[Air-L] CFP #AoIR2018 Montreal

[Andrew Herman]

Greetings from the #AoIR 2018 Montreal Conference Committee


For those of you who were not present in Tartu for the great unveiling of the CFP for next year's AoIR Annual Conference, we are pleased to circulate here in all of its glory. Please let is know if you have any questions and, the conference deities willing, we hope to see you in Montreal!


Andrew Herman

Cindy Tekkobe

Melanie Millette

Jeremy Hunsinger

Mary Elizabeth Luka

Nathan Rambukkana



The overarching theme of AoIR2018 will be Transnational Materialities.

The theme is broadly rooted in the burgeoning implications of current massive global migrations of people and data, within the context of a growing materialist movement in cultural and media studies, media archaeology, software studies, science and technology studies, feminist materialism, object oriented ontologies of post-humanist philosophy, critical political economy, actor-network theory, and the like. These heterogeneous and polyvalent perspectives have opened up spaces for interrogating the socio-technical assemblages which comprise “the internet”.

The “material turn” within internet research seeks to firmly ground critical analyses in the manifold physicalities and corporealities embodied and engendered within such networked technologies. This turn has been embraced with enthusiasm in Canadian communication and media studies, whose intellectual tradition has been shaped by a productive confluence of medium theory (e.g., Marshall McLuhan), spatial materialism of communication systems (e.g., Harold Innis), feminist media and social justice theory (e.g., Gertrude J. Robinson, Dorothy Smith), and political economy of media institutions and practices (e.g., Vincent Mosco).

As a settler nation with complex contested histories, vast geographies, and ongoing struggles to achieve global economic impact, Canada is situated firmly in the middle of the pack globally when it comes to internet presence. Like so many other nations, Canada’s transnational aspirations are deeply tied to its efforts to integrate and grow a diverse population. Such  interconnected orientations are increasingly mediated by internet technologies. These interconnections are materialist in nature, but deeply transnational in both institutional and cultural construction. This leads us to the theme of the conference: transnational materialities. While providing a direction, this theme is not meant to be limiting, as the spaces within it allow for reflexivity, critique, construction, interpretation, and a myriad of other positionalities. We seek research and analysis that finds its provenance in a multiplicity of methodologies, from qualitative work such as textual analysis, to quantitative projects, such as big data, to mixed methods projects that employ both kinds of research.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

  *   global infrastructures, their networks, and materialities
  *   the politics and policies of the internet’s transnational and material contexts, including the materiality of communication regulations and policies including issues around ICT4D, community informatics, piracy and copyright, and network neutrality
  *   intersections of technology/race/ethnicity/embodiment, including First Nations and Indigenous networks and communication practices, and Francophone and minority language cultures, politics, and challenges in the context of transnational materialities
  *   the internet as a set of spatial paradigms in material terms: information highway, data centres, cyberspace, virtual space, net, web, network, tubes
  *   the materiality of new digital intermediaries such as the Internet of Things, AI, robots/robotics, automations, algorithms, VR, teledildonics
  *   contemporary intersections of gender, race, class (etc.) and technology, including feminist interventions and backlash movements such as GamerGate
  *   the role of internet technology in building affinity movements and transcending borders, e.g., the materiality of the hashtag across platforms, political solidarities across transnational borders, global fan cultures and media, and the role of internet technologies in the circulation of and resistance to “alt-right” discourses and hate speech
  *   the shifting political and creative economies of streaming media, such as YouTube celebrities; porn channels becoming producers of mainstream television shows (xHamster) and educational content (PornHub);  assemblages of “Internet Cats”; or weird/strange transnationalities/materialities of the internet
  *   the politics of platforms as extensions and/or erasures of the self
  *   social media, email, platforms, podcasts, etc. as actors/actants in networks
  *   materialities of big/small/wide/deep data, its research methods and related possibilities

15 January 2018
Submission site opens for #AoIR2018 Montréal

1 March 2018
Submissions due for PAPERS, PANELS, ROUNDTABLES and FISHBOWLS, EXPERIMENTAL SESSIONS, and PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS

15 April 2018
Nominations for Nancy Baym Book Award<https://aoir.org/awards/nancy-baym-annual-book-award/> and Best Dissertation Award<https://aoir.org/awards/dissertation-award/> due

5 May 2018
Notification of acceptances for presenters

20 May 2018
Applications due for conference travel SCHOLARSHIPS and for DOCTORAL COLLOQUIUM

1 August 2018
Early Bird Registration Deadline for all presenters

15 August 2018
The full #AoIR2018 Conference Program goes live.

15 August 2018
Deadline for Visa Letter requests (for presenters only – Visa Letters not provided for attendees)

30 September 2018
Deadline for uploading accepted, non-blind, final version of paper and panel submissions

10 October 2018
Pre-conference Workshops

11-13 October 2018
Main Conference