Communication Law and Policy

The division congratulates its top paper award winners this year.  They include: 

Network Neutrality or Bias?-A Determination of Lawful and Unlawful Internet Discrimination,
Rob Frieden, Penn State University

Necessary Knowledge for Communications Policy: Information Asymmetries and Commercial Data Access and Usage in the Policymaking Process,
Philip M. Napoli, Fordham U; Michelle Seaton, Fordham University; and

Democratizing Global Communication? Global Civil Society and the Campaign for Communication Rights in the Information Society,
Milton L. Mueller, Syracuse U; Brenden Kuerbis, Syracuse U; Christiane M. Pagé, Syracuse University

The top student paper award goes to: Beyond Network Neutrality: Criteria for a Democratic Internet,
Sascha D. Meinrath, Institute for Communications Research; Victor W. Pickard, U of Illinois

The division received 77 papers and proposals for the S.F. conference this year so competition for the limited number of presentation slots was high.  We will recognize the award winners at our business meeting, scheduled for Sunday afternoon, after which the meeting will segue into our division reception.  Please come by to meet your colleagues and to help plan the division activities.  We hope to have some special guests at the reception.

The division is sponsoring a one day preconference scheduled for Wednesday, May 23 at the University of San Francisco. The topics at the preconference include community telecommunications efforts, copyright and establishing research networks.  Joe Karaganis from the Social Science Research Council will participate in the discussion along with several experts on these topics.  The ICA website has more detail.  Please sign up if you are interested in these subjects.

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Feminist Scholarship

FSD is co-sponsoring a plenary re-thinking the impact of the Barnard Convention 25 years later. The plenary session, called "Representing Sexuality, Mediating Power," features an all-star panel and is scheduled for Friday, May 25th, from 4:30 p.m. to 5:45 p.m. in the huge Franciscan Room C.

The Barnard Convention was a milestone in articulating a pro-women/pro-sex standpoint for academics and activists alike. This panel is co-sponsored by FSD, LGBT, Phil Comm, and Pop Comm. This plenary is scheduled right after the FSD Business Meeting, where we will give awards to the authors of the top three student papers -- Hongmei Chen (University of Maryland), Melissa Fritz (University of Toronto), and Karen Sichler (University of Georgia). After the plenary, FSD is having a joint reception with LGBT, Phil Comm, Pop Comm, and ERIC.

Some other notes of interest: We had over 100 submissions for about 52 slots. The quality of the papers and works in progress was really high. There's a range of panels focusing on everything from girls' media uses to women's health, from women's activism to women and technology. I want to THANK the reviewers for FSD; we could not do this without you!

Vicki Mayer, Vice Chair
vmayer@tulane.edu

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Interpersonal Communication

We have an exciting set of programs for the San Francisco conference.  Our premier events will be our Top Four Paper panel followed by our business meeting on Friday afternoon.  We will present awards for Top Papers, Top Student Papers, and Top Dissertation. 

The dissertation and thesis award committee headed by Pamela Kalbfleisch has completed their difficult task this year. Please attend the business meeting this year to support our winners.

We look forward to seeing you at the panels in San Francisco.

Respectively Submitted,

Beth Le Poire, Chair
bmolineu@callutheran.edu

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Mass Communication

Congratulations to Mass Comm Vice Chair Robin Nabi and her team for putting together an exciting program of panels for the 2007 San Francisco meetings. Plan to attend the Mass Communication Division business meeting and reception starting at 4.30pm on Sunday, in Continental Ballroom 4, followed by a 1-hour reception at 6pm. Checks will be presented to winners attending the business meeting, where we will also congratulate Talia Straud (U of Texas-Austin), and her Ph.D. advisor Vince Price (U Pennsylvania), for winning the 2007 Kyoon Hur Dissertation Award.

The top four student papers will be presented on Saturday at 3pm in Continental Ballroom 4. The winners are: 

• "The Watchdog's Bite: Viewer Reactions to Uncivil News Interviews" by Eran N. Ben-Porath (U of Pennsylvania)
• "Fantasy Theme Analysis of the Rhetorical Visions Embedded in the Blogs of Expatriates in Taiwan" by Yea-Wen Chen (U of New Mexico)
• "The Effect of Late-Night TV Comedy Viewing on Adolescents' Civil Participation: Political Efficacy as a Mediating Mechanism" by Lindsay H. Hoffman (Ohio State U) and Tiffany Lynn Thomson (Ohio State U)
• "Unintended Construct Activation: A Cognitive Development Explanation for the Boomerang Effect in Response to Strategic Messages" by Sahara Byrne (U of California) 

The top four papers in Mass Communication will be presented on Sunday at 3pm in Continental Ballroom 4. The winners are:

• "The Influence of Television News Depictions of the Images of War" by Michael Pfau (U of Oklahoma) and Michel M. Haigh (Pennsylvania State U)
• "Capital, Consumptoin, Communication and Citizenship: The Socal Positioning of Taste and Civic Culture in the U.S." by Lewis A. Friedland, Dhavan Shah, Nam-Jin Lee, Mark Andrew Rademacher, Lucy Atkinson, Thomas Hove (U of Wisconsin)
• "Adolescents' Exposure to Sexually Explicit Online Material and Sexual Uncertazinty: Investigating Perceptions of Pornography as Underlying Mechanisms" by Jochen Peter and Patti M. Valkenburg (U of Amsterdam)
• "Perceptions of Effectiveness Versus Markers of Actual Effectiveness in Adolescents' Reactions to Antitobacco Ads" by Erica W. Austin, Myiah Hutchens Hively, Yi-Chun "Yvonnes" Chen, Rebecca Van de Vord, Jared Dawson, Rakhee Gupta, and Bruce Pinkleton (Washington State U)

The news media and ICA conference participants are invited to attend a reception and panel discussion on "News Framing and International Conflicts: Contexts and Impacts” from 6pm-7.30pm on Saturday at The San Francisco Hilton, Yosemite C Ballroom, sponsored by The Claus M. Halle Institute for Global Learning and the new Arabic Media Center at Emory University. Papers and panelists include "From Failure to Fiasco: Media and Misrepresentation in Iraq" Bob Entman and Steve Livingston (George Washington U); "The Role of Media in International Conflicts: A Long-Term Analysis of Israel’s Media Image in International TV News" Roland Schatz (Media Tenor); "Framing Controversy on Al-Jazeera: From Cartoon Wars to the Pope" Sam Cherribi (Emory U); and "Is what you see what you believe? Visual reporting about the 2006 war in Lebanon" Christian Kolmer (Media Tenor). Gadi Wolfsfeld (Hebrew University) will comment on this timely research. Cochairs are Holli Semetko, Director of The Halle Institue and Gordon Newby, Director of the Arabic Media Center. If you plan to attend, please RSVP by May 15th to holli.semetko@emory.edu.

Holli A. Semetko, Chair

holli.semetko@emory.edu