Second Call For Abstracts: South African Society for Critical Theory Conference 6 (Theme: Critical Theory, Digital Media and the Future of Democracy) - 14 to 16 November 2024
Jean du Toit
South African Society for Critical Theory 6th Annual Conference
14 to 16 November 2024
Durban University of Technology
Critical Theory, Digital Media and the Future of Democracy
The
South African Society for Critical Theory is pleased to announce the keynote
speakers for its forthcoming conference...
Keynote Speaker: Ylva Rodny-Gumede (University of Johannesburg)
Professor Ylva Rodny-Gumede is the Head of the Division for Internationalisation and a Professor in the School of Communication at the University of Johannesburg. She is also a Senior Associate Researcher with the Stanhope Centre for International Communications Policy Research at the London School of Economics and the Senior Leader for the University at Universitas 21.
Professor Rodny-Gumede has worked in journalism, marketing and PR and has consulted for several government, private and academic institutions in Europe and Southern Africa including the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and the Swedish National Agency for Higher Education. She is the former President of the Southern African Communications and Media Association (SACOMM) and serves as a non-Executive Director on the board of the Institute for Advancement of Journalism (IAJ) and Brand South Africa. Her current research concerns the broader transformation of higher education in South Africa.
Keynote Speaker: Cedric Patrick Nunn (Documentary Photographer)
4th-generation hybridised, born, raised and based in South African. Cedric Nunn began making photographs in 1982, then joined the Johannesburg based photographic association and agency Afrapix in 1982. He was a charter member of this group of photographers who were associated with a second wave of “social documentary photography” in South Africa. Nunn’s work confronts ideas of structural racism, class politics, the legacies of Apartheid, and the chimera of new South African black economic empowerment. His work is also very personal as his mid-career retrospective “Call and Response” suggests, photography is something of a calling. Nunn has continued to work independently as a documentary photographer and artist, showing his work in galleries and museums in South Africa and abroad. He has published two books and conceived and directed two documentary films.
[Additional keynote speakers may be announced in due course]
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Call follows below:
The South African Society for Critical Theory’s (SASCT) upcoming 6th Annual Conference will take place at the Durban University of Technology from the 14th to the 16th of November 2024, on the theme of Critical Theory, Digital Media and the Future of Democracy. This will be a hybrid conference, with in-person attendance suggested but with accommodation made for online participation and presentations.
Critical Theory, as an interdisciplinary field of study, explores power relations, social structures, and the ways in which these factors shape our world. Such considerations are crucial in 2024, which is an election year for 64 countries, including South Africa, and is for some anticipated to be a watershed political moment. At the same time, the apparent universalisation of access to various means of digital production has polarised debate regarding the influence of digital media on democracies – consider the impacts of social media networking, natural language processing technology and large language models (‘artificial intelligence’), and automated computer-generation of pictures and video. Contemporary scholars like Fuchs (2021, 2022) have expressed their concern about the intersection of the political with these technologies, particularly in terms of the compression of public interest journalism/media, the rise of algorithms and clickbait influencing democratic backsliding. He theorizes “Industry 4.0” (IoT, AI, Big data, social media and cloud computing) as a digital German Ideology, cautioning us to employ necessary scepticism for any ideology which proclaims a revolution before it has actually taken place (Fuchs 2018: 281). The critical apparatus of Critical Theory can allow us to reflect on digital (media) ownership and bring questions of control into sharper focus, thereby enabling discussion around declining public trust and the erosion of democracy in the contemporary technological milieu.
As part of such considerations, this conference welcomes papers that consider the question of digital media in relation to Critical Theory, including but not limited to:
· > Theoretical frameworks for understanding Industry 4.0 (digital capitalism)
· > The role of power relations in shaping the digital environment (particularly in terms of ownership and regulation)
· > The relation between the digital divide and the political
· > The intersection of race, gender, and class with digital access
· > The cultural and historical dimensions of technological determinism for shaping political and social discourses
· > The potential for Hacktivism(s) to challenge dominant power structures and influence democracy
· > The potential for Critical Theory to address questions related to societal problems created by digital capitalism (as described in Fuchs’s ten problems of 2021)
· > The potential for new coalitions to respond regionally and globally to manage digital media more equitably
The conference welcomes approaches from all aspects of Critical Theory, broadly construed. In particular, the conference welcomes papers that address issues relating to: African Critical Theory, Digital Culture, the intersections between Critical Theory of European origin (Frankfurt School, Foucault, etc.), Black Existentialism, and Africana Critical Theory as well as contributions on any and all aspects of Critical Theory, e.g. the 3 generations of Frankfurt School Critical Theory, Postcolonial Theory, De-colonial Theory, Critical Feminism, Critical Film Studies, Critical Race Theory, Critical Theory of Technology, Critical Legal Studies, Post-structuralism, Psychoanalysis, Critical Hermeneutics, Liberation Theory, Critical Pedagogy, Critical Theology, Critical Anthropology, etc.
The Conference organisers would also appreciate papers that address thinkers whose work lies outside the “canon” of Critical Theory, but whose work can extend current research in Critical Theory or whose work in itself embodies alternative forms of Critical Theory. Whilst the organisers encourage contributions that address the conference theme, the theme itself should be viewed as merely suggestive.
Submission
Please submit a 300-word abstract to sas...@gmail.com by the 9th of September 2023. Acceptance letters will be sent by the 16th of September at the latest. The full paper should be no more than 3500-4000 words for a 30 min presentation.
Proposals for panel discussion are also welcome.
Accommodation
In-person attendance at the Durban University of Technology, South Africa recommended. A list of places to stay will also be provided (these will be sent out with acceptance letters).
Conference fees
The fee for the three-day conference (including teas and lunches) is R1200 (including VAT).
The fee for participating graduate and PhD students is R300.
International speakers who are participating online must pay an online fee of R300.
Special issue
Note also that a special issue on the theme of the conference will be
published in Acta Academica: critical views on society, culture and
politics, a DHET-accredited
journal.
Contact us
Should you have queries regarding any aspect of the conference then please do not hesitate to contact the conference organising committee:
Anusha Sewchurran: Anush...@dut.ac.za (host)
Mark Amiradakis: Amirad...@ufs.ac.za
Jean du Toit: Jean....@nwu.ac.za
Bibliography
Fuchs, C., 2018. Industry 4.0: the digital German ideology. Triplec: Communication, Capitalism & Critique, 16(1), pp.280-289.
Fuchs, C., 2021. The digital commons and the digital public sphere: How to advance digital democracy today. Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, 16(1).
Fuchs, C., 2022. Digital Democracy and the Digital Public Sphere: Media, Communication and Society Volume Six. Taylor & Francis.