culmed 2018 - A Stream on “Critical Media Literacy in a Global World”

The Arts & Culture Unit and the Mass Media & Communications Unit of ATINER are organizing A Stream on “Critical Media Literacy in a Global World”, 11-14 June, 2018, Athens, Greece as part of the 3rd Annual International Symposium on Culture and Civilization sponsored by the Athens Journal of Mass Media and Communications.
Critical Media Literacy (CML) is an indispensable competence in a globalized and hence highly mediated world, especially when media organizations have become global monopolies of economic, political and cultural power. In a democratic society, corporate mainstream media should be making government and powerful individuals and entities accountable to people. To the contrary, they serve those interests by spinning and spreading misinformation, lies, and myths, manufacturing reality, while limiting discourses that are not serving their own economic and political interests. The revolution of internet, digital communication and social media has been considered as the democratization of media, as long as ‘net neutrality’ is protected. At the same time, the surveillance and control of the state and industries have exploded, threatening people’s privacy, democracy, and security. Net neutrality is under constant threat by those same big media corporations that seek aggressively to control the internet as they do with cable customers. As mainstream corporate media totally relinquished their role of being the ‘fourth estate’ for democracy to function, alternative, non-profit public interest media is blooming, with an open internet as a primary condition for many of those media to exist. Understanding how corporate media work and the politics of mass communication, as well as knowing, using, supporting, and creating public interest media, constitute the bases of CML competence. This stream is open to paper presentations that will illustrate how corporate media work, stressing the need to critically examine what apparently seems innocent and harmless types of media such as children’s books, teen magazines, social media, news and entertainment. CML presentations are expected to provide conceptual frames and pedagogical strategies for using alternative, public interest, and digital social media to boost critical thinking and understanding of the real social issues. The presenters can demonstrate how important it is for students at all academic levels, teachers, parents and people in general to become critical media literate in a corporate ruled globalized world.
You may participate as presenter of one paper, chair or/and organizer of a session, or observer.
Fee structure information is available on www.atiner.gr/2018fees.
Special arrangements will be made with a local hotel for a limited number of rooms at a special conference rate. In addition, a number of special events will be organized: A Greek night of entertainment with dinner, a special one-day cruise to selected Greek islands, an archaeological tour of Athens and a one-day visit to Delphi. Details of the social program are available here.
Please submit a 300-word abstract before 12 February 2018, by email, to atiner-AT-atiner.gr, Dr. Myriam N. Torres, Professor and Language, Literacy, & Culture Program Coordinator, Curriculum & Instruction Department, New Mexico State University, USA. Please include: Title of Paper, Full Name (s), Current Position, Institutional Affiliation, an email address and at least 3 keywords that best describe the subject of your submission. Decisions will be reached within four weeks of your submission. Please use the abstract submitting form.
If your submission is accepted, you will receive information on registration deadlines and paper submission requirements. Should you wish to participate in the Conference without presenting a paper, for example, to chair a session, to evaluate papers which are to be included in the conference proceedings or books, to contribute to the editing of a book, or any other contribution, please send an email to Dr. Gregory T. Papanikos, President, ATINER & Honorary Professor, University of Stirling, UK (gregory.papanikos-AT-stir.ac.uk).
The association was established in 1995 as an independent world association of Academics and Researchers. Its mission is to act as a forum where Academics and Researchers from all over the world can meet in Athens, in order to exchange ideas on their research, and to discuss future developments in their disciplines.
The organizing and hosting of International Conferences and Symposiums, the carrying out of Research, and the production of Publications are the basic activities of ATINER. Since 1995, ATINER has organized more than 400 International Conferences and other events, and has published close to 200 books. In 2012, the Association launched a series of conference paper publications (click here), and at the beginning of 2014, it introduced its own series of Journals (click here).
Academically, the Association is organized into seven Divisions and 37 Units. Each Unit organizes at least an Annual International Conference, and may also undertake various small and large research projects.
Academics and Researchers are more than welcome to become members and to contribute to ATINER’s objectives. If you would like to become a member, please download the relevant form (membership form). For more information on how to become a member, please send an email to: info-AT-atiner.gr.