Cultural Production and Experience: Strategies, Design, and Everyday Life

Call for papers

Time and place: November 13-14, 2008 in Roskilde, Denmark
Proposal deadline: May 1, 2008
Main contact person: Fabian Holt (please write Roskilde conference in the subject line)
Venue: Roskilde (more details will be announced soon)
Web site: http://web.mac.com/fabsound/Site/Conf.html

Keynote speakers:
Angela McRobbie (Goldsmiths College)
David Hesmondhalgh (University of Leeds)
Gerhard Schulze (University of Bamberg)
Kevin Hetherington (Open University)

The overall theme of this conference is the changing role of professional entertainment in contemporary, post-industrial society. Concepts such as the “culture society,” “creative industries,” and “experience economy” all signal an increase in the volume of production and consumption of cultural commodities. This development has implications for producers, consumers, and society at large.

The shifting relations between producers and consumers, between production and experience, generate two key questions: The first is how new strategies and forms of cultural production relate to changing forms of consumption and experience. This concerns the embodiment of cultural production in social life. The second question is how cultural commodities, live or mediated, are being consumed and how they affect consumers on both macro- and micro-levels of social life.

The conference organizers value new approaches and original perspectives grounded in empirical research. We welcome work in all areas of the creative and cultural industries, including tourism, media, publishing, music, theatre, film, event, national and amusement parks, and ICT (e.g. computer games and mobile phone entertainment). Presenters are also encouraged to explore connections across industries and genres in various aspects of production and consumption. This could include issues of convergence and cross-branding.

A major aspect of the theme is the organizational and institutional contexts of production. It is pertinent to recognize the changing roles of national and city governments and new alliances and networks between private and public sectors.

Research in these areas has responded to commercial and political agendas organized around the concepts of the creative and cultural industries and the experience economy. Interdisciplinary research and collaborations between the social and human sciences, business studies, and schools of art and design are still relatively few and far between. We welcome such initiatives and provide space for discussions of different and even conflicting notions of cultural production, consumption and experience. A particular concern is how the feedback loop between theory and practice, idea and product, can be sustained via methods of product design.

[A more detailed description can be found at the conference website]

Organization of the conference: The basic model is plenary keynotes alternating with parallel tracks of paper presentations and a few roundtable discussions. We accept proposals for research papers and for roundtable panels.

Paper proposals: Max. 500 words must be sent to Fabian Holt of the conference committee by May 1, 2008. Again, please write “Roskilde conference” in the subject line. The proposals will be reviewed by a committee. Notification of acceptance will be given by June 1.

Roundtables: The roundtable panels should facilitate dialogue between scholars and professional producers. Each roundtable is expected to begin with a two-minute statement by up to five presenters and then move on to discussion with a moderator. The presenters must submit a one-page written statement prior to the conference, which will be available at the conference Web site one week before the conference.

Deadline for paper submissions: Papers for the ordinary panels (max. 8000 words) and statements for roundtable panels (max. 1 page) must be submitted to fabianh@ruc.dk by October 15.

Conference committee:
The conference committee consists of Fabian Holt, Jørgen Ole Bærenholdt, and Jon Sundbo of the Center for Experience Research at Roskilde University, Denmark.

Publication
Some presenters will be asked to write their paper into an article for a special issue of a distinguished international journal. Our decisions will be based on the criteria of the quality and relevance of the papers.

Price
300 Euros including meals and accommodation.

Registration
All participants should by sending an e-mail to e-mail to Hanne Tofteng, Roskilde University, hannet@ruc.dk before October 15, 2008.

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