist, describing the micro processes of power relations between ‘users’, their digital identities, and the networks in which they are a part as forms of everyday surveillance. In this context, the notion of ‘users’ is itself complicated by persons that may be players, participants, clients, members, etc. However, these examinations begin to illuminate how forms of collaboration and co-operation transforms practices of surveillance through processes of mutual shaping. Voluntary use of technologies such as location check-in, social sign-on, the use of hashtags, begin to suggest new ways in which surveillance is enacted, performed, and transformed. This has significant implications for ‘user identification’, with agency and power distributed through the people, practices, systems and artefacts that comprise the use of new media and social networks. This panel welcomes papers that explore empirically and conceptually the relationships between the use of new media/social networks, digital or user identification and surveillance. Please submit your abstract electronically via <http://convention2.allacademic.com/one/ssss/4s12/> and make sure to suggest that your paper will fit into open panel 61, "New Media, digital identities and transformations of surveillance". You can find more details about the conference on <http://www.4sonline.org/meeting>. The deadline for abstract submissions is 11 March 2012. For further information and details, feel free to contact the organizers: Jason Pridmore (jason.pridmore(a)zuyd.nl) Anders Albrechtslund (alb(a)hum.au.dk) ==================================== Anders Albrechtslund Associate Professor, PhD Dept. of Aesthetics and Communication Aarhus University, Denmark

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CFP: Articulating Alternatives
by Eleftheria L. 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

Apologies for cross-posting. ** *CFP: Articulating alternatives: agents, spaces and communication in/of a time of crisis* *A workshop for new scholars hosted by the Centre for the Study of Global Media and Democracy, Goldsmiths, University of London, May 3rd, 2012.* This is a workshop which addresses a series of issues around the mediation of political life in a time of crisis. The last couple of decades have witnessed the intensification of the neoliberal logic, culminating in a profound crisis of capitalism. This has been accompanied by the widespread de-legitimisation of political institutions as citizens lose trust in the political process and confidence in the capacity of political elites to protect their interests. Concomitantly, recent years have seen the emergence of a myriad of actors (from indigenous people’s movements to alter-globalisation movements to current mobilisations like the Arab Spring and the Occupy movement), which challenge the neoliberal hegemony and seek to construct alternatives. Such actors are engaged in various forms of knowledge production oriented towards the development of critiques of the current system as well as the elaboration of alternative forms of economic, social, and political organisation. In the workshop, we wish to explore some of the complexities of the relationship between mediated communication and politics in a time of crisis. The intensive mobilisation of citizens around the world raises a number of questions in relation to how agents of transformation are constructing political vernaculars and actions at different scales and across different sites, both physical and virtual. The notion of a politics of crisis is set as a framework for the exploration of the agencies, spaces and communication practices of counter-capitalist voices. Pertinent here is the addressing of the structures of both the nation-state and global economic actors where the use of digital communication channels ranges from information-spreading to organisation and mobilisation. Many recent protests have been distinctly invested in particular localities (squares, streets), but appear to also express a sense of globality (evident for example in the argued global reach of the Occupy movement). New communication technologies appear to be offering unprecedented opportunities for the dissemination and elaboration of ideas, potentially playing a significant role in social processes of knowledge production and the articulation of alternatives. At the same time, conventional media are arguably in a state of crisis, arising from tendencies of commercialisation and concentration of ownership. As the media lose the confidence of their publics and thus their privileged epistemic status, questions are raised about their capacity to foster democratic public spheres. We are interested in addressing questions in relation to the discursive construction of alternatives, the agents involved in these processes, the spaces that are being opened up for articulation and action, as well as the modes of politics which characterise the current time of crisis. The themes we wish to explore include: - *Agents*. Are there new actors emerging in the context of political, economic and social crises? What form do such actors take, and what kinds of politics do they engage in? What role do conventional media as well as new information and communication technologies play in the emergence and organisation of such actors? How might media contribute to the elaboration of alternatives and the construction of transnational solidarity across geopolitical boundaries? - *Spaces*. How do the geography and spatiality of politics impact on the perspectives and claims arising in resistance to capitalism? What spatialities and scales are enacted through current modes of political praxis and forms of communication? What is the ‘place of place’ in contemporary political practices and discourses, and how does this relate to the ‘national’, ‘transnational’ or ‘global’? What role do media play in the politics of place and scale? Where does the matter of politics exhibit itself both online and offline? - *Communication*. How can we conceptualise the relationship between media and citizenship in the current climate of crisis? What role do the media play in the communication of a politics of crisis? How might media be implicated in the continued subalternisation, exclusion or incorporation of alternative/emergent knowledges and practices? Can the mainstream media be reformed to resume their (idealised?) democratic function as the guarantors of an open democratic public sphere? Or should we instead entrust our hopes to the burgeoning field of social and citizens’ media? In order to facilitate in-depth discussion and collective knowledge production, the workshop will be restricted to a limited number of participants. We welcome submissions of original work from early-career researchers from diverse disciplinary backgrounds including (but not limited to): media and communications, sociology, politics, anthropology, cultural studies, geography, and information studies. Interested participants should submit a 250 word abstract and brief biography by March 15th, 2012 to Eleftheria Lekakis (e.lekakis(a)gold.ac.uk <h.choi(a)qut.edu.au>)and Hilde Stephansen ( h.stephansen(a)gold.ac.uk) The authors of successful abstracts will be notified by March 22nd, 2012 and are invited to submit working papers of between 1500-3000 words in advance of the workshop. -- Research Fellow Centre for the Study of Global Media and Democracy Department of Media and Communications Goldsmiths College, University of London New Cross, London, SE14 6NW United Kingdom

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LSE Summer School International Journalism and Society
by S.S.Orgad＠lse.ac.uk 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

Applications are now invited for The London School of Economics' Summer School 'International Journalism and Society - The Role of the Media in the Modern World'. This three week course aimed at students and practitioners from undergraduate level upwards is in its 6th year, run by the LSE's media think-tank Polis and taught by LSE lecturers with daily guest speakers. Details here: http://www2.lse.ac.uk/study/summerSchools/summerSchool/courses/internati onalRelationsGovernmentAndSociety/IR245.aspx or email polis(a)lse.ac.uk Charlie Beckett Director, POLIS Department of Media & Communications London School of Economics Mob: 07808 786573 www.polismedia.org www.charliebeckett.org @charliebeckett on Twitter 'WikiLeaks: News In The Networked Era' Out January 15th 2012 Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://lse.ac.uk/emailDisclaimer

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OII Summer Doctoral Programme
by Victoria Nash 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

The deadline for this year's tenth Oxford Internet Institute Summer Doctoral Programme is fast approaching, so if you know any good PhD students who could benefit from two weeks' intensive study of cutting edge Internet-related social science research please make sure they get their application in by 23rd Feb. Full information available at: http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/teaching/sdp/Y2012.cfm Any questions about the programme can be directed to me or our team via sdp(a)oii.ox.ac.uk<mailto:sdp@oii.ox.ac.uk>. best v Dr Victoria Nash Research & Policy Fellow Director of Graduate Studies Oxford Internet Institute University of Oxford 01865 287231 victoria.nash(a)oii.ox.ac.uk<mailto:victoria.nash@oii.ox.ac.uk> http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/

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AAA Panel on Social Media & Anthropology
by Alice Marwick 14 Feb '12

14 Feb '12

Jordan Kraemer (jkraemer(a)uci.edu<mailto:jkraemer@uci.edu>) and Charles Pearson (charles.a.pearson(a)gmail.com<mailto:charles.a.pearson@gmail.com>) are organizing this panel for the American Anthropological Association annual meeting this fall (11/14-11/18 in San Francisco). Please contact one of them if you are interested. Thanks! Abstract: Towards an Anthropology of Social Media By the end of 2012, Facebook stands to have one billion global users, while two hundred million tweets (Twitter posts) are sent daily and YouTube users upload 60 hours of video each minute. Alongside these well-known online platforms, numerous smaller ones attract users in different regions across the globe and in many languages (such as RenRen in China or Orkut in Brazil). So-called "social media" are emerging as an ubiquitous facet of everyday life for both anthropologists and people with whom we work. In contrast to this diversity of users and practices, however, popular discourse often portrays social media in binary terms. While some accounts warn that emergent media will further social isolation, others frame social media in terms of celebratory cyber-utopianism. In such enthusiastic narratives, social media provide a universally democratizing space for communication, offering users new means for civic participation while collapsing distinctions between producer and consumer or local and global. Indeed, social media have even been heralded for eradicating modes of alienation. Anthropologists are uniquely positioned to study the particularities of emerging media platforms and practices in global and transnational contexts. Yet an anthropology of social media must contend with the challenges of studying rapidly transforming global communication networks and social practices. On one hand, since users may be radically distributed and place-ness may be difficult to locate or identify, how can we rethink single- and multi-sited methods to address the spatial dimensions of social media practices? On the other, what are the increasingly informational aspects of new modes of expression and circulation? This panel will address the specificities and particularities of social media and emerging modes of production. Whose sociality do social media represent, articulate, or facilitate? How are certain forms of connectivity and interactivity privileged, and under what circumstances? In short, what are the concerns and possibilities for an emerging anthropology of social media? _______________ Alice E. Marwick, Ph.D. Postdoctoral Researcher Microsoft Research New England Desk: 857.453.6330 Cell: 206.650.9109 amarwick(a)microsoft.com

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Learning Analytics and Knowledge conference
by Haythornthwaite, Caroline 14 Feb '12

14 Feb '12

NB. Early registration closes February 15 2012. Register now to get the best rates. http://lak12.sites.olt.ubc.ca/ Please join us for the Second International Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge (LAK12). This year’s conference will be located in Vancouver, Canada from 29th April to 2nd May 2012. For the world of higher education, learning analytics is gaining increasing momentum for its capacity to respond to and inform the dynamic and complex landscape that is 21st century education and learning. Learning analytics has a vast potential to address the many current concerns in higher education surrounding learning and the educational experience – such as lead indicators and predictive models for identifying students requiring additional learning support, reducing student attrition, measuring student graduate attributes, and developing scalable methods for enhancing teaching practice. Learning analytics capitalizes on the data intensive, technological base that supports contemporary formal and informal learning to extend capacity and understanding of learning processes in contemporary environments. It is of little surprise that the field of learning analytics is a rapidly expanding area of research and practice, drawing the attention of governments, foundations, and academics. Our conference provides the opportunity to consider these opportunities and challenges and the role learning analytics can play in both applied and theoretical contexts. LAK12 will bring together a diversity of researchers focused on the many inter-disciplinary fields associated with learning analytics. Who Should Attend? Learning Analytics and Knowledge 2012 is a multidisciplinary conference for: * learning scientists * (computer) scientists and data/knowledge engineers * researchers in education, sociology, psychology, information science * educators at all levels * Institutional/ Organizational data analysts * training and development professionals * educational and academic leaders * business leaders * course management system developers and leaders The Learning Analytics and Knowledge conference will explore the current state of learning analytics, knowledge modelling and representation, knowledge work and analytics, and plan for needed research, technologies, and processes to advance the field. Conference Chairs * Shane Dawson, University of British Columbia, Canada (sdawson @ exchange .ubc .ca) * Caroline Haythornthwaite, University of British Columbia, Canada (c. haythorn @ ubc .ca) Program Chairs * Dragan Gasevic, Athabasca University, Canada (dgasevic @ acm .org) * Simon Buckingham Shum, Open University, UK (s. buckingham. shum @ gmail .com) Workshops Chair * Rebecca Ferguson, Open University, UK (r. m. ferguson @ open.ac.uk<http://open.ac.uk>)

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Tool to Download Websites?
by Kathleen Stansberry 14 Feb '12

14 Feb '12

I¹m working on a project that involves conducting a cluster analysis (type of textual analysis based on Kenneth Burke¹s work) on the content of five different websites. I want to download the full content of these five sites so I have hard copies to work from during the rather arduous process of going through and categorizing the text. Can anyone recommend a good program to download full websites (to a page depth of at least 3)? I¹ve been using SiteSucker but am finding it a bit buggy. Thank you! Katie Kathleen Stansberry Ph.D. Candidate University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication http://katiestansberry.com kpontius(a)uoregon.edu (541) 228-5576

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