CSTonline

Department of Communication and Media, **March 16th 2017**

Organisers: Annette Hill, Michael Rübsamen, Tina Askanius and Zaki
Habibi

Fear is a key factor in today's media landscape. A dynamics of fear
frequently frames the news about the environment or immigration, it
dominates discourses of security and surveillance, and it permeates
people's lived experiences in precarious times. This symposium seeks to
address the range of forms and practices within which fear is mediated
in its many varieties, researching across political and public spheres,
policy and industry sectors, audio-visual content, digital and social
media, and audiences and popular culture.

The politics of fear, both past, present and future, cast a shadow on
the media and its power to shape and influence publics and audiences.
Media often trade in fear at different levels of intensity, working
within the political economy of emotions and anxieties about ourselves
and others, or about individual lives and public institutions. The
social construction of fear and insecurity in media representations,
policies and regulations, and in popular culture, can highlight conflict
and violence, and discourses of identity and othering. We see this in
the imagination of fear in popular storytelling such as crime, fantasy
or horror genres. We see this in the rise of populism within Europe or
America, where the subject positions of 'us and them' can lead to
xenophobia and political extremes. And we see this in the increased use
of surveillance in crime and policing, intelligence gathering, or within
commercial data gathering and geo location tracking, highlighting the
pervasive presence of surveillance and the difficult questions that need
to be asked regarding regulation and privacy.

We invite contributions to this symposium on media and fear that address
the following areas of enquiry: histories of media and fear; a politics
of fear; political activism, surveillance and fear; representations of
fear in fiction and factuality; audiences, publics and fear. The
research questions include: 1. What are the various relations between
media and fear? 2. How can we critically examine the politics of fear in
news, radio and television, film, digital and social media? 3. How and
for what reasons do audiences engage, both positively and negatively,
with narratives of fear in politics, society and culture?

These research questions can be applied to a range of theories, ideas
and problems concerning political culture, citizenship and democracy,
television, film, radio and print media, digital and social media,
popular culture, as well as other topics. Different approaches to
research on media and fear can include media, communication and cultural
studies, media history, film studies, sociology, political
communication, memory studies, cultural geography, amongst others. The
aim is to provide a platform for international scholars from various
disciplines to dialogue on the politics of fear as it relates to
knowledge, people and power.

The schedule includes a combination of keynote addresses,
pre-constituted panels, and open panels. Confirmed speakers include Nico
Carpentier (Uppsala University, Sweden), Joke Hermes (In Holland
University, Netherlands), Annette Hill (Lund University, Sweden),
Anastasia Kavada [(University of Westminster, UK), Jane Roscoe (London
Film School), Tarik Sabry (University of Westminster, UK), and Roza
Tsagarousianou (University of Westminster, UK). ]{lang="EN-US"}

 For further information please consult our website
[http://www.kom.lu.se/maf2017](http://www.kom.lu.se/maf2017){target="_blank"}[[.
]{lang="EN-US"}]{.underline}[There is a registration fee of 750 SEK (80
Euros) that covers food and drink for the day and an evening
buffet.]{.contextualExtensionHighlight .ms-font-color-themePrimary
.ms-border-color-themePrimary .ident_4494_4605 tabindex="0"}


Department of Communication and Media,
<b>
 March 16th 2017
</b>
Organisers: Annette Hill, Michael Rübsamen, Tina Askanius and Zaki Habibi  Fear is a key factor in today’s media landscape. A dynamics of fear frequently frames the news about the environment or immigration, it dominates discourses of security and surveillance, and it permeates people’s lived experiences in precarious times.

Messaggi di Rogue Scholar

Media and Fear – International Symposium, Lund University, Sweden, March 16th 2017