Registration Open for Differential Mobilities Conference
May 8-11, 2013 at Concordia University, Montreal
More info at http://mobilities.ca/pamnet-4/about/
From May 8-11, 2013 the Mobile Media Lab in the Communication Studies department of Concordia University in Montreal will be hosting Differential Mobilities: Movement and Mediation in Networked Societies. This international conference is sponsored by the Pan-American Mobilities Network, in association with the European Cosmobilities Network. The conference will be held in collaboration with the 4th annual meeting of the Pan-American Mobilities Network. Previous conferences have been held at: Royal Roads University, Victoria B.C (2010); Drexel University, Philadelphia PA (2011) ; and North Carolina State University, Raleigh-Durham NC (2012).
The conference is an opportunity for scholars, artists, activists, and policy makers to engage in a lively exchange of ideas in an interdisciplinary context, taking the term “mobilities” as a fulcrum. Mobilities has become an important framework for understanding and analyzing contemporary social, spatial, economic and political practices. Mobilities research is interdisciplinary, focusing on the systematic movement of people, goods and information that “travel” around the world at speeds that are greater than before, creating distinct patterns, flows– and blockages. Mobilities research contributes to the study of these technological, social and cultural developments from a critical perspective.
Each year the conference has a different thematic focus, reflecting the interests and expertise of the local organizing committee. Previous themes have included: Cultures of Movement: Mobile Subjects, Communities, and Technologies in the Americas (2010); Mobilities in Motion: New Approaches to Emergent and Future Mobilities (2011); Local and Mobile: linking mobilities, mobile communication and locative media (2012)
This year’s theme is Differential Mobilities: Movement and Mediation in Networked Societies. The term ‘differential mobilities’ has been deployed to describe dynamics of power within networked societies. When we conceptualize movement, mobility, or flows within spaces and places, we need to account for the systemic differences within infrastructures and terrains that create uneven forms of access. ‘Differential mobilities’, conceptually, highlights how exclusions occur, creating striations of power. It draws attention to differences in how these inequalities are experienced, the strategies for resistance, and the processes of mediation that have been implemented to instigate change.
The Pan-American Mobilities Network is a scholarly and professional network dedicated to the study of mobilities in South, Central, and North America. The Pan-American Mobilities Network gathers individuals and groups interested in developing more knowledge about mobilities on–or intersecting with–these continents and keen on building collegial relationships. Membership is free and a web-site for the organization is in process.
The Cosmobilities Network connects European scientists working in the field of mobility research. As an interdisciplinary network it represents state of the art research on different aspects of social, physical, cultural and virtual mobilities. It fosters mobility research as a key discipline investigating the modernization of European societies under the conditions of globalization and global complexity.
Conference Chair: Kim Sawchuk (Concordia University, Québec)
Organizing Committee: Jim Conley (Trent University, Canada), Owen Chapman (Concordia University, Québec), Adriana de Souza e Silva (NC State University, USA), Paola Jirón Martinez (University of Chile, Chile), Mary Gray (Microsoft/Indiana Univerisity, USA), Ole B. Jensen (Aalborg University, Denmark), André Lemos (Federal University of Bahia, Brazil), Mimi Sheller (Drexel University, USA), Jen Southern (Lancaster University, UK), and Phillip Vannini (Royal Roads University, Canada).
