[Air-L] Preliminary Call for Papers MEA Convention June 7-10 2012 Manhattan College, Riverdale, New York

[Janet Sternberg]

Preliminary Call for Papers
The Thirteenth Annual Convention
of the Media Ecology Association
June 7-10, 2012
Manhattan College
Riverdale, New York
http://www.media-ecology.org

"The Crossroads of the Word"

Deadline for Submissions: November 1, 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 at manhattan.edu).
A maximum of two submissions per author will be accepted. Authors who
wish their papers to be considered for the Top Paper or Top Student
Paper award must indicate that on their submissions. All submissions
will be acknowledged. Campus housing will be available. Deadline for
submissions: November 1, 2011.

Additional details will be forthcoming at
http://www.media-ecology.org