[Nettime-bold] CFP: The Politics of New Media Research: Methodologies,Debates and Practices

[Ned Rossiter <Ned.Rossiter@arts.monash.edu.au>]

Call for Papers
Southern Review: Communication, Politics & Culture
Special Issue 35.3, 2002

The Politics of New Media Research: Methodologies, Debates and Practices

Edited by Mary Griffiths and Susan Yell
Monash University, Gippsland

Three contexts inform the theme of this issue. The first is the rise 
of the new communication technologies and their increasing centrality 
across the spectrum of what were formerly discrete communication 
mediums, practices and institutions. Second, the diverse genealogies 
of communications studies and research - organisational and social 
psychology, sociology, political economy, rhetoric, cultural studies, 
linguistics - have led to a corresponding diversity of methodologies 
and theoretical frameworks. Third, a new generation of communications 
scholars (spawned from the rapid expansion of university 
communications programs) is emerging as more Net-literate than their 
predecessors and is contributing to the acceleration in the changing 
research agenda.

This issue aims to address questions concerning the methodologies and 
approaches appropriate to researching new communications media.  It 
calls for papers which give case studies of research in new media, 
and a defence or critique of the chosen methodologies.  We invite 
papers which take up one or more of the following issues:

* the politics of new communications research agendas - what is 
funded, and why?  How do research agendas relate to institutional 
cultures?
* the nature of the fit between more traditional methodologies and 
new technologies - e.g. how does new media research challenge the 
boundaries of empirical research, which is also the dominant paradigm 
in research and funding criteria across the disciplines?
* frameworks for theorising and researching the new forms of 
embodiment associated with new media - how can the interface between 
'real' and virtual bodies be conceptualised?
* suitable and successful qualitative research methodologies - is the 
virtual environment more or less easily researched?
* the changing ethics of privacy, security and data collection as 
they relate to intellectual property regimes;
* the role of interdisciplinarity in new media research; which 
disciplines count as authoritative, and which (if any) are privileged?
* is the corporatised university providing a supportive framework for 
emerging new media researchers, and what sort of research is being 
conducted by networks independent of the university?

Papers should be approx. 4500 words. Under special circumstances 
longer papers will be considered. Please send us 3 hard copies of 
your paper, double -spaced on white A4 paper, with your name and 
institutional affiliation on a separate sheet to facilitate anonymity 
in the evaluation process. You may submit electronically - please 
contact the editors for details. An abstract (max. 100 words) is 
required, and a biographical note of no more than 50 words. 
Referencing should follow the MLA Style Manual (1988) 'works cited' 
form of documentation (for further details see 
http://www.bedfordbooks.com/rd/mla/cited.html). Discursive notes 
should be avoided. Full details of editorial policy are available on 
request.

THE DEADLINE FOR PAPERS IS 31 August 2002.


ENQUIRIES:
mary.griffiths@arts.monash.edu.au
sue.yell@arts.monash.edu.au

Contributions should be sent to:
Susan Yell
Southern Review
HUMCASS
Monash University, Gippsland Campus
Churchill VIC 3842 AUSTRALIA

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