Centre for Media and Communication Studies “Massimo Baldini”

Internet pages of the Centre for Media and Communication Studies “Massimo Baldini” are now online.

HERE

The new Centre is institutional member of ECREA and affiliate member of MeCCSA

ECREA Section “Audience and Reception Studies” – Workshop

Workshop
Narrative Fact and Fiction
Patterns of narrative construction in media stories and differential effects

(Hosted by the “Narrative Network”, the ECREA Section “Audience and Reception Studies” and the Department of Communication of the University of Vienna)

Date: 4-5, April 2009, location: University of Vienna
One of the most important functions of media is to inform and connect citizens, enabling them to participate in democratic processes and providing the grounds for integration and social cohesion in a society. Specifically, media stories support and uphold these functions. Both journalistic stories referencing real life events as well as fictional stories referencing fictitious worlds contribute to the audience’s knowledge and world view – possibly complementing or contradicting each other. Fictional and factual stories increasingly converge in terms of style and content. Topics are followed up across pragmatic boundaries. A good example of this is Dan Brown’s book “The Da Vinci Code” that reinterprets biblical history, which has solicited popular historical books scrutinizing the novel’s assertions. While the distinction of fact and fiction is clear on the production side, it seems to be less clear in the audience’s mind and next to irrelevant for actual story experience and effects.

The workshop deals with the question how fictional and factual stories are intertwined at various levels and intends to deepen insights of how patterns of construction and the effects of stories differ with respect to its factual or fictional background. Contributions may address aspects such as: What different types of narrative patterns exist in factual and fictional media stories? What are characteristics of effective stories? How do factual and fictional stories interact in the audience’s mind?

Please send abstracts (150 words) for 30-minute presentations via email to the organizers

[susanne.kinnebrock@univie.ac.at; helena.bilandzic@uni-erfurt.de]
Deadline for submissions is February 8, 2009.

MeCCSA Conference 2009

MeCCSA Conference 2009 will be at National Media Museum, Bradford from Wed 14 to Fri 16 January 2009.

Confirmed plenary speakers:

• Shaun Moores  (University of Sunderland)
• Matthew Fuller (Goldsmiths)
• Laura Mulvey (Birkbeck University of London)
• Diane Negra (University College Dublin)
• Shearer West (AHRC)

Further informations about pricing charts, subscriptions, conference times, venue are available HERE

Crisc-Cmcs at FilMobile Conference

Crisc-Cmcs will participate at FilMobile Conference, London, 4-5 April 2008.

The Centre will present the step 2 of its research about “Mobile Audiences” in Italy (Mobile Audiences between Access and Participation).

Futher details, here.

Space/Place-Communications

Communications and Space/Place
2nd Annual Postgraduate Conference
University of Leeds – Institute of Communications Studies
Friday 6th June 2008

With the participation of Professor Zygmunt Bauman as the keynote speaker for the 2008 conference and Dr. Sophia Kaitatzi-Whitlock as the opening speaker.

Further details? Here!