Political Communication Division:

ICA Political Communication Graduate Student Preconference
 University of Arizona, May 23-24, 2012

Call for Abstracts
Sponsoring Division: Political Communication

Aims: The preconference goals include providing guidance, feedback and professional socialization to political communication graduate students  at the master's and doctoral levels, introducing graduate students to  ICA and inviting them to take part in the academic discourse on  political communication through ICA, and cultivating a network among  young political communication scholars. To achieve these goals, the  preconference will bring together a select group of graduate students  working on political communication projects and provide them with the  opportunity to present and discuss their projects in a constructive  atmosphere. The preconference will also address common issues graduate  students face, including working toward publication and building a c.v.  The event will take place at the University of Arizona in Tucson, on May  23-24, 2012.

 Submission guidelines:

Graduate students working on political communication projects are  invited to submit abstracts of their research projects. Studies of communication dealing with government, political media, policy, political figures, citizens, campaigns, and advocacy groups are all within the purview of the division. Abstracts that address political communication problems at all levels of analysis using a variety of theories and methods are welcome. Abstracts should be no longer than 750 words of text (plus figures and references) that include an introduction of the theoretical or conceptual foundations of the project, research questions, methods,  preliminary findings (if available), conclusions, and research  significance. Abstracts will undergo review; please be sure to remove any identifying information. Projects at all stages will be considered, including research currently in the stages of data collection or analysis. Evaluation criteria will include quality of argument, methodological rigor, and importance of project to theory building in political communication.

 Please submit abstracts as an attachment in PDF or Word format to ICA.gradstudent.preconf@gmail.com. Indicate whether the project is a thesis or dissertation project, specify the stage of work (e.g., writing of the research proposal, complete and defended proposal, initial data collection, advanced data collection, data analysis, final writing/defending) and include author names, institutional affiliation, regular mailing address, fax number and email address in a separate document, or as part of the main message.

 The deadline for submissions is December 31, 2011. Acceptance and rejection decisions will go out on February 15, 2012. Preconference Committee: Kevin Coe (University of Arizona), Claes de  Vreese (University of Amsterdam), Jill Edy (University of Oklahoma),  Lance Holbert (Ohio State University), Kate Kenski (U of Arizona) and Yariv Tsfati (University of Haifa).  For more information please contact Yariv Tsfati, Division Chair, Department of Communication University of Haifa, 31905 ISRAEL, Fax  ++972-4-8240120, Email ytsfati@com.haifa.ac.il

 Call for papers  - New Media and Citizenship in Asia: Social Media, Politics, and Community-Building
 International Communication Association Preconference
 Phoenix, Arizona, USA
 May 24, 2012

The role of new communication technologies, such as the internet, social media, and mobile phones in political and civic engagement has generated significant interest not only from scholars, but also from organizations, politicians, and ordinary citizens. While recent events in the Middle East help recognize the potential of new communication media as an agent contributing to macro-level political changes, these new communication tools are also actively utilized in more traditional political processes, such as  electoral campaigns. Also important is people's everyday use of new communication technologies, which research has uncovered as providing an opportunity to encounter public affairs news  and discourse, enhance understanding of issues, and get involved in civic and political activities.  This preconference aims to showcase innovative scholarly work examining various subjects concerning the role of social media, mobile phones, and other new communication technologies in the formation of democratic citizenship-writ large in Asia. The preconference seeks studies that address relevant topics in a particular Asian country, and welcomes comparative research on Asian countries or Asian and non-Asian countries. The preconference encourages researchers to explore diverse topics, and possible areas include (but are not limited to): use of social media, mobile phones, and other new communication technologies in elections; influence of new media on citizen choices, participation, and knowledge; political elite's use of news media; use of social media by civic and grassroots groups; social media and civic engagement; new media and community;  political talk and social media; patterns of new media use and political and civic consequences; trends in social media; cloud computing and collective action; changes in news consumption; computational social science. Up to 15 papers will be selected through a peer-review process and divided into three or four interactive panels. Selected papers will be published in an edited volume or a special issue of a journal.
 
Submission guidelines

• Abstracts of no more than 500 words are due on November 28, 2011.
• Submit your abstract to kwak@umich.edu as an MS Word attachment  (please use your full name to label the file).
• The authors of accepted abstracts will be notified by 15 December,  2011.
• Final papers (5,000-8,000 words) are due by March 15, 2012.

Travel Grants
Travel grants will be available to participants, particularly those who  are from developing/transitional countries that appear in Tiers B and C on the  ICA country tier chart (country of residence, not of origin). All graduate students who are first authors or presenters will be provided with a travel grant.

 Organizers

• Nojin Kwak, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Studies, Director of the Nam Center for Korean Studies, University of Michigan, USA
• Marko M. Skoric, Assistant Professor, Division of Communication Research, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological  University, Singapore
• Scott Campbell, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Studies, University of Michigan, USA
• Junho Choi, Assistant Professor, Graduate School of Information, Yonsei  University, South Korea

Sponsors

• Nam Center for Korean Studies, University of Michigan, USA
• Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang  Technological University, Singapore Political Communication Division, International Communication Association

Game Studies Interest Group:

Web resources: The Game Studies Interest Group has launched a web site hosted by ICA and located at http://icagames.org.  The site includes information, documents, and multimedia content related to the Game Studies SIG.  The site also links to our social media offerings: a Facebook site at http://www.facebook.com/icagames and a Twitter account at http://twitter.com/icagames (as well as our recommended Twitter hashtag #icagames for relevant discussion).  We hope to build a community at these sites and provide useful content and discussion for Game Studies SIG members and supporters, so please visit our new online spaces and let us know how they can serve you better!

Preconference session: As the competitive paper review process for the 2012 ICA conference in Phoenix gets underway, we are also planning some other special events that the Game Studies SIG will host at the conference.  In addition to sessions featuring competitively-selected research papers  and panels that will be determined in the coming months, the Game Studies SIG is also planning to host a preconference session dedicated to best practices in video game research.  Details of the preconference, which will be held on the same day as the conference's opening events, will be available soon.  If you are interested in participating in this preconference or providing sponsorship assistance, contact Game Studies vice chair James D. Ivory (jivory@vt.edu)