How should we understand the shape of democratic politics? What contribution can work on culture and communication make here?
Exciting new intersections are emerging between research on communications and culture and new work in political theory. In Singapore the ICA Philosophy of Communication division will hold a preconference to explore these topics, with the support of Penny O'Donnell of ICA's Journalism Studies division and the cosponsorship of the Popular Communication and Political Communication divisions as well.
Alongside experiments with new forms of public deliberation and the debates on the public sphere in the 1990s and 2000s, new work in political theory has begun to rethink the reference points of political practice: expanding the range of those who are treated as political actors (the work of Seyla Benhabib and Nancy Fraser), transforming the scales on which political decisions are taken (Nancy Fraser and James Bohman's work on the internet and 'democracy across borders'), improving our understanding of what counts as political 'voice' (the work of Axel Honneth) and expanding the domain of the political, often in the cultural or aesthetic spheres (Isin and Nielsen's recent work from Canada on 'acts of citizenship').
Meanwhile, alongside cultural studies general interest in challenging the definitions of politics, researchers in culture and communications have become increasingly interested in the role popular culture and everyday communications play in helping us imagine, enact, and sustain the new forms of political practice: work on queer citizenship (Lauren Berlant, Michael Warner); work on 'voice' within contexts of development communications (Jo Tacchi and others); recent work on the practices of 'listening' across political, cultural, and artistic fields; and work on fan practices, social networking sites, and politics (Henry Jenkins).
The point of the preconference is to explore how researchers and communication practitioners interested in how cultural research can invigorate political theory, and vice versa. We will be concerned with thinking about the terms of contemporary politics within and beyond the horizon of neoliberalism.
The preconference was heavily subscribed, so we will have parallel paper sessions for some of the day. Through the sponsorship of Goldsmiths' Department of Media and Communication and Centre for the study of Global Media and Democracy, our discussions open with a keynote from Catherine Walsh of Universidad Andína Simon Bolivar, Quito. Walsh is an expert on activism in development and has agreed to fly on from her keynote at the Crossroads in Cultural Studies conference which closes in Hong Kong just before ICA, making possible an exciting strategic link between Philosophy of Communication division and Crossroads.
Other speakers will also make the trip down from the Hong Kong Crossroads for our preconference, which should make for an interesting mix. Towards the end of the day, we will have a session highlighting the work of the Australian 'Listening Project' that has recently generated a lot of interest by asking what it would be genuinely to listen to the political voices all around us.
Do register for what should be an exciting day!
