IVSA 2018 - 36th annual IVSA Conference

The 2018 IVSA conference invites papers, photo essays and films that investigate the question: How do we visualize political processes? Our scope includes national political processes as well as relations of power in social movements and in everyday life; in the family, intimate relationships, the workplace, schools, labor unions, and local and regional governments.
We are particularly interested in “transparency” and democracy as well as the struggle for and against power in authoritarian societies. We regard power as contested, resisted, opposed and recreated in a myriad of ways and in a continual flow of social activity.
We invite investigations of politics and power in the mature democracies of the West, but also in contested democracies in developing countries and democratic struggles inside authoritarian societies.
Papers, films and photo essays may explore one of the following themes, but are not limited to:
How do we visualize political process in a democratic, authoritarian or contested political system?
What is “transparency,” speaking visually?
How do we see power in everyday life (relationships, institutions, families, etc)?
How do authoritarian governments create visual rhetorics to support anti-democratic politics and repressive social arrangements?
How are images and films used in struggles for emancipation and liberation?