4th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Conference 2014

Call for papers
4th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Conference 2014
College of Arts, Media and Technology, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand
8-9 August 2014

Organized by:
Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Group (IAPMS group)

College of Arts, Media and Technology, Chiang Mai, Thailand

We are pleased to announce the 4th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Conference, which will take place on 8-9 August 2014 in Chiang Mai, in collaboration with College of Arts, Media and Technology, Chiang Mai University, Thailand. Following the first conference in Osaka in 2008, the second conference in Hong Kong in 2010, and the third conference in Taipei in 2012, we move our next meeting to Thailand—hub of vibrant South-East Asian popular music and music industry.

Founded in 2008, Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Group (IAPMS group) is a research network that at the moment includes 120 scholars not only in Asia but also in Europe, America and Oceania. Through its biennial conferences and related activities, the group provides a platform to foster scholarly conversations and collaborations arising from the growing academic interest in Asian popular music both inside and outside Asia.

Conference Theme: How to Perform ‘Inter-Asia’ Popular Music Studies

Nowadays, Asian popular music is strong and serious investigation on it is growing, in the academy and elsewhere. More importantly, the cultural economy of popular music in Asia has become transnational or border-crossing in a literal sense. There are quite a few case studies that show that the consumption and mediation as well as the production and distribution easily cross national borders.

However, most of ‘inter-Asia’ popular music studies restrict themselves to a ‘national’ base. Most researchers are specialized in the popular music of one nation or language group and it has proven to be quite a challenge to adopt a truly ‘inter-Asia’ perspective. This perspective of comparative or cross-cultural research is unfortunately still a somewhat distant ideal, with only a handful of successful texts that light the way. Given this situation, is it enough for each researcher to write about his/her ‘own’ music and leave the comparison to the readers of a ‘special issue’ or ‘edited volume’ that covers different ‘cases’? Or should we rather find out a ‘collective’ or ‘collaborative’ approach to doing research and writing papers? How can it be done, when you do not have sufficient international connections, when there is no agreed upon vocabulary and periodization, when your time schedule or life cycle does not match? Finally, is collective or collaborative writing really necessary?

The 4th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies conference will address the possibilities and difficulties of adopting an ‘inter-Asia’ perspective. We especially welcome papers that consider comparative and/or collaborative research, in the future as well as in the present. The conference engages with all the scholarly debates of the emerging fields of Inter-Asia popular music studies, in the following categories or streams:

Stream 1: Theory and Methodology
Stream 2: Production, Circulation and Consumption
Stream 3: History,Geography, Politics
Stream 4: Genre, Identity, Ideology

The organizers of Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Conference 2014 in Chiang Mai would like to invite paper presenters to send their abstract (not more than 250 words) to iapms2014chiangmai@gmail.com before 25 January 2014. Please don’t forget to write down the ‘stream’ in which you think your paper fits.

Please use this Proposal Form (right click to download) when submitting your proposal. Please use your surname as file name (e.g. Chua.doc, Douglas.doc). If you plan to organize a panel with more than two people, please coordinate with the panelists to put all the necessary information on one form (e.g. panel title, paper titles, individual abstracts, panelists information). A panel description is not necessary.

Please email all inquiries to: iapms2014chiangmai@gmail.com

25 January 2014: Deadline for abstract submission

25 February 2014: Acceptance of papers

25 April 2014: Registration

25 July 2014: Submission of full paper

English is the only language in the conference as there is no common language among Asia language. Translation service can be provided only during Q&A, in case the presenters need it.

For updated information about submission, registration, accommodation, transportation, etc. please keep visiting our website.