Events
Events include paper calls for conferences, workshops, lectures, seminars, and exhibits (listed in chronological order).
Last updated 01/16/2012 by Kathryn de Ridder-Vignone.
Scientific and Political Change
Deadline: January 25 2012
Updated: December 16 2011
Scientific and Political Change," an innovative graduate course using problem-based learning around a sequence of 3-week cases, invites participation from a distance in three ways: registering for credit; joining collaborative explorations on one of the cases with short weekly check-ins; or serving on panels to hear the presentations at the end of each case. The course and collaborative explorations, offered by the Science in a Changing World track at the University of Massachusetts Boston, start on January 25, 2012. For more details contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
1st International Conference on Management of Intellectual Property Rights and Strategy (MIPS2012)
February 02 2012 to February 05 2012 | School of Management, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IITB), India*
Deadline: July 08 2011
http://www.som.iitb.ac.in/mips2012
Updated: July 17 2011
The core focus of this conference is to provide a suitable and conducive platform to discuss, debate and present contemporary research in the area of Intellectual Property Rights and its management. *Theme of the Conference:* The theme for the conference is "IP for Development: The emerging Paradigm". Following are the Track of interest identified, but are NOT limited to: - Economics of commons – managing technology, knowledge transfer and spillovers, standardisation and pooling through IPR - Identification, Decisions and Strategic management of IPR – IP Informatics and analysis - Missing IP management in strategy - Myths and realities in IP Quality, Valuation and its branding - Navigating the Digital jungle – IPR as the compass - Public institutions, requirements and intergenerational equity of IP - Rationales and Paradigms in the role of IPR - The Public – Private Dichotomy under TRIPS Flexibility and Maximum standards - Tripping open innovation – Does IP close the opening of collaborative innovation models? *Early Call for Papers/ Submissions* The submissions are through the online mode only. Register and upload your extended abstract online at towards the submission and review process. The extended abstract would be limited to 750 words [including the keywords]. Workshop / Tutorial proposals <500 words related to IPR are also invited. Full papers are expected by October 1, 2011. Selected and reviewed submissions would be accommodated in Research / Practitioners / Case study stream. Full papers are a must to be eligible for the research papers stream and the related grants. Practitioners' series can be an extended abstract of 3 pages. *
Important Timelines* - Extended Abstracts DUE: July 08, 2011 - Review status: August 16, 2011 - Workshops / Tutorials Proposals: July 08, 2011 - Full Paper for Review: October 1, 2011 - Full paper review and selection status: December 1, 2o11 - Early Registration: November 15 – December 31, 2011 - Regular Registration: December 11, 2011 onwards - Camera Ready Paper: January 01, 2011 - Conference Dates: February 2-5, 2012 *Conference Components* The conference provides the ideal opportunity for emerging researchers in the IPR domain to interact with experts and practitioners through doctoral colloquium, themed tracks and keynote sessions. Separate workshops and tutorials are also being planned as part of the pre conference event. To enable the industry and practitioners participation, the conference has separate case study tracks across the various industries and also application style papers which apply the various research models into reality. Proposals for workshops, tutorials and sponsorship are welcome. *MIPS 2012 conference Secretariat* IPR Chair Office SJMSOM, IIT Bombay, Powai Please contact us at mips2012[at]som.iitb.ac.in IPR Chair Project: Prof. Karuna Jain, iprchair[at]som.iitb.ac.in IPR Chair Office: iprchair.office[at]som.iitb.ac.in *Further Details*
The third GENDER, SCIENCE, and ORGANIZATIONS WRITING WORKSHOP
February 02 2012 | Winter Meeting of the Sociologists for Women in Society, at the Hilton Bayfront Hotel in St. Petersburg, Florida
http://www.socwomen.org/web/conferences/upcoming-conference.html
Updated: December 16 2011
The theme for the S.W.S. meeting is "Toward a Feminist Institution: Transforming the Academy." We are a growing group of sociologists, members of ASA and/or SWS, who have been working on research related to NSF-funded ADVANCE projects. These include studies on gender and STEM careers, scientific workplace organizations, transformation and change processes in organizations to promote gender equality, and other themes pertinent to gender and academia. Many of us work with intersectional theoretical approaches. We have been inspired by Mary Anne Holmes (University of Nebraska-Lincoln) and Suzanne O’Connell (Wesleyan University) who have been running writing retreats for Geoscientists. At this self-organized workshop we will talk about our current projects, write (in several blocks of time set aside), and think about possible collaborative projects in these areas. We invite interested sociologists to join us. Because space will be limited, please send an email to Kathrin Zippel (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) to reserve a spot (first come…), and to join the distribution list for updates on the preparation for the workshop. Though we expect that participants in the workshop will register for and attend the SWS meeting, there is no extra fee to participate in the writing workshop. The room rental is covered as part of the hotel's charge to SWS, and participants will bring snacks and extension cords to share and go out for lunch. Please make sure to reserve a hotel room a.s.a.p. The hotel explains: “The special room rate will be available until January 3rd or until the group block is sold-out, whichever comes first.” If you are interested in sharing a room you are welcome to do this through the distribution list for the workshop. You will find more information about the hotel and conference registration for the SWS Winter Meeting (Thursday Feb. 2- Sunday Feb. 6th).
iConference 2012
February 07 2012 to February 10 2012 | Toronto, Canada
Deadline: December 05 2011
http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/2012index
Updated: August 15 2011
Greetings to everyone!
We are now accepting submissions for iConference 2012, our seventh annual gathering of scholars, researchers, and professionals who share an interest in the critical information issues of contemporary society.
The iConference will include peer-reviewed papers, posters, alternative events, and workshops?all intended to push the boundaries of information studies, explore core concepts and ideas, and create new technological and conceptual configurations. Our four-day event takes place in downtown Toronto, February 7-10, 2012. The conference theme is: Culture * Design * Society.
Authors and organizers can now submit papers, poster abstracts, alternative events proposals, and workshop proposals using our secure submissions website: http://bit.ly/iconf12sub
In addition, a Doctoral Student Colloquium is being organized, with funding from the National Science Foundation. Applications for the colloquium are now being accepted. Learn more at http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/doctoral/
The iConference series is sponsored by the iSchools, a growing association of more than 30 Schools, Faculties and Colleges in North America, Europe and Asia?however, affiliation with the iSchools is not a prerequisite, and we encourage everyone to participate. Presenting sponsors of iConference 2012 include NSF and Microsoft Research.
* Conference home: http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/2012index * Submissions site: http://bit.ly/iconf12sub * Last Year?s Proceedings: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1940761
Submission types: * Papers: We?re looking for original research, six to eight pages; papers will be refereed in a blind process, and accepted papers will be published in the ACM Digital Library. Submission deadline: Monday September 12, 2011 Notification: Early November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011
* Posters: We?re interested in posters presenting new work, preliminary results and designs, or educational projects. Poster abstracts will undergo a blind review, and accepted posters will have their abstracts published in the ACM Digital Library. Submission deadline: Monday September 26, 2011 Notification: Mid November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011
* Workshops: These can be half- or full-day and can focus on any area within information. Submission deadline: Monday September 19, 2011 Notification: Early October Final version due: Monday October 31, 2011
* Alternative Events: These can include panels, fishbowls, performances, storytelling, roundtable discussions, wildcard sessions, demos/exhibitions, and more. All should be highly participatory, informal, engaging and pluralistic. Submission deadline: Monday September 19, 2011 Notification: Mid November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011
* Doctoral Colloquium: This year?s colloquium will be organized around the theme of ?inquiry.? Applicants will submit a 1,000 word abstract addressing the question, ?What is the nature of inquiry in the information field, what makes it similar to or different from other areas of research, and what challenges have you met in your own research in this regard?? Visit our website for details: http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/doctoral Application deadline: Friday September 30, 2011 Notification: Late November
Learn more at http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/2012index
iConference 2012
February 07 2012 to February 10 2012 | Toronto, Canada
Deadline: September 12 2011
Conference: http://www.ischools.org/iConference12/2012index/
Updated: May 16 2011
The iConference is an annual gathering of a broad spectrum of scholars and researchers concerned about critical information issues in contemporary society. The iConference pushes the boundaries of information studies, explores core concepts and ideas, and creates new technological and conceptual configurations -- all situated in interdisciplinary discourses. These issues will be tackled during our four-day event in downtown Toronto, February 7-10, 2012. The conference theme is: Culture * Design * Society. Please join us for a multitude of high quality papers, posters, workshops, along with interactive alternative events that will frame the conversation. In addition to these activities, there will be a Doctoral Colloquium and an Early Career Workshop at the conference, lots of social events, and many opportunities to mingle. The iConference series is sponsored by the iSchools, a growing association of more than 30 Schools, Faculties and Colleges in North America, Europe and Asia -- however, affiliation with the iSchools is not a prerequisite, and we encourage everyone to participate
* iCaucus: http://www.ischools.org/site/ * Last Year’s Proceedings: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1940761 Submission types: * Papers: We’re looking for original research, six to eight pages; papers will be refereed in a double-blind process, and accepted papers will be published in the ACM Digital Library. Submission deadline: Monday September 12, 2011 Notification: Early November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011 * Posters: We’re interested in posters presenting new work, preliminary results and designs, or educational projects. Poster abstracts will undergo a blind review, and accepted posters will have their abstracts published in the ACM Digital Library. Submission deadline: Monday September 26, 2011 Notification: Mid November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011 *
Workshops: These can be half- or full-day and can focus on any area within information. Submission deadline: Monday September 19, 2011 Notification: Early October Final version due: Monday October 31, 2011 * Alternative Events: These can include panels, fishbowls, performances, storytelling, roundtable discussions, wildcard sessions, demos/exhibitions, and more. All should be highly participatory, informal, engaging and pluralistic. Submission deadline: Monday September 19, 2011 Notification: Mid November Final version due: Monday December 5, 2011 * Doctoral Colloquium: This year’s colloquium will be organized around the theme of “inquiry.” Applicants will submit a 1,000 word abstract addressing the question, “What is the nature of inquiry in the information field, what makes it similar to or different from other areas of research, and what challenges have you met in your own research in this regard?” Visit our website for details. Application deadline: Friday September 30, 2011 Notification: Late November
The Inaugural Asia Pacific Science Policy Studies (SPS) Research Conference
February 08 2012 to February 10 2012 | Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
Deadline: September 15 2011
Updated: August 15 2011
What is the relationship between science and policy decision-making? How do nations make decisions to invest in science and technology – and how are citizens involved?
The aim of this conference is to showcase the latest international thinking in the field of Science Policy Studies and to support emerging SPS scholarship in the Asia Pacific region. If you are concerned about the future of science and technology, and if you have ideas about how science policy systems work best, you should be part of this event.
We look forward to you joining in this unique and stimulating discussion between science policy researchers, government officials, industry and professional associations, along with scientists from a broad range of disciplines, Māori scientists and indigenous knowledge holders. Expressions of Interest – receive alerts and news updates
Please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Inaugural Asia Pacific Science Policy Studies Research Conference
February 08 2012 to February 10 2012 | Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
Deadline: December 15 2011
Updated: November 16 2011
Constructing National Wellbeing through Science and Innovation
An Asia Pacific STS Network APSTN event
What is the relationship between science and policy decision-making? How do nations make decisions to invest in science and technology – and how are citizens involved?
The aim of this conference is to showcase the latest international thinking in the field of Science Policy Studies and to support emerging SPS scholarship in the Asia Pacific region. If you are concerned about the future of science and technology, and if you have ideas about how science policy systems work best, you should be part of this event.
We look forward to you joining in this unique and stimulating discussion between science policy researchers, government officials, industry and professional associations, along with scientists from a broad range of disciplines, Māori scientists and indigenous knowledge holders.
The Inaugural Conference of the National Academy of Inventors ® (NAI)
February 16 2012 to February 17 2012 | University of South Florida will take place in Tampa, Florida
www.nai.usf.edu/conference
Updated: November 08 2011
The conference is intended to be a forum to encourage creative thinking and the spirit of innovation, promote and enhance the development and utilization of inventions, and provide advice and guidance to new and existing inventors. David Kappos, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office will deliver the keynote address.
The conference is seeking oral or poster presentations on original research on all aspects of academic innovation and its impact. All accepted abstracts will be published in a special conference issue of the journal Technology and Innovation- Proceedings of the National Academy of Inventors ®. The Call for Abstracts and additional information about the conference are available at www.nai.usf.edu/conference. For questions or more information, please contact NAI Coordinator Keara Leach at 813-974-5862 or .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Risky endeavors: Emerging approaches to the creation of risk and responses…
February 24 2012 to February 28 2012 | Association of American Geographers NYC
Deadline: September 21 2011
http://www.aag.org/cs/annualmeeting
Updated: August 22 2011
It is unsurprising that many scholars have turned their attention to specific techniques of risk creation, maintenance, and resolution. Risk, variation, uncertainty, contingency, and insecurity have become buzzwords in this chaotic atmosphere. The impetus to identify, quantify, and act on future unknowns is a ubiquitous feature of contemporary systems of rule, accumulation, and knowledge production. In natural sciences, uncertainty about specific outcomes of climate change has created space for climate-deniers to forestall global warming policy. In financial markets, risk continues to be a central driver and metric of profit under neoliberalism. In the conduct of wars and counter-insurgencies, the designation and capture of ‘enemy combatants’ hinges on the creation of profiles compiled from vast intelligence gathering networks and fed into algorithms designed to identify threats. These regimes of risk identification and management, new or repackaged, create material and discursive spaces ripe for geographical (and allied disciplines) inquiry. Natural hazards research, the works of Ulrich Beck, and ecological modernization theorists remain influential approaches to understanding risk in particular ways. But these ways of thinking about risk are not monolithic or unchallenged. New approaches involve both uncertainty itself and the ways in which that uncertainty is created, modeled, deployed, made policy ready, contested, and cataloged. This session challenges participants to engage with the continuities and differences of approaches to risk in and beyond their specific substantive area. Participants could also engage how these specific conceptualizations of the unknown may or may not influence or even be commensurable with other regimes of uncertainty. Papers may also focus specifically on these forms of meta-uncertainty, in which fractured approaches to understanding risk must engage one another.
Abstracts may be sent to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Please include author(s), affiliations, and AAG-issued pin number. Format: Presenters are asked to strictly limit themselves to a 15-minute paper to ensure ample time for discussion amongst participants.
HASTAC Announces New Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition
February 28 2012 to February 29 2012 |
Deadline: December 05 2011
http://dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers.php
Updated: December 05 2011
HASTAC is proud to announce a new Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition. The new Competition-held in conjunction with the HASTAC/MacArthur Foundation Badges for Lifelong Learning Competition-explores the potential of digital badges for and by teachers. Applicants will propose badge systems that allow teachers to track and promote feedback regarding their acquisition of new competencies and skills. Applications are now being accepted for Stage One of the Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition. Deadline is December 5th at 5pm PST/8pm EST. Full information about the Competition is available at http://dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers.php and posted below.
---------- Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition (Three Stages)
Full information: http://dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers.php Awards: $10,000 to $200,000 In conjunction with the Badges for Lifelong Learning Competition, applicants are invited to propose badging systems not only for learning content, but also for teacher learning and feedback. Competitive submissions proposing badge systems that track and promote feedback regarding the competencies and skills as well as the programs and subjects over which teachers acquire expertise will be a central part of the Stage 1 and Stage 2 processes of the Competition. The winning proposal(s) will be awarded funding to develop the proposed badging system.
Stage One: Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition
Full information: http://www.dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers-stage-1.php Now accepting applications. Deadline: December 5, 2011 at 5pm PST/8pm EST Application requirements: 1,000 word written proposal and optional supplementary materials. For Stage One, educators applying to the Competition submit proposals describing subject and content matter for a teacher badge system that recognizes, rewards and offers peer feedback to teachers regarding mastery of capacities and skills. Submissions require a 1,000 word written proposal and can include optional supplementary materials that help visualize the proposed badging system. These materials should include systems for recognizing and rewarding some of the capacities, skills, and content they believe are needed to effectively teach math, literacy, or digital literacy skills and/or to effectively teach to the Common Core State Standards. For example, giving feedback to students; developing complex skills; or skills needed to teach in an environment that privileges digital or online learning.
Stage Two: Teacher Mastery and Feedback Badge Competition
Full information: http://www.dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers-stage-2.php Stage Two opens on December 12, 2011. Deadline: January 12, 2012, 5pm PST/8pm EST Application requirements: 1,500 word written proposal plus visual materials that graphically represent the badge design submission. In Stage Two, applicants will be encouraged to submit proposals that map out what a teacher mastery and feedback badging system would look like, how it would operate, what benefits and challenges it would present, and the design and implementation process it would incorporate. The proposed badging systems should be based on, and fully interoperable with, Mozilla's Open Badge Infrastructure.
Stage Three: Match-making and Finals
Full information: http://www.dmlcompetition.net/Competition/4/teachers-stage-3.php Stage Three Meeting: February 28-29, 2012
No application needed--finalists from Stages One and Two will be selected to advance. Stage Three pairs Stage Two finalists with Stage One finalists and/or collaborators, to form comprehensive teams who will work together to finalize collaborative badge proposals.
Connect with the Digital Media and Learning Competition:
Web: http://www.dmlcompetition.net Winners' Hub: http://hastac.org/competitions Badges Group: http://hastac.org/groups/badges-lifelong-learning Scoop.it: http://www.scoop.it/t/badges-for-lifelong-learning Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dmlComp Hashtags: #dmlbadges and #openbadges Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DMLcomp Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/103047964663117398536/posts LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Digital-Media-Learning-Competition-3935137
The Governance of Innovation and Socio-Technical Systems: Theorising and Explaining Change
March 01 2012 to March 02 2012 | Copenhagen Business School, Denmark
Deadline: September 25 2011
Updated: July 19 2011
‘Governance’ is a notion that has gained increasing currency the past years in the field of (sectoral) innovation systems and socio-technical systems’ studies. Generally speaking, it refers to the ability of a society to solve collective action problems in issues that involve science, technology and innovation. However, there continues to be a considerable level of indeterminacy in the literature. Firstly, because the empirical literature on systems exhibits multiple understanding of change, and hence about how governance processes take place. This diversity has not been properly spelled out, obscuring the way in which change is linked to specific forms of (effective) governance. And secondly, because these empirical studies tend to use the notion ‘governance’ in rather loose conceptual terms and sometimes even only implicitly. This tends to underestimate or ignore the coordination aspect embedded in any form of systemic change. For these two reasons, the actual explanatory capacity of the notion ‘governance’ when studying systems’ change remains limited.
This workshop aims at addressing this gap in the literature, asking how do agents and institutions coordinate in the process of generating change in complex socio-technical and (sectoral) innovation systems. The workshop aims at attracting theoretical and empirical papers by academics working on innovation studies, comparative public policy, modes of governance, science and technology studies (STS), institutional studies, varieties of capitalism, international relations and global governance. As mentioned above, most of the work on socio-technical and innovation systems’ change and governance is dominated by multiple understandings of change and an unclear conceptualization of governance. This workshop wants to take a step further, enabling a theoretical and empirical advancement on what explains systems’ change and what are the mechanisms and processes of governing (effectively or not) these complex systems.
The seminar is arranged by the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence and the Department of Business and Politics at the Copenhagen Business School, in collaboration with FUHU, Denmark.
Please, note that there will be a limited number of participants.
▪ The deadline for abstract submissions is September 25th, 2011. Abstracts should be of max 500 words describing the research question, methods, and preliminary results.
▪ The submission of abstracts should be done at this email address: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
▪ Decisions on acceptance of abstracts will be communicated by November 10th (or shortly thereafter), based on advice from the international program committee (see above).
Questions regarding the academic content of this workshop can be put to the convener, Prof. Susana Borrás at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) . All submissions must be made to this email address: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Science and Method in the Humanities
March 02 2012 | Rutgers University
Deadline: November 01 2011
http://sciencemethodhumanities.wordpress.com/
Updated: September 15 2011
The aim of the conference is to explore questions of method and methodology in the sciences and in humanities scholarship that engages the sciences. This one-day event will bring together scholars working across that curricular divide for an interdisciplinary discussion of science and method, ranging from the historical development of scientific methods and their various historical re-articulations to broader concerns of methodology across the humanities.
How does interdisciplinary scholarship reframe questions of methodology, broadly construed? How is method variously understood and how are its formulations shaped by historical, theoretical, and disciplinary concerns? How does method relate to matters of fact and theory? How do humanities disciplines appropriate and modify particular scientific methods? Related themes/topics may include (but are not limited to): - Scientific methods and the history of science - Methodology, disciplinary history, and the professionalization of the humanities - Method and form, genres of scientific knowledge, aesthetics of science, or as science - Inscription and writing: media, authority, translation, referentiality - Elements of method: hypothesis, collaboration, witnessing, objectivity - Historical method: induction, deduction, experimentation - Philosophy and the Analytic/Continental divide - Vitalism in the sciences and in critical theory - The afterlives of positivism - The “cognitive revolution” and the humanities - The curriculum and the “two cultures” debate - Science Studies/STS, Actor Network Theory, and historical study - Vernacular Science and Mobile Technologies - Digital humanities: computation, quantitative analysis, electronic publishing and peer review
Please send 400-500-word abstracts to Lizzie Oldfather ( .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) by November 1, 2011. Sponsored by: Rutgers British Studies Center, Program in the History of Science, Technology, Environment and Health, Center for Cultural Analysis, Program in Early Modern Studies. For more information, please visit http://sciencemethodhumanities.wordpress.com/
Science, Medicine, and the Making of Race
March 08 2012 to March 10 2012 | University of Mississippi
Deadline: December 16 2011
Updated: August 15 2011
The 2012 Porter Fortune Symposium at the University of Mississippi sponsored by the Department of History explores the intersection of scientific ideas about race and gender with medical practice and experimentation, from the 18th to the 20th century. As racialized science was developing, non-white bodies were often favorite subjects of medical research. This symposium seeks papers from the fields of history of science, history of medicine, and general history exploring the topic of how race and gender get written into (or out of) science, whether in the context of colonialism, slavery, healthcare policies, or museum acquisitions. The 3-day conference will be held from March 8 -10, 2012 on the campus of the University of Mississippi.
We are very happy to announce our keynote speaker for the event will be Londa Schiebinger, the John L. Hinds Professor of History of Science at Stanford University. Dr. Schiebinger is the author of Nature’s Body: Gender in the Making of Modern Science (winner of the 1995 Ludwik Fleck Book Prize), Plants and Empire: Colonial Bioprospecting in the Atlantic World (winner of the 2005 AHA prize in Atlantic History, and the Alf Andrew Heggoy Book Prize, French Colonial Historical Society, 2005), as well as numerous other works on race, gender, and science.
The University of Mississippi and its Department of History have held the Porter Fortune Symposium every year since 1975, on various topics. It is a three-day event, with both a keynote address and a number of thematic sessions. Typically, selections of the papers appear in an edited volume. Please submit a one-page proposal and a c.v. to conference organizers at: Theresa Levitt (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) or Deirdre Cooper Owens (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)). Please include in the body of the email: your name, institutional affiliation, and contact information. Panel submissions are also encouraged. These should include a 250-word rationale for the panel, as well as the 250-word abstract for each paper. Please submit each panel in one email message (including the names, affiliations, and contact information of each member).
Deadline for Submissions is: 12/16/2011.
Course on Human Genetics and Medical Technology
March 12 2012 to March 15 2012 | Nijmegen, the Netherlands
Deadline: January 16 2012
Updated: December 06 2011
The department of IQ healthcare, Ethics, Philosophy and History of Medicine, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, announces the advanced European Bioethics Course ‘Human Genetics and Medical Technology’ from 12 -15 March 2012.
During the course we will study the relation between technology and (medical) ethics. Focus of the course are the moral problems generated by the research and development and application of new knowledge in a range of emerging fields such as tissue engineering and genomics. The implications give rise to new images of the human being and shift common understanding of health and disease.
Topics are, amongst others, screening and testing from clinical perspective, Health Technology Assessment, translational medicine and storage and analysis of (genetic) data. Lecturers include: prof. Evert van Leeuwen, Simone van der Burg PhD, Ineke van der Burgt MD, PhD, prof. Gert Jan van der Wilt, Conor Douglas PhD, Martin Boeckhout MA, MSc.
During the lectures students will be introduced to basic philosophical and ethical concepts. There will be ample time for questions and debate. Small group discussions and working groups are devoted to in-depth discussions of different cases and particular contemporary issues in the area of human genetics and medical technologies. Participants are expressly invited to supply cases from their own work and experience for discussion during the course.
The key-note lecture will be held by Insoo Hyun PhD, Associate Professor in the Department of Bioethics and Director of the CWRU Stem Cell Ethics Center, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, USA.
This course is of interest to researchers working in the field of human genetics, biomedical sciences, life sciences, genetics and biology and physicians doing research that has a genetic component but also to professionals from other areas in healthcare such as physicians and nurses health care administrators, bioethics committee members, professionals working in the pharmaceutical industry, professionals in the areas of ethics, philosophy and theology, and PhD students undertaking courses of study in any of these areas.
Location: Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, the Netherlands. Language: English. Price: Euro (€) 690 for early registration before January 16th, 2012, Euro (€) 790 for registration after this date. For more information, please consult our website: www.masterbioethics.org, under Intensive courses, Human Genetics and Medical Technology or contact Simone Naber: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Tel: [0031](0)24-3613359/[0031](0)24-3615320.
The intensive course Human Genetics and Medical Technology is part of the post-initial Erasmus Mundus Master of Bioethics program.
3rd Mobilities conference 2012 Local and mobile: Linking mobilities, mobile communication
March 16 2012 to March 18 2012 | Raleigh, NC
Deadline: October 30 2011
http://crdm.chass.ncsu.edu/mobilities/
Updated: October 14 2011
The Communication, Rhetoric and Digital Media (CRDM) Program and the Mobile Gaming Research Lab at NC State University will be hosting the 3rd joint international conference of the Pan-American Mobilities Network and the Cosmobilities Network. Invited keynote speakers: · Paul Dourish (University of California, Irvine) · Rich Ling (IT University of Copenhagen) · Teri Rueb (University of Buffalo, SUNNY) Mobilities has become an important framework to understand and analyze contemporary social, spatial, economic and political practices. Being interdisciplinary in its nature, Mobilities focuses on the systematic movement of people, goods and information that “travel” around the world in rates much higher (or much slower) than before. As such, mobility studies challenge traditional scholarship that often ignores the social dimensions of mobility, overlooking how travel, movement, and communication and transportation networks help to constitute modern societies and communities. Mobility has always been critical for the creation of social networks and to the development of connections to places. In addition, Mobilities contributes to study of the technological, social and cultural developments in transportation, border control, mobile communication, “intelligent” infrastructure, surveillance.
While mobility is an important framework to understand contemporary society, the pervasiveness of location-aware technology has made it possible to locate ourselves and be networked within patterns of mobility. As user generated maps and location-aware mobile devices become commonplace, we experience a shift in the way we connect to the internet and move through space. Networked interactions permeate our world. We no longer enter the internet--we carry it with us. We experience it while moving through physical spaces. Mobile phones, GPS receivers, and RFID tags are only a few examples of location-aware mobile technologies that mediate our interaction with networked spaces and influence how we move in these spaces. Increasingly, our physical location determines the types of information with which we interact, the way we move through physical spaces, and the people and things we find around us. These new kinds of networked interactions manifest in everyday social practices that are supported by the use of mobile and location-aware technologies, such as participation in location-based mobile games and social networks, use of location-based services, development of mobile annotation projects, and social mapping, just to name a few. The engagement with these practices has important implications for identity construction, our sense of privacy, our notions of place and space, civic and political participation, policy making, as well as cultural production and consumption in everyday life. We invite papers that address themes at the intersection of mobility and location, or related topics, such as: · Mobile communication and location awareness in everyday life practices; · New urban spatialities developed with mobile gaming and locative social media; · Privacy and surveillance issues as they relate to mobile and location-based social networks; · Identity and spatial construction through locative media art / embodied performance; · Civic engagement and political participation through mobile social media, new mapping practices and location-aware technologies; · Borders, surveillance, and securitization with ubiquitous and mobile technologies; · Aeromobilities, air travel, and aerial vision; · Alternative mobilities and slow movements; · Planning, policy and design for future mobilities and location-based services; · Tourism, imaginary travel, and virtual travel; · Transitions toward sustainable mobilities; · New methodologies for mobilities research. Disciplines represented at the conference may include (but are not exclusive to): Anthropology, Architecture and Design, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Communication, Criminology, Cultural Studies, Geography, Media and Visual Arts, Politics and International Relations, Public Policy, Sociology, Theater and Performance Studies, Tourism Research, Transport Research, and Urban Studies. Conference location: North Carolina State University, Raleigh (NC), USA Conference hotel: Brownstone Hotel (http://www.brownstonehotel.com/) Discounted rates will be available to registered participants. Important dates: Deadline for abstracts: 30 October 2011 (800 words, including references) Notification of acceptance: 15 December 2011 Registration deadline: 30 January 2012 Conference Dates: 16-18 March 2012 Please submit your abstracts through the conference website: http://crdm.chass.ncsu.edu/mobilities/ Organizing Committee: Adriana de Souza e Silva (NC State University, USA) Heather Horst (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia) Lee Humphreys (Cornell University, USA) Ole B. Jensen (Aalborg University, Denmark) Mimi Sheller (Drexel University, USA) Irina Shklovski (IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark) Phillip Vannini (Royal Roads University, Canada) For further information, contact: Adriana de Souza e Silva, Ph.D Associate Professor of Communication Interim Associate Director, Communication, Rhetoric, & Digital Media Ph.D program North Carolina State University http://www.souzaesilva.com .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Workshop on Empirical Philosophy of Science - Qualitative Methods
March 21 2012 to March 23 2012 | Sandbjerg (Denmark)
Deadline: November 15 2011
Updated: October 14 2011
Keynote Speakers: Nancy Nersessian, Georgia Institute of Technology Lisa Osbeck, University of West Georgia Erika Mansnerus, London School of Economics Hauke Riesch, Imperial College London
The workshop seeks to explore the benefits and challenges of an empirical philosophy of science: What do philosophers gain from empirical work? How can empirical research help to develop philosophical concepts? How do we integrate philosophical frameworks and empirical research? What constraints do we accept when choosing an empirical approach? What constraints does a pronounced theoretical focus impose on empirical work? Qualitative methods such as interviewing, fieldwork and qualitative text analysis gain increasingly appeal among philosophers of science. More and more scholars in philosophy resort to empirical work in order to study scientific practice. At the same time, the results produced through empirical work are very different from those gained through the kind of introspective conceptual analysis more typical of philosophy. Empirical work based on qualitative methods has a long and rich research tradition rooted in the social sciences. The use of qualitative methods in philosophy of science therefore also brings philosophers in close contact with philosophically inclined social scientists studying science.
This workshop will provide participants with the opportunity to explore some of the methodological, conceptual and practical challenges of conducting qualitative empirical work with philosophy of science. The discussion will focus on recently accomplished or ongoing research projects, and will address questions concerning the quality of empirical work and its explanatory power and theoretical significance for philosophy of science. In order to ensure a comprehensive discussion we invite papers both from scholars in philosophy and the social sciences who study scientific practice with the help of empirical methods. Of particular interest are submissions that introduce examples of empirical work in philosophy of science, discuss first-hand experiences with qualitative methods and/or provide reflections upon the scope of an empirical philosophy of science.
To apply: Proposals for papers (in either Word or pdf format) should include title, an abstract of ~800 words as well as the participant’s name, e-mail, phone and institutional affiliation.
Deadline for the submission of abstracts: November 15, 2011. Decisions will be announced by December 1, 2011.
Please send submissions to: Susann Wagenknecht, Centre for Science Studies, Aarhus University / .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Culture Matters
March 28 2012 to April 01 2012 | La Jolla, CA
Deadline: September 19 2011
http://www.culturalstudiesassociation.org/conference/call-for-papers
Updated: August 15 2011
The Cultural Studies Association (CSA) invites participation in its tenth annual conference. This year’s theme, “Culture Matters,” calls for proposals that critically and creatively reflect on culture and “the material” broadly conceived. How do we theorize the relationship between culture and materiality? In what ways might interdisciplinary formations such as ethnic studies, critical gender studies, queer theory, indigenous studies, and new media studies challenge or redefine notions of the material? How should cultural critics understand the material in relationship to the immaterial? What are the cultural-material aspects of knowledge production both inside and outside the university? How does culture become a material force and how can cultural critics and producers intervene in or transform institutions and material practices? In short, what do materialist cultural studies projects look like now and what forms should they take in the future?
We welcome proposals from all areas and on all topics of relevance to cultural studies, including but not limited to literature, history, sociology, geography, politics, anthropology, communications, popular culture, cultural theory, queer studies, ethnic studies, indigenous studies, feminist studies, postcolonial studies, legal studies, science studies, media and film studies, material culture studies, visual art and performance studies.
While the program committee accepts individual presentation proposals, we especially encourage submissions of pre-constituted sessions. We also invite proposals that engage with this conference location and its many resources.
All conference formats – papers, panels, roundtables, workshops, and seminars – are intended to encourage the presentation and discussion of projects at different stages of development and to foster intellectual exchange and collaboration. Please feel free to adapt the suggested formats or propose others in order to suit your session’s goals. If you have any questions, please address them to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
All of the conference formats will be 105 minutes in length.
Conference registration opens September, 2011. In order to be listed in the program, conference registration – which includes membership in the CSA – must be completed online before 27 February 2012. All program information – names, presentation titles, and institutional affiliations – will be based on initial conference submissions.
Constructing Worlds
April 05 2012 to April 06 2012 | UC Irvine
Deadline: January 16 2012
Updated: January 11 2012
“When I ask, ‘What is worlding?’ I’m asking what the material, semiotic, world-making practices at stake are for whom. Who-what-lives-dies-how in this worlding? What imaginaries and flesh are conjoined in these particular acts of worlding?” - Donna Haraway, Wellek Library Lectures, 5/2/11
Worlding, in Haraway’s model, is an overlapping and intersecting of both tangible and intangible practices which decide who or what exists, how, when, where, and why - in short, how worlds are established, maintained, ordered, and deconstructed. Taking into account the introduction of various technological, philosophical, and political developments into our contemporary cultural discourse, the 2012 Visual Studies Graduate Conference at UC Irvine will ask what it means to make a world, sense a world, exist in a world, or destroy a world.
The conference will explore constructed worlds in all their visual manifestations and encourages submissions that deal with the idea of a world that is not preexisting and fixed, but constructed, or in the process of creation. This idea of a world is exceedingly supple and open to numerous complex interpretations. A world can be both tactile and virtual, exterior and interior. It can be ancient, contemporary and everything in between. Technology, language, physical migration, global economics, political discourses, and a litany of other phenomena contain the power to not only construct new worlds, but also to redefine and destroy existing worlds. With these ideas in mind, we seek papers that highlight not only the generation of worlds, but also their delineation within society. We welcome papers that discuss how ideology implements and transforms the process of world making or world breaking, provoking new methods of communication and cultural interaction.
We hope to receive submissions from across the humanities, arts, social sciences, and natural and technological sciences which engage issues of vision, visibility, and visuality, including (but not limited to) gender and sexuality studies, critical theory, ethnic and cultural studies, history, anthropology, sociology, environmental studies, literature and language studies, information and technology studies, philosophy, political science, classics, art history, and film and media studies.
Potential topics include: + The construction and experience of built environments: leisure worlds such as theme parks, themed attractions, World’s Fairs and expositions, tourist destinations, malls, Spectropoli, and virtual worlds + Distinctions and definitions of urban, suburban, and rural territories; nature and recreation preserves + Creating order out of chaos: authority, regulation, and discipline in the construction of worlds, colonization, nation-building, the rise of the state, and biopolitics and necropolitics + The world in binaries: public/private, representation/reality, utopia/dystopia, creation/destruction, global/local, universal/particular + World making as art/art as world making: design practices, museum exhibitions, and cooperative collaborations which engage in world making + Worlds constructed around social categories: ethnicity, cultural practice, socioeconomic standing, religion, political orientation, gender, and sexual orientation and practice + Phenomenological aspects of world making + Time and space: the evolution of worlds over time, and the establishment and revision of boundaries + Rendering worlds: geospatial categorizations, urban planning, ancient and modern cartography, GIS, digital or virtual globes, scientific imaging, space, ocean and earth-based photography
Please email your 200-250 word abstract to: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Final presentation length is 20 minutes. Conference presentations will also be part of a special online issue of Octopus Journal (www.theoctopusjournal.org).
Defining and measuring meaningful broadband adoption an academic workshop
April 11 2012 | New America Foundation, Washington DC
Deadline: January 31 2012
Updated: January 05 2012
As government services, political discourse and commerce expand online, policymakers and public interest organizations are promoting broadband “adoption” among people who are not currently using the Internet, or using it marginally. Yet there is little discussion of what “adoption” means or how it can be measured. For lack of a better indicator, agencies and researchers often use the metric of home subscription numbers, which tell us very little about the different modes or locations of access which may be more relevant for some populations, nor about the effects of adoption on new users and communities.
In the United States, the absence of meaningful metrics for adoption is becoming evident as two federal digital inclusion efforts -- the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) and Broadband Initiatives Program (BIP) -- enter their evaluation phases. As policymakers and advocates search for ways to document the effect of these programs, the design of meaningful metrics could have implications for the sustainability of broadband initiatives and the well-being of individuals and communities identified as possible beneficiaries. In light of these challenges, the Open Technology Initiative at the New America Foundation is calling for proposals that address the question: “What is meaningful broadband adoption, and how can we measure it?” Authors of successful proposals will be invited for a day-long workshop at the New America Foundation in Washington, DC, to present and discuss answers to this question. The goal of the workshop is to bring together researchers from different disciplinary traditions to discuss challenges in defining broadband adoption and its effects, address issues of reliability and validity, and present innovative methods for studying adoption.
We welcome proposals that reflect work-in-progress as well as completed studies. We are especially interested in proposals that review recent broadband adoption initiatives, including those outside of the United States. Please submit your proposal here at https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=en_US&formkey=dDZ6NjFlU0tiLWN3d2gtNURCUVJjM1E6MQ#gid=0 by January 31, 2012 (If you cannot open the link, please copy and paste the URL on the browser). Proposals should explicitly identify the methodological and/or conceptual innovation that you are developing or have developed, as well as presentation format (slides, video, map, paper, interactive workshop, etc.). Do not include any information in your proposal that would enable reviewers to identify you. Proposals will be blind-reviewed by a multidisciplinary panel of scholars. Please note: final acceptance is contingent upon submission of completed works or works in progress one week before the date of the workshop. Tentative Schedule:
About the New America Foundation and Open Technology Initiative The New America Foundation is a nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy institute that invests in new thinkers and new ideas to address the next generation of challenges facing the United States. New America's Open Technology Initiative formulates policy and regulatory reforms to support open architectures and open source innovations and facilitates the development and implementation of open technologies and communications networks.
Critical themes in media studies conference
April 13 2012 to April 14 2012 | New York City
Deadline: January 31 2012
Updated: December 06 2011
EXTENDED DEADLINE!
The graduate students of the Department of Media Studies and Film at The New School are pleased to announce a call for papers and projects to the 12th annual Critical Themes in Media Studies Conference, taking place April 13-14, 2012 in New York City.
The Media Studies Department at the New School, a pioneer of progressive education, was designed from its inception to be a home for both theory and practice-based scholarship. In the spirit of this tradition, we would like to encourage the submission of traditional scholarly papers as well as multi- modal research projects.
We ask all applicants to be prepared to present their work in a traditional academic format, but individual panels may encompass projects in a variety of configurations. We invite you to surprise all those in attendance with your conclusions, observations, demonstrations, curations, and curiosities found within today's media landscape.
Presenters are invited to submit project proposals that include but are not limited to: papers, interactive installations, maps, walking tours, performances, and so on. We will send notification in advance to all presenters for whom we are able to accommodate any non-traditional formats and provide technical services.
Media Studies remains a constantly evolving field ripe with dynamic possibilities for exploration. As such, Critical Themes in Media Studies is not organized around a single overarching theme. We welcome work from across a wide range of topics related to media theory. Panels will be formed around common areas of interest that emerge from the works received.
For general inquiries or further information, please contact: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
For more information about past Critical Themes conferences, visit: http://criticalthemes.net
From SMS to Smartphones: Tracing the Impact and Developmental Trajectory of the Mobile Phone in Asia
April 13 2012 to April 14 2012 | University of Singapore
Deadline: September 15 2011
Updated: August 18 2011 Asia is widely regarded as a region that has enthusiastically embraced information technology. This observation is especially true of the region's adoption and appropriation of the mobile phone. The affordability, versatility and ubiquity of the mobile phone has had a discernible impact on Asia. Despite the significance of mobile phones in the Asian landscape, research on this topic has been shaped by studies on the US and Scandinavia, while research on Asia is growing, but in its nascent stages. This workshop seeks to address the imbalance by bringing together researchers who are studying mobile phone trends in Asia and collectively, workshop participants will discuss and deliberate over the global implications of their research findings and the developmental trajectory of the mobile phone. The workshop will be held at the Department of Communications and New Media, National University of Singapore from 13-14 February 2012. April 18 2012 to April 20 2012 | Florence, Italy Deadline: September 30 2011 www.pcst2012.org Updated: August 15 2011 Proposals are welcome for presentations on science communication, science in society research, science journalism, science museums, public engagement with science and technologyand *communication activities by research institutions*. April 23 2012 to April 24 2012 | The British Library, London Deadline: October 15 2011 Http://www.genomicsnetwork.ac.uk/egenis Updated: September 14 2011 Confirmed keynote speakers April 25 2012 to April 27 2012 | London Deadline: December 16 2011 Updated: November 08 2011 April 25 2012 to April 27 2012 | Goodenough College, London WC1N Deadline: January 22 2012 www.neurosocieties.eu Updated: January 11 2012 Conference of the European Neuroscience & Society Network April 26 2012 to April 18 2012 | Roanoke, Virginia Deadline: September 15 2011 Updated: July 19 2011 Sponsored by Women's and Gender Studies at Virginia Tech April 26 2012 to April 28 2012 | Roanoke, Virginia Deadline: September 15 2011 Updated: March 12 2011 May 04 2012 to May 05 2012 | Hoboken, NUJ Deadline: February 01 2012 Updated: December 16 2011 The College of Arts and Letters at Stevens Institute of Technology will host a conference celebrating the achievements and insights of George Perkins Marsh (1801-1882), environmentalist, diplomat, philosopher, and scholar, to be held on our Hoboken, NJ campus, May 4-5, 2012. Authors are invited to submit papers on any aspect of Marsh’s many achievements or the impact of his work. A selection of papers will be published in a volume of conference proceedings. Papers (not to exceed 4,000 words) should be submitted electronically to: Professor Lisa M. Dolling, Dean, College of Arts and Letters, Castle Point on Hudson, Hoboken, NJ 07030 or electronically to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). May 06 2012 | Austin, TX Deadline: January 13 2012 http://heritagematterschi2012.blogspot.com Updated: December 16 2011 Designing for Current and Future Values through Digital and Social Technologies May 07 2012 to May 09 2012 | Institute for Advanced Studies on Science, Technology and Society (IAS-STS), Graz, Austria Deadline: January 30 2012 www.sts.tugraz.at Updated: December 06 2011 The IAS-STS in Graz, Austria, which is hosted by the IFZ - Interuniversity Research Centre for Technology, Work and Culture (www.ifz.tugraz.at), promotes the interdisciplinary investigation of the links and interactions between science, technology and society, technology assessment, as well as research on the development and implementation of socially and environmentally sound technologies. Therefore, IAS-STS hosts international fellows and research associates through its fellowship programme. Additionally, the institute organizes the annual conference on "Critical Issues in Science and Technology Studies". May 09 2012 to May 11 2012 | University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands. Deadline: November 30 2011 http://www.utwente.nl/igs/IGS - Eu-SPRI ECRC INTERACT UNI/ Updated: August 24 2011 Eu-SPRI Early Career Researcher Conference May 09 2012 to May 11 2012 | Amersterdam, NL Deadline: January 01 2012 Updated: December 05 2011 From 9-11 May 2012, the conference Towards a sustainable bio-based society: aligning scientific and societal agendas for bio-innovation will take place in Amsterdam. This conference is organized by CSG in collaboration with the European Science Foundation (ESF), the ESRC Genomics Network (EGN, United Kingdom) and GEN-AU (Austria). May 10 2012 to May 12 2012 | The Pennsylvania State University Deadline: August 01 2011 femmss.org. Updated: November 11 2010 Paper proposals are invited for the fourth conference of the Association for Feminist Epistemologies, Methodologies, Metaphysics and Science Studies (FEMMSS) to be held at The Pennsylvania State University, May 10-12, 2012. For more information about FEMMSS and our past conferences see femmss.org. May 11 2012 to May 13 2012 | Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario Deadline: September 25 2011 http://cometogether2012.wordpress.com Updated: August 22 2011 Come Together: Digital Collaboration in the Academy and Beyond seeks to explore the relationship between digital technology and academic, activist and artistic collaborations. Our focus is on how these collaborations come into being, what challenges they present, and how they are reshaping both the academy and the world at large. While we welcome all papers on the topic of digital collaboration, we are especially interested in those that examine the ways in which technology enables work across disciplinary, geographic, cultural and/or other boundaries, those that identify and/or propose solutions to the barriers that still need to be overcome, and those that offer frameworks for innovative forms of digital collaboration. May 12 2012 to May 15 2012 | Woods Hole, MA Deadline: January 31 2012 track, http://www.stv.umb.edu/SICW.html Updated: December 05 2011 New England Workshop on Science and Social Change Spring 2012 Workshop 1 May 19 2012 to May 22 2012 | Woods Hole, MA Deadline: January 31 2012 http://www.stv.umb.edu/SICW.html Updated: December 05 2011 Organizer & Lead Facilitator: Peter J. Taylor, University of Massachusetts Boston, Science in a Changing World graduate track. May 23 2012 to May 25 2012 | Gijón (Asturias) Deadline: February 15 2012 Updated: December 06 2011 Second Meeting of the Network for Social Studies of Science and Technology of the Spanish State (eSCTS) May 23 2012 | Phoenix, Arizona Deadline: December 11 2011 Updated: October 14 2011 ICA Preconference Sponsored by the Communication History Interest Group. May 25 2012 to May 26 2012 | Czech Republic Deadline: January 31 2012 http://urban.anthroweb.net/xwiki/wiki/urbananth/view/Main/Forthcoming Updated: January 11 2012 In this meeting we would like to discuss: 1. How the city image is influenced by specific broad contexts. 2. How cities exceed their own borders and how the city borders are affected by the outside influences. 3. How foreign migration influences the image of the city and changes in its borders. May 29 2012 to June 01 2012 | Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Deadline: December 15 2011 http://www.ecoeco.org/content/2011/06/2012-isee-conference-call-for-papers Updated: October 14 2011 *2012 ISEE Conference Call for Papers* ISEE is a nonprofit, member-governed organization dedicated to advancing understanding of the relationships between the economy, ecology and society, for the mutual well-being of people and nature. ISEE conferences are transdisciplinary and have been held biennially since 1990. ISEE 2012 has been conceived to dovetail with the Rio+20 UNCSD Earth Summit. The Earth Summit has been charged with developing a road map for international cooperation toward a “Green Economy” and for promoting institutions necessary for sustainable development. ISEE 2012 will address UNCSD themes as well as other key debates within ecological economics and environmental policy. It will promote dialogue with the Summit through a final ministerial panel and the participation of policy makers. The challenge for Ecological Economics at this Summit is to contribute to designing innovative alternatives, to address market and institutional failures, as well as to better understand ecological and economic systems. *Conference Themes* - Greening the Economy: Measuring green growth; The energy question; Sustainable consumption; (Un)sustainable cities? - The Political Economy of Green Development: Food security: who sows? who reaps?; The economics and politics of climate change; Pollution and politics; Challenges of community resource governance. - Environmental Justice, Ethics and Values: Global agreements: is convergence possible?; Balancing nature: people, biodiversity and resilience; Governing environmental behaviour; Mores and morals: toward an environmental ethic; Political ecology and ecological conflicts. - Methodological Challenges: Feminist economics and ecological economics: can the twain meet?; Behavioural economics and economic behaviour: beyond homo economicus?; Economics and Ecology: transdisciplinary conversation. May 30 2012 to June 01 2012 | Waterloo, Ontario Deadline: November 22 2011 http://ocs.sfu.ca/fedcan/index.php/cca2012/cca2012/login Updated: November 15 2011 Starting this year, various initiatives will be set up to foster exchanges around the theme “Technology and Emerging Media” within the Canadian Communication Association. Notably, a meeting will be scheduled during the upcoming CCA annual conference to discuss the possible creation of an interest group. There also are plans to publish papers that will be presented at this conference, which will take place in Waterloo, Ontario from May 30 to June 1, 2012. This publication project will take the form of online proceedings edited by the two theme co-chairs. Instructions to authors: May 31 2012 to June 02 2012 | University of Wisconsin--Madison Deadline: December 15 2011 Updated: October 25 2011 In our globalized, highly-industrialized society, human and nonhuman animals are enmeshed in surprising and often troubling ways. “Pharm” goats are living factories for the production of pharmaceuticals; honeybees are explosive-detectors in the “War on Terror;” and household pets – clothed and escorted in strollers – have become humanized companions. What do these sorts of enmeshments mean for us and our “human condition” as well as for our non-human animal counterparts? What do they mean for relationships among species? June 01 2012 to June 02 2012 | Iowa State University, Ames, IA Deadline: October 31 2011 https://sites.google.com/site/gpssarg/ Updated: August 15 2011 June 02 2012 | Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science, University of Toronto Deadline: February 29 2012 Updated: January 11 2012 IHPST invites scholars to submit paper proposals for our upcoming conference, which will be held on June 2nd, 2012 at the University of Toronto. In the History and Philosophy of Science, it has become the consensus view that values play a constitutive role in scientific practice. However, relatively little attention has been paid to the consequences of this conclusion: that the values that scientists, as individuals, bring to bear on their work is of paramount importance. In short, the wisdom of scientists matters. June 07 2012 to June 09 2012 | Max Planck Institute for the history of science, Berlin, Germany Deadline: October 01 2011 Updated: August 15 2011 The study of values in the social sciences went through a period of substantial conceptual and institutional transformation between the late 1920s and the early 1960s. Values became assigned a central place within the social science curriculum. Previously non-academic aspects of inquiry into this topic entered the academic mainstream, and both public and private research foundations provided funding for collaborative research projects on an unprecedented scale. June 18 2012 to June 21 2012 | Bergen, Norway Deadline: January 10 2012 Updated: September 15 2011 Panel: Mobility of Expertise Knowledge: Transfers, transgressions, and transitions In a globalized world, mobility of expertise knowledge is acknowledged as a critical core processes in contemporary culture and society. Current academic debates analyze transfers, transgressions and transitions of knowledge as a multidimensional phenomenon.[1] Welfare development, growth, and innovation are defined as areas, dependent on knowledge mobility. Therefore, we need to understand how knowledge moves between humans, within institutions and nation states. This session will problematize the assumption that knowledge is unbound and easily transferable. Our aim is to emphasize how knowledge undergoes transitions, depending on cultural and social context. It is per se a process with dynamics, power relations and ambiguities. Our point of departure is a critical perspective on the understanding of knowledge as culturally and socially indistinctive. Such a perspective includes values, practices and materialism on one hand, and individual, groups and organizations on the other. June 21 2012 to June 24 2012 | Link: http://hopos2012.philosophy.dal.ca/ Updated: September 15 2011 The keynotes have been announced for the annual History of Philosophy of Science Society conference occurring in Halifax, June 21-24th, 2012, for which the Atlantic Node is a partner. June 25 2012 to June 27 2012 | Eindhoven, The Netherlands Deadline: January 10 2012 Updated: September 14 2011 It is widely acknowledged that a large variety of values and norms (including epistemic, moral, and political values and norms) play an important role in modeling. Although the literature about value-free science is huge, the specific theme of values and norms exclusively focusing on modeling has not yet received the attention it should. Models are often conceived of as being approximate representations with epistemic or even non-epistemic purposes, which makes them subject to a plethora of normative influences. We are interested in questions such as: How do epistemic and non-epistemic values affect the production and assessment of models? What is the moral significance of these values and norms? To what extent, if any, does the allowance of value assessments threaten the objectivity of models? Would it be desirable, and possible, to eliminate epistemic or non-epistemic values and norms from models? We invite papers addressing these and related issues from a foundational as well as an applied perspective. We especially welcome contributions on non-epistemic values in engineering modeling, climate modeling and modeling in operations research. July 02 2012 to July 04 2012 | Maastricht University, The Netherlands Deadline: February 15 2012 http://www.maastrichtuniversity.nl/epet2012 Updated: December 16 2011 1st International Conference of the Society for the Ethics and Politics of Emerging Technologies (EPET) Imagining Techno-Moral Change July 04 2012 to July 06 2012 | Aberystwyth University, Wales, UK. Deadline: September 30 2011 Updated: August 15 2011 The 4th Media History conference will focus on the ways in which people have understood the social, cultural and political roles of the media from the 15th to the 20th century. The concept of ‘the media’ will be interpreted broadly, so as to include print culture (including the press and publishing), cinema, broadcasting, and other visual and electronic media. July 09 2012 | Ireland Deadline: January 31 2012 http://www.theasa.net/annual_meeting/page/future_meetings/ Updated: November 15 2011 The 2012 conference of the Association for Medical Humanities will take place at University College Cork, Ireland. Organised in conjunction with the Consortium for Medical Humanities, an inter-University initiative to develop research in Medical Humanities in Ireland, the theme is ‘Medical Identities: patients and professionals’, and we hope that it is one that will allow for a broad interpretation of the historic development of the profession, and of the people who use and serve it. Themes may include: July 16 2012 to July 19 2012 | Portland, OR Deadline: February 15 2012 http://www.scar.org/abstracts/ Updated: January 16 2012 For more information, please contact Peder Roberts (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)). July 26 2012 to July 27 2012 | Kavala, Greece Deadline: January 15 2012 Updated: November 08 2011 The topic: We invite proposals from scholars in the history of science, technology, and medicine, science and technology studies, the humanities, visual and performing arts, museum and cultural studies and other related disciplines for a workshop on the uses and meanings of mundane things such as boxes, packages, bottles, and vials in shaping knowledge production. In keeping with the conference theme, we are asking contributors to include specific references to the ways in which boxes have played a role—commercial, epistemic or otherwise—in their own particular disciplinary frameworks. Boxes have always supported the significance of the objects they contained, allowing specific activities to arise. In the hands of natural historians and collectors, boxes functioned as a means of organizing their knowledge throughout the eighteenth century. They formed the material bases of the cabinet or established collection and accompanied the collector from the initial gathering of natural specimens to their final display. July 26 2012 to July 27 2012 | University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands Deadline: February 15 2012 Updated: January 11 2012 International Conference on the Philosophy and Science of Well-being and their Practical Importance July 29 2012 to August 08 2012 | American University of Beirut http://www.uchri.org/initiatives/SECT/8/ Updated: December 16 2011 Seminar in Experimental Critical Theory VIII August 01 2012 to August 04 2012 | Buenos Aires, Argentina Deadline: December 15 2011 http://www.isa-sociology.org/buenos-aires-2012/ Updated: October 14 2011 Session Organizers: Grit Petschick (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), Technical University Berlin, Germany) Helena Pettersson (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), Umeå Universitet, Sweden) Nina Baur (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), Technical University Berlin) Ethnography is a methodological approach widely used in the sociology of science and technology. The Sessions aims to explore specific methodological problems and strategies of using ethnography in this field. Papers for this session should therefore address one or more of the following questions: - What are the advantages and disadvantages of using ethnography in sociology of science and technology in comparison to other methods? What alternatives do exist (e.g. case studies, interviews, surveys, public administrative data)? When and why should which method be preferred? - What are the specific challenges of using ethnography in sociology of science and technology (e.g. in field access, data collection, data analysis), and how can they be solved? - What is the relation between theory and data, i.e. how can theoretical concepts of sociology of science and technology be linked to ethnographic data? - Which field-specific adaptations of ethnography do exist in order to solve these problems? What are the characteristics of these field-specific adaptations, e.g. "Technography" (Werner Rammert), Institutional Ethnography (Dorothy E. Smith)? How do they differ from classical ethnography? Which of these adaptations should be preferred and why? - What are the advantages and disadvantages of using ethnography analyzing categories of inequality in sociology of science and technology in comparison to other methods? August 04 2012 to August 05 2012 | Waterville Valley Resort Waterville Valley, NH http://www.grc.org/programs.aspx?year=2012&program=grs_scipol Updated: September 15 2011 This conference is a unique forum for *graduate students, post-docs, and other scientists with comparable levels of experience and education* to present and exchange new data and cutting edge ideas. We invite abstract submissions for presentations and posters by scholars and practitioners in: economics, science and engineering, science and technology policy, and science and technology studies. The theme of the 2012 meeting is "The International Context of Science and Technology Policy". August 29 2012 to August 31 2012 | Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen Deadline: January 31 2012 Updated: January 11 2012 The need for societal sustainability strategies is globally recognized and reflected in the coming Rio+20 Earth Summit. In the wake of the current international economic crisis such strategies are increasingly framed in a ‘green growth’ discourse, where economic and ecological problems are addressed through the promotion of clean technologies and ‘smart’ solutions: Smart cities, smart grids and smart growth. While such efficiency strategies may provide for changes in specific sectors and cross-sector practices, they are not likely to facilitate the type of pervasive transformative changes at the system level needed to deal with the entrenched character of the current climate and resource utilisation challenges. September 05 2012 to September 09 2012 | Pavia, Italy Deadline: February 12 2012 Updated: January 11 2012 The origins of electrotechnologies. September 13 2012 to September 15 2012 | University of Vienna Deadline: March 25 2012 http://neurocultures2012.univie.ac.at http://gender.univie.ac.at/ Updated: January 05 2012 For paper submissions, please use the online tool on our conference site http://neurocultures2012.univie.ac.at Abstracts should be submitted by 25 March 2012. No conference fee for participants. We will do our best to provide travel funds, but strongly encourage participants to apply for travel funding at their home institutions. Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) International. October 13 2012 to October 30 2012 | La Foret Conference and Retreat Center Colorado Springs, CO Deadline: February 29 2012 http://disccrs.org/disccrsposter.pdf Updated: November 15 2011 Participation limited to 30 early-career Ph.D. scholars *Airfare and on-site expenses are supported through grants from NSF and NASA * http://disccrs.org As our understanding of climate change and its far-reaching ramifications continues to grow, it is imperative for climate change researchers to form strong collaborative bonds that reach across disciplines and other boundaries. Every year the DISsertations initiative for the advancement of Climate Change ReSearch (DISCCRS, pronounced *discourse*) hosts a symposium for early-career climate change researchers. Our goal is to catalyze international, interdisciplinary collaboration while laying the foundation for dynamic, communicative collegial networks that are better-equipped to understand and respond to the myriad challenges posed by climate change. During the week-long symposium, the 30 invited DISCCRS Scholars will have the opportunity to present their research, hone interdisciplinary communication and teambuilding skills, and discuss emerging research and trends. Scholars will also have the chance to talk about the societal and professional challenges involved in climate change research, with each other and with established researchers invited to serve as mentors. Applications will be reviewed by an interdisciplinary committee of research scientists. October 18 2012 to October 21 2012 | MediaCity:UK - University of Salford Deadline: March 01 2012 Updated: January 05 2012 The 13th Annual International and Interdisciplinary Conference of the Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR) October 23 2012 to October 26 2012 | Seoul, Korea Host : Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI) Deadline: April 15 2012 Updated: December 06 2011 * *Call for Papers* *Scope*: Quantitative aspects of science of science. Collaboration and communication in science and in technology. Science policy. Combination and integration of qualitative and quantitative approaches. Theoretical, methodological and applied aspects, for example: - Emerging issues in Scientometrics / Informetrics /webometrics and history - Science Policy and collaboration - Collaboration Studies for Science & Society - Collaboration, Knowledge Management & Industrial Partnership - Collaborative Bridge between Academic Research and Industry - Techniques for Collaboration Studies - Visualization Techniques in Collaboration Studies - Quantitative analysis of S&T innovations - Informetrics laws and distributions, mathematical models of communication or collaboration - Nature and growth of science and of collaboration in science and its relation with technological output - Evaluation indicators - Collaboration in science and in technology from both quantitative and qualitative points of view. Please, note that these examples listed above give a broad outline of the scope of the workshop theme but do not limit it. November 01 2012 to November 03 2012 | Athens, Greece Deadline: January 24 2012 Updated: December 16 2011 The purpose of the European Society for the History of Science is to promote European cooperation in the field of the History of Science understood in the broadest sense. In particular, the society shall, in the European context, aim at: December 13 2012 to December 15 2012 | University of Copenhagen, Denmark Deadline: February 15 2012 http://antropologi.ku.dk/srt/conference_dec2012/ Updated: January 16 2012 In December 2012, a three-day international conference will be held in Copenhagen with the aim of promoting comparative social science research into the routinisation and globalisation of selective reproductive technologies (SRTs). December 13 2012 to December 15 2012 | University of Copenhagen, Denmark Deadline: February 15 2012 Updated: September 15 2011 In a historical perspective, selective reproduction is nothing new: across the world, infanticide and selective neglect of children have a long history; and the widespread deployment of sterilisation and forced abortion in especially the 20th century is well-documented. But the development and routinisation of increasingly sophisticated biomedical technologies that aim to prevent or promote the birth of particular ‘kinds of children’ has placed selective reproduction under the aegis of science and expertise in novel ways. For social scientists, this development raises a range of questions – questions about how these biomedical technologies are used, regulated, and commercialised; about how public concern and criticism have shaped their use; about the roles they play in personal and political deliberations and imaginings; and about their consequences for the ways we think about individuality and collectivity, responsibility and choice. Over the last three decades or so, social scientists have followed assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) on routes of routinisation and globalisation, examining their development by clinicians and scientists as well as their impact on the daily lives of involuntarily childless couples in different cultural and socio-economic contexts. Recently, similar attention has been directed at selective reproductive technologies (SRTs). With this conference call, we aim to invigorate the momentum this increasing scholarly attention has generated, as SRTs continue to be routinised and globalised as clinical-laboratory practices. Although they often rely on similar techniques and will often overlap, it is important to distinguish between these forms of reproductive technology: ARTs aim to overcome biological obstacles to ‘natural’ reproduction while SRTs aim to prevent or allow the birth of certain ‘kinds of children’. In December 2012, a three-day international conference will be held in Copenhagen with the aim of promoting comparative social science research into the routinisation and globalisation of SRTs. Selective reproductive technologies: • comprise of specific laboratory and clinical techniques which facilitate the selective fertilisation of gametes, implantation of embryos or abortion of foetuses; • encompass practices of e.g. carrier testing, gamete donor screening, gamete and embryo quality assessment/biopsy, ultrasonography, blood chemistry analysis, amniocentesis, chorionic villus sampling, karyotyping, genetic testing and/or induced abortion; • generate deliberations and negotiations about whether (and if so how) to begin, terminate or continue a pregnancy; • are used by individuals and governments to prevent or promote the birth of certain ‘kinds of children’ (e.g. a child suffering from ‘serious disease’, a healthy child, an intelligent child, a male child, a saviour sibling). The development and growing use of SRTs has provoked important ethical debate around questions such as: What is a life worth living? What kinds of children should (not) be born? How does selective reproduction affect a society’s ability to appreciate human difference? Under what [2] circumstances (if any) is late-term termination of pregnancy acceptable? Who should make decisions about which embryo to implant or whether or not to terminate a pregnancy? While such questions necessarily infuse and saturate empirical social science work around SRTs, the focus of this conference will be on mundane, everyday questions such as: How have selective reproductive technologies been taken up and put into practice in different cultural and socio-economic contexts? In which ways are prospective parents in different countries engaging with these technologies? How do SRT providers interact and communicate with prospective parents? What visions and imaginings of potentiality guide clinical practice in the realm of reproductive selection? What are some of the structural constraints/possibilities that these technologies come to be embedded in? What are the roles of government authorities in promoting or regulating the use of SRTs? How do market forces and other economic factors fuel or constrain the routinisation of SRTs? Finally, the conference wants to explore how routinisation and globalisation took place: when and how were these technologies introduced in various countries, what forms of opposition did they encounter, which role did public criticism play for the practical, technological and regulatory development of the technologies in question?
The workshop aims to be multi-disciplinary, comprising up to fifteen speakers who will have the opportunity for sustained discussion and engagement over two days. Based on the quality of proposals and the availability of funds, partial or full funding is available for successful applicants. Full funding would cover air travel to Singapore by the most economical means, plus board and lodging for the duration of the workshop. Priority for funding will be accorded to applicants who are based in Asia. We invite those interested in participating in the workshop to submit original paper proposals which should include a title, an abstract of 500 words, a short biography of 250 words by 15 September 2011. Papers that have been selected will be notified by 30 September 2011.
Workshop Convenors Associate Professor Sun Sun LIM (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)12th International Public Communication of Science and Technology (PCST) Conference
The overall theme of the conference is Quality, Honesty and Beauty in Science Communication. Proposals are especially invited on themes such as What does quality mean in science communication? Evaluating public communication of science The art of communicating science Ethics and Responsibility in Science Communication Aesthetics of Science Communication
Other themes of interest are: Communicating the Social Sciences Reflexive challenges: Communicating PCST Public Communication of Technology: the 'Cinderella' of PCST? Professionalisation and career models in science communication Science centres as forums for communicating controversial science
As always at PCST conferences, proposals are also welcome that address: Emerging trends and issues in science communication Changing media, changing formats, changing science communication models?
The deadline for proposals is *30 September, 2011*. Submitted proposals will be reviewed by members of PCST Scientific Committee, and the final program will be announced in January 2012.
Reduced fees will be available for early registrants and students. Travel grants for junior participants are available.
ESRC Genomics Network Conference Genomics in Society: Facts, Fictions and Cultures
Lisa Cartwright (University of California, San Diego) Anne Fausto-Sterling (Brown University) Ann Lingard (novelist and science communicator) Margaret Lock (McGill University)
The ESRC Genomics Network (EGN) is a group of research centres dedicated to examining the development, application and social implications of the science and technologies of genomics. The EGN was established in 2002, and this 2012 conference will not only highlight current social science research in this field but will also celebrate a decade of academic achievement in the social sciences. In their keynote speeches internationally renowned scholars will present from their recent work relating to genomics. More than a decade on from the publication of the full sequence of the human genome, genomic science and its social and technical applications and developments remain in flux and continue to raise concerns. There are great expectations that the life sciences, including genomics, are ideally positioned to deliver solutions to global challenges relating to health, food, and energy, but there are also concerns about cultural and institutional obstacles to this delivery and about the protection of ethical goods. We invite proposals for papers and panels that will present the best and most innovative research on the expectations for and challenges relating to genomics and the life sciences. Proposals for panels which bring together international experts with multiple perspectives on specific topics or research areas, highlighting and exploring diverse views or controversy are particularly welcome.
Potential questions or themes of interest to the conference organisers include:
Innovations and challenges on the path to sustainable bio-societies Representation and communication of genomic and life science themes in artistic and other media Direct to consumer genetic testing, e-medicine and online patient activism Systems biology, synthetic biology, data sharing and management Food security, biofuels The use of model organisms and the human/animal relationship Prenatal testing, psychiatric genomics, disability studies Forensic DNA technologies Genomics and medicine, including regenerative medicine and translation
Sessions on the EGN workstreams Genomics and Identity Politics, and Health Systems and Health Technologies are in preparation. We invite proposals on topics which complement or supplement these foci. Deadline for submissions: 15 October 2011 For further information visit: www.genomicsnetwork.ac.uk/egenis or email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) Address proposals to: Christine Hauskeller, email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). University of Exeter, Egenis, Byrne House, St German’s Road, Exeter EX4 4PJ, UK: For all proposals please provide authors' names, affiliation, contact details, and a biography of 150-200 words.
Paper proposals: 500 words maximum. Session proposals: please include session description, organiser details and list of up to four presenters, plus individual paper proposal, 500 words maximum, from each presenter. Poster (A1 size) proposals: 200 words maximum.
Confirmed EGN presenters: John Dupré, Christine Hauskeller, Steve Hughes, Ruth Chadwick, Brian Wynne, Adam Hedgecoe, Maureen McNeil, David Wield, David Castle, Steve Yearley, Steve Sturdy
The Mutal Challenges of the Neurosciences and Public Health
Abstracts are invited for a conference of the European Neuroscience & Society Network (www.neurosocieties.eu). Abstracts of up to 300 words that include names, institutional affiliations, and email addresses should be sent to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by December 16, 2011.
For the past five years, the European Neuroscience and Society Network has been the leading international network for the social, legal and ethical study of new advances in the neurosciences. Funded by the European Science Foundation from 2007-2012, the network has sponsored dozens of workshops, conferences and neuroschools bringing together prominent and early career scholars to discuss how new discoveries in the neurosciences are reshaping ideas of justice, governance, mental health, and self and society. In April 2012, the ENSN will convene in London for a final international conference on the mutual challenges of the neurosciences and public health.
The organising committee would like to invite participants to submit original paper contributions for presentation at the meeting. Junior and senior researchers are encouraged to address all aspects of the relations between neuroscience and public health, and to approach these from a variety of approaches (e.g., theoretical, policy work). Particularly encouraged are papers related to the following main topics:
1. The neurosciences and the redefinition of public health problems How do emergent modes of redefining, diagnosing and treating neurological and mental disease and illness redefine what counts as a public health problem? What is the role of new medical technologies, namely imaging techniques or drugs? Consequences for the mental health field? What new categories of health problems and of patients are emerging?
2. Access to and distribution of new medical technologies Are new medical technologies in the field of mental health care and neurology generating new inequalities in access to health care? Are they associated with new forms of provision of health care and classification of patients/users? What is the role of patient associations in promoting equity of access?
3. The challenge of human rights How are current conceptions of human rights challenged or modified by the knowledge and practices associated with the neurosciences? How are the rights of mental patients redefined, as well as notions of autonomy and dignity? How are the possibilities of intervention on conditions defined as mental or neurological seen as enhancing or threatening established rights? Is a new generation of human rights associated with the capacity for intervention in the biological make-up of human beings in the making?
4. Neuroscience and 'biological citizenship' How are conceptions of citizenship and of the political transformed as the biological has become a field of contention and regulation? What are the emerging forms of governing life? What new institutions and public spaces are emerging?
5. Neuropolicy- governing through the brain What historical, conceptual, technological frameworks have caused a neuro-centric reformulation of the individual? What kinds of circulating knowledge facilitates the identification of our 'selves' with the brain? What groups and types of conducts are targets of neuro-based interventions?
6. Neuroscience and global mental health What is the current global burden of mental health care and what are the main strategies used to deal with it? What geographical biases exist in the distribution of mental health care? What lessons can be learnt from specific national contexts? We are particularly keen in exploring these issues in a variety of national realities and we encourage papers from non-Western countries.
Confirmed Speakers
Carol Brayne, University of Cambridge, UK Steven Hyman, Harvard, USA Kelly Kelleher, Chidlren's Institute, OH, USA Anne Lovell, University of Paris, France Jonathan Metzl, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, NT, USA Nikolas Rose, London School of Economics Norman Sartorius, Johns Hopkins, USA Davi Johnson Thornton, Southwestern University Charlotte Walsh, University of Leicester Allan Young, McGill University
Organising committee Giovanni Frazzetto (Berlin) Linsey McGoey (University of Essex) Joao Arriscado Nunes (University of Coimbra) Nikolas Rose (London School of Economics) Ilina Singh (London School of Economics) Scot Vrecko (University of Exeter)
The Mutual Challenges of the Neurosciences and Public Health
For the past five years, the European Neuroscience and Society Network has been the leading international network for the social, legal and ethical study of new advances in the neurosciences. Funded by the European Science Foundation from 2007-2012, the network has sponsored dozens of workshops, conferences and neuroschools bringing together prominent and early career scholars to discuss how new discoveries in the neurosciences are reshaping ideas of justice, governance, freedom of will and self-determination, and efforts to treat the global burden of disease. In April 2012, the ENSN convene in London for a final international conference on the mutual challenges of the neurosciences and public health. For this occasion, we would like to invite participants to submit original paper contributions for presentation at the meeting. Junior and senior researchers are encouraged to suggest interesting and cutting edge empirical research that surveys all aspects of the relationship between neuroscience and public health and has the potential to lay out new frontier theoretical and policy approaches. We are keen to invite papers specifically related to the following main topics: 1. The neurosciences and the redefinition of public health problems How do emergent modes of redefining, diagnosing and treating neurological and mental disease and illness redefine what counts as a public health problem? What is the role of new medical technologies, namely imaging techniques or drugs? Consequences for the mental health field? What new categories of health problems and of patients are emerging? 2. Access to and distribution of new medical technologies Are new medical technologies in the field of mental health care and neurology generating new inequalities in access to health care? Are they associated with new forms of provision of health care and classification of patients/users? What is the role of patient associations in promoting equity of access? 3. The challenge of human rights How are current conceptions of human rights challenged or modified by the knowledge and practices associated with the neurosciences? How are the rights of mental patients redefined, as well as notions of autonomy and dignity? How are the possibilities of intervention on conditions defined as mental or neurological seen as enhancing or threatening established rights? Is a new generation of human rights associated with the capacity for intervention in the biological make- up of human beings in the making? 4. Neuroscience and 'biological citizenship' How are conceptions of citizenship and of the political transformed as the biological has become a field of contention and regulation? What are the emerging forms of governing life? What new institutions and public spaces are emerging? 5. Neuropolicy- governing through the brain What historical, conceptual, technological frameworks have caused a neuro-centric reformulation of the individual? What kinds of circulating knowledge facilitates the identification of our 'selves' with the brain? What groups and types of conducts are targets of neuro- based interventions? 6. Neuroscience and global mental health What is the current global burden of mental health care and what are the main strategies used to deal with it? What geographical biases exist in the distribution of mental health care? What lessons can be learnt from specific national contexts? We are particularly keen in exploring these issues in a variety of national realities and we encourage papers from non-Western countries. Confirmed speakers: Carol Brayne, University of Cambridge, UK Jo Dumit, University of California, Davis Steven Hyman, Harvard, USA Kelly Kelleher, Chidlren's Institute, OH, USA Anne Lovell, University of Paris, France Jonathan Metzl, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, NT, USA Nikolas Rose, LSE Norman Sartorius, Johns Hopkins, USA Davi Johnson Thornton, Southwestern University Charlotte Walsh, University of Leicester Allan Young, McGill University Abstracts of up to 300 words should include your name, institutional affiliation, and email address and should be sent t .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by Jan 22nd 2012. Gender, Bodies and Technology: (Dis)Integrating Frames”
Proposal Deadline: September 15, 2011
We invite proposals from scholars in the humanities, social and natural sciences, visual and performing arts, engineering and technology for papers, panels, new media art and performance pieces that explore the intersections of gender, bodies and technology in contexts ranging from classrooms to workplaces to the internet. In keeping with the conference theme, we are asking contributors to include specific reference to the ways in which their own particular disciplinary frameworks shape their approach to their sites of research.
As an assemblage of people and technologies we see the conference itself as enacting the conference theme. We welcome innovative uses of technology and creative session formats, including performance and interactive presentations, as well as traditional paper presentations. We are committed to the integration of scholarship from the Arts as well as more traditional forms of scholarship and we welcome early contact by email if space and/or technology requirements might present logistical challenges. Proposals will be reviewed and notification will be made by October 15, 2011. Final drafts of papers received before April 26, 2012 will be considered for possible publication. The Gender, Bodies & Technology website, online submission form, as well as the full program from the 2010 conference can be viewed at: http://www.cpe.vt.edu/gbt/
For more information or if you would like to join our growing listserv of scholars and artists working at this intersection, please contact: Sharon Elber GBT Coordinator .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) “Gender, Bodies & Technology: (Dis)Integrating Frames”
We invite proposals from scholars in the humanities, social and natural sciences, visual and performing arts, engineering and technology for papers, panels, new media art and performance pieces that explore the intersections of gender, bodies and technology in contexts ranging from classrooms to workplaces to the internet. In keeping with the conference theme, we are asking contributors to include specific reference to the ways in which their own particular disciplinary frameworks shape their approach to their sites of research.
Our confirmed keynote speakers include:
Dr. Judith Halberstam
Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Gender Studies, University of Southern California
Dr. Judy Wajcman
Head of Department of Sociology, London School of Economics & Political Science
Specific topics might include, but are not limited to:
· Gender and the technologies of the workplace, education, and public/private spaces
· Disability and technologies of intervention
· Feminist theorizing of the intersections between technology and constructions of embodiment,
identity and selves
· Performance, new media and other creative expressions: engaging/enacting/destabilizing conventions
of embodiment and technology
· Gendered innovations in technology: gendered objects, design, pasts/futures
· Technological production and control of classed, racialized, aged and gendered bodies
· Personal narrative and oral history as sources of embodied theorizing
· New Media, digital representation and virtual gendered environments
· Medicalized bodies: reproduction, disease, bioethics, body constructions
· Performing/transgressing gender and sexuality
· Technologies of development and sustainability; eco-feminism
· Activism, participatory decision-making and issues of technological citizenship
As an assemblage of people and technologies we see the conference itself as enacting the conference theme. We welcome innovative uses of technology and creative session formats, including performance and interactive presentations, as well as traditional paper presentations. We are committed to the integration of scholarship from the Arts as well as more traditional forms of scholarship and we welcome early contact by email if space and/or technology requirements might present logistical challenges.
Proposals will be reviewed and notification of the outcome will be made by October 15, 2011. We are pursuing publication outlets for selected papers from the conference. Final drafts of papers received before April 26, 2012 will be eligible for consideration. The Gender, Bodies & Technology website, online submission form, as well as the full program from the 2010 conference can be viewed at: http://www.cpe.vt.edu/gbt/
For more information or questions please contact:
Sharon Elber GBT Coordinator, Women’s and Gender Studies Program, Department of Sociology, Virginia Tech, 408 McBryde Hall (0137)
Blacksburg, VA, 24061 USA, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
http://www.cpe.vt.edu/gbt/
George Perkins Marsh: An American for all Seasons
CHI 2012 Workshop on Heritage Matters
Acceptance notification: Feb 10, 2012
This one-day workshop brings together HCI scholars and practitioners who share a common interest in heritage matters. Drawing on the concept of ‘heritage’ as a framework for personal, social, and institutional practices that bring the past to matter in the present, the workshop addresses how personal digital archives, heirlooms, and inscriptions come to have social and cultural value in the long term. The goal of the workshop is to expand the boundaries of HCI theory and practice beyond individuals acting ‘in the moment’ to individuals, communities, and organizations participating ‘over time’ in the social production of personal and collective memory and identity. We welcome scholars and practitioners from areas of expertise that include human-computer interaction, design studies, interaction and product design, anthropology, sociology, history, geography, heritage studies, memory studies, cultural studies, and digital media arts. Participants will be selected on the basis of a submitted 4 to 6 page position paper in the CHI Extended Abstracts format. Papers will be accepted based on originality and quality. We intend to represent a broad and diverse array of viewpoints. Participation from disciplines underrepresented in HCI is particularly welcomed. At least one author must register to attend the workshop, in addition to registering for at least one day of the conference. *Position papers should be a PDF in the ACM Extended Abstracts Format sent as an email attachment to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by January 13, 2012.* 11th Annual IAS-STS Conference “Critical Issues in Science and Technology Studies”
CONFERENCE THEMES
--Gender - Technology - Environment--
-Special Session: Mobile learning and working – how ‚smart technologies‘ change our lives
The former, rather theoretical, concepts of tele-working and e-learning became reality when the Internet found its way into our daily routines, and the old promises of location- and time-independency finally became true when ‘smart technologies’ like smart phones brought learning and working to another level of mobility. However, there is also a price to pay. People who work outside office hours and office walls or learn remotely do not only win freedom and self-determination, they may lose relationships, for instance, when they miss informal exchanges during coffee breaks. Moreover, when working and learning never officially starts, as a consequence it ‘never’ ends. Thus, not only job-related but also private relationships are in danger of de-synchronisation. Additionally, team spirit, support from supervisors and the feeling of being part of an organization may wither, too. And finally, with each new technology that constitutes our social lives, we have to ask ourselves where we learn to not only work self-organised but also critically reflect all these mentioned consequences of ‘smart technologies’? We therefore invite scholars with papers based on theoretical reflection as well as empirical studies from work in progress to finished research on this topic. In this session we will discuss possibilities, chances, limits, critical aspects and utopias of mobile learning and working and we ask: How do ‘smart technologies’ change our lives?
-Special Session: Queerness in science and technology studies
This session is interested in queer perspectives in and on science and technology studies which challenge heteronormative and hegemonic point of views in these fields of research. First of all, this calls for papers dealing with the basic theoretical question: If a ‘queer’ point of view stands for opposing the hegemonic views – how useful, then, is the concept of ‘queerness’ for science and technology studies? Secondly, we are interested in papers analysing STS on a meta-level: How do hegemonic views become established? What structural role does heteronormativity play in STS? Furthermore, we invite scholars who discuss queer STS based on empirical research, asking for instance: Who are ‘the others’ in discourses about ‘average users’ of technology? How much deviation from the norm is implied or tolerated when standard procedures in science and technology are defined? What are methodological consequences when critique on heteronormativity in research is taken into account? How does this perspective influence the role of the researcher?
--Ethical, Legal and Social Aspects of Human Genetics and Agricultural Biotechnology--
A main focus of the conference will lie on research projects providing a critical analysis of human genetic research or of agricultural biotechnology. Researchers investigating either ethical, legal and social aspects of genetic testing in the medical domain or risk policy and wider governance issues related to agricultural biotechnology are especially encouraged to contribute.
-Special Session: Knowledge Brokerage as participatory interaction processes linking research, policy and civil society
We invite colleagues from research, policy and practice to report about their practical experiences in knowledge brokerage (KB) in the context of sustainability challenges. In particular, we are looking forward to contributions giving practical examples of, and lessons learned from concrete knowledge brokerage activities engaging people from different communities. The session will be organized as an interactive workshop where participants will discuss and reflect on the potentials and limits of linking research, policy and practice through KB. The contributions may address issues such as: • Choice of appropriate KB-tools: online versus face-to-face activities (well-proven tools; specific challenges) • Strategies to support capacity building for KB within different communities • How does social learning take place in the context of KB? • What are the main characteristics of effective and successful KB?
--Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP)--
SCP seeks to promote social and economic development within the carrying capacity of ecosystems. Researchers investigating the field of innovative, green or social responsible public procurement, including benefits, strategies for the implementation or case studies are encouraged to give a presentation.
-Special Session: Stimulation of innovation through public procurement
What is the potential of public procurement to stimulate sustainable innovation? Which context conditions are supportive? What do existing cases show? What do public organizations need in order to successfully procure innovation?
--Energy and Climate--
Presentations in this field should develop appropriate measures and strategies for the promotion of renewable energy sources and for the transition to a sustainable energy system. Regional governance, climate policy strategies, innovation policy, technology assessment, and the role of users in the area of energy technologies should play an important role.
-Special Session: Energy Poverty
This session focuses on the emerging problem of energy poverty in developed countries, but proposals that analyse energy poverty from a more global perspective are also welcome. We encourage submissions to following topics: energy poverty from the perspective of energy consumption on the household level, energy poverty as a socio-technical figuration of society, qualitative and quantitative case studies, cross-country comparisons, energy justice, inequalities and vulnerability, energy practices as well as other relevant research approaches.
ORGANIZATIONAL DETAILS
--Participants--
The 11th IAS-STS conference invites interested researchers (especially postgraduates and young researchers) in the areas of science and technology studies and sustainability studies to give presentations. The conference provides a forum to discuss on a broad variety of topics in these fields – especially papers are encouraged which include some aspects of the above mentioned conference themes.
--Abstracts--
Abstracts should include no more than 250 words, comprising detailed contact information, affiliation and specification of the conference theme you are referring to. Submission of abstracts should please be send to Thomas Berger (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) ) by Monday, January 30, 2012.
We also appreciate proposals for poster presentations and specific sessions in line with the conference themes. Proposals for sessions shall include a preliminary title of the session, names of possible speakers and a short outline on the issues to be discussed (max. 250 words) and should be send to the above mentioned email address by Monday, January 30, 2012.
We also welcome participants attending the conference without presenting a paper themselves.
--Conference fees--
100 € (including conference folder, coffee breaks, lunch sessions, social event)
No conference fees for current fellows of the IAS-STS fellowship programme 2011/12.
--Registration--
Registration for the 11th IAS-STS conference on "Critical Issues in Science and Technology Studies" will be open until Monday, March 26, 2012. The online registration form will be accessible by the beginning of February 2012.
--Conference Venue--
IFZ- Inter-University Research Centre for Technology, Work and Culture Schlögelgasse 2 8010 Graz, Austria www.ifz.tugraz.at
Options for accommodation will be posted on the conference website.
For more information: www.sts.tugraz.at
INTERACT UNI: New perspectives on enduring research questions in university-society interaction?
Towards an emerging multi disciplinary research agenda for knowledge exchange and co-creation within science, research and innovation policy studies’
Deadline: November 30 2011
This conference aims to bring together leading early career researchers across a range of social science disciplines to provide an open forum driving an emerging scientific conversation around science-society interactions. The involvement of a senior scientific panel from leading European professors in this field will help to incorporate the voices of young researchers into the scientific mainstream, and help to develop the next generation of researchers in the field of European policies for science and research.
The conference welcomes papers from a range of disciplinary backgrounds and traditions, including policy studies, political science, sociology, studies of science and technology, public administration, the economics of science and innovation, research management, and entrepreneurship. The organisers encourage contributions that critically reflect on the role of knowledge in society through knowledge exchange, co-creation and transfer practices in and between organisations and institutions. The emphasis in this critical reflection should be on the knowledge exchange systems and networks between wider national science and education systems, and more localised practises and behaviours of knowledge creation and circulation.
The following are suggested as sub-themes, but not necessarily limited to:
Ethics, politics and utility in science and technology agendas and practices
Understanding and moderating value system conflicts in practices of research
Entrepreneurship and excellence in research systems and institutions
New careers and disciplines in science, technology and innovation
Accountability, governance systems and innovation for utility
Socialisation and structuration in emerging science and technology domains
Uncertainty, mediation and translation in knowledge valorisation practices
Public engagement, interaction and involvement in research and innovation
The risks and rewards of contemporary science, research and innovation shifts.
The conference invites early career researchers (defined as Ph.D students and post-doctoral researchers) to submit an extended abstract and brief CV (as one document) including their publication track record.
The conference is open to 30 participants. The organising committee will select those 30 participants based on their abstracts’ scientific quality and relevance to the conference theme.
Towards a sustainable bio-based society: aligning scientific and societal agendas for bio-innovation
Confirmed Keynote Speakers: George Gaskell, Ruth Chadwick, Herbert Gottweis, Luuk van der Wielen, Christine Hauskeller, David Castle, Hub Zwart.
Bringing together participants from academia (senior experts as well as early stage researchers), industry and policy, this international, interdisciplinary conference will:
o identify key trends in the co-evolution of contemporary bio-societies on the one hand and life science research on the other
o explore the opportunities, challenges and concerns for society at large arising from these trends
o develop a roadmap towards a sustainable bio-based economy through the alignment of scientific and societal agendas.
This three-day meeting will include plenary presentations by keynote speakers, interviews, forum discussion as well as poster presentation sessions. We hereby invite early stage researchers (e.g. Ph.D. researchers and post-docs) to submit proposals for poster presentations on issues relevant for life sciences, policy, industry, funding agencies and media. These might include (but are not confined to) reflections on the societal aspects of the following issues:
Sustainable bio-innovation
Societal impact of synthetic biology and bionanoscience
Private/public partnerships and IPR
Biomimesis, biomaterials and biofuels
The submission deadline is 1 January 2012. More information and general information about submitting a poster abstract can be found in the pdf on this site: http://bit.ly/rHjUSa . The ESF Conference website, where you can register, will go online shortly. If you want to be informed about this, please contact Olga Crapels at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) . FEMMSS 4: Call for Proposals
We welcome new participants and perspectives from across the academy and outside it that provide feminist discussion on any topic in epistemologies, methodologies, metaphysics, or science studies. Note the following broad themes of recent and ongoing interest:
* Practicing & teaching science as a feminist
* Gender, justice & climate change
* Liberatory approaches to science policy
* Feminist perspectives on cognition, logic, argumentation & rhetoric
* Liberatory methodologies
* Knowledges of resistance
* Experience, authority & ignorance
* Science, technology & the state
* Public philosophy
Proposals of 250-300 words, plus bibliography, and a CV of no more than 3 pages should be combined in a single Word (or Rich Text Format) file. Submissions by e-mail attachment are due by August 1, 2011 to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Please note “FEMMSS4 submission” in the subject line.
Come Together: Digital Collaboration in the Academy and Beyond
In addition to traditional 20-minute papers, we also welcome proposals for round tables, workshops and non-traditional modes of information sharing such as online presentations and discussion. We are pleased to receive proposals from all interested individuals, regardless of affiliation.
Potential topics include:
Digital collaboration between activists, writers, academics, artists, journalists etc. The impact of digital media on pedagogy and learning at universities and beyond The consequences of listservs, blogs, message boards and other forms of digital communication Modes of thought or artistic expression that become (im)possible through digital collaboration Copyright law and its effect on online collaboration, and vice versa The Internet as a tool for coordinating or suppressing social, political and cultural activity The “digital divide,” its consequences, and/or how it can be overcome The economy of digital collaboration, or Wikinomics
Individuals interested in presenting 20-minute papers should submit abstracts of up to 300 words, and individuals or groups interested in proposing a roundtable, workshop or non-traditional session should submit a 500 word proposal outlining the format and intended aims of the session. All proposals should be emailed to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
For further information follow us on twitter @cometogether12.Open Spaces for Scientific and Social Change II: Support for Translation
Organizer & Lead Facilitator: Peter J. Taylor, University of Massachusetts Boston, Science in a Changing World graduate
Commentators on the spread of innovations have noted the challenge of moving beyond the enthusiasm of early adopters--Innovations have to be translated so that they address the pragmatic and particular concerns of other potential adopters. What does this mean for the "open spaces" workshop format that has evolved in NewSSC? (The term open spaces refers here to an arena that is separate from but keeps in view two other realms: Critical interpretation of the directions taken by scientific and technological research and application; and Participation in social movements so as to influence those directions.) With a view to exploring how to support translations beyond NewSSC, applications are sought from teachers and researchers (including graduate students) who are interested in facilitating discussion, reflection, avid learning, and clarifying one's identity and affinities in relation to scientific and social change. The workshop activities will, as they have in the past, build on what the particular participants contribute and will employ a range of tools and processes for individual reflection and group interaction. What is different this time is that the focus is on each participant building plans to translate the tools and processes into their own settings, plans that will undoubtedly include how to create communities of practice to support such efforts. Newcomers and return participants are welcome...
Applications due 31 Jan. 2012 For more details, see http://www.stv.umb.edu/newsscarrange.htmlOpening up New Directions in Epidemiology and Population Health
Applications are sought from researchers (including graduate students) and other professionals who are interested in exploring ways to open up new directions in epidemiological thinking and research. An interest in "not simply continuing along previous lines" (to quote a participant in a previous workshop) means sharing and extending perspectives, problems, tools, connections, and audiences that draw us outside our previous comfort zones. The workshop activities will build on what the participants contribute, but topics addressed might include:
Popular epidemiology and community-based participatory health research Lay epidemiology and bringing epidemiological thinking into public discourse Promoting discussion among researchers beyond epidemiology proper Teaching non-specialists to become conversant with the methods, results, and controversies in epidemiology and related fields Innovative research designs; Alternatives to various statistical conventions Visual thinking and communication Lessons from historical case studies Bringing the histories and philosophies of other disciplines to bear in re-framing persistent or stubborn research questions How to support each other doing more in-depth, less-conventional work Conditions for professional and scholarly creativity ...and more (to be determined by participants)
The workshop will also introduce participants to tools and processes for individual reflection and group interaction designed to produce insights and deepen the people-connections valuable for putting those insights into practice after the workshop...
For more details, http://www.stv.umb.edu/newssc12b.html Applications due 31 Jan. 2012Between disenchantment and hope/ Entre el desencanto y la esperanza
When Hesiod narrates the myth of Pandora describes how, once Pandora opened the vessel that contained all the evils, they got dispersed throughout the world. Only one was left inside: hope. A second version of the myth states that the vessel Pandora was carrying actually contained not evils, but goods and, when the vessel was open, all of them, except for hope, returned to the gods. Thus, in Greek mythology, hope is an ambivalent concept, which could be described as good or as evil, as a consolatory call to action or as an asset for the immobility and inaction.
After more than ten years of uncritical rhetoric about the triad science-innovation-economic growth, in which science only appeared in its role of engine of innovation and development, the economic and social crisis of recent years has served as a breeding ground for the emergence of worrying diagnoses on the future. The academic community, inside and outside the Spanish state, has also suffered the effects of the recent twist of science policy, which now insists on dramatic financial cuts, which are having remarkable implications for the organization of science and its epistemic practices. In this general context, the second meeting of the esCTS Network aims to reflect not only on the role that academics can and should play in the face of disenchantment and despair, but also on their responsibility about the articulation between the present and possible futures.
We want to launch the debate about the need not to confine our work to the development of diagnostics, the need of setting aside the rhetoric of a passive hope and enabling the conditions to imagine alternative futures. Proposals such as the "open science", impure methods of scientific production, or the different modes of activism from science, are examples of alternative ways to generate spaces of hope at the intersection between academy, science and society. At this second meeting of the esCTS Network, we invite everyone to think about our responsibility with respect to the development of images of the future, to examine our disciplines and the relationship between academy and society, and to explore the sources from which we can get inspiration to articulate that responsibility.
Submission of proposals
We invite to all researchers (PhD, young doctors and professors) to submit their proposals in the area of the social studies of science and technology, in any of the many disciplines in which they are located: history, sociology, history of science, philosophy of science, medicine, feminism, engineering, anthropology, psychology, environmental studies, law, gender, etc.
Languages: Proposals will be accepted in all the official languages of the Spanish state, plus English and Portuguese.
Posting Rules
Deadline for proposals: February 15, 2012. Maximum length: 200 words.
You must include contact details: name, emails, institution or university to which you belong.
Doctoral students who submit their proposals must indicate their affiliation, doctoral stage in which they are, and a brief list of those issues that they would like to discuss during the doctoral workshop (which will also be organized in this new meeting) such as some specific issues to the thesis, its structure, methodological items, preparing articles for publication, participation in international conferences, etc.
The proposal must be sent to: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Communication of acceptance by March 15, 2012
http://redescts.wordpress.com/category/red-escts/
II Encuentro de la Red de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología del Estado Español (eSCTS)
Convocatoria de Propuestas de Comunicación
“Entre el desencanto y la esperanza”
Para el segundo encuentro de la red proponemos una reflexión colectiva bajo el lema ‘Entre el desencanto y la esperanza’. Cuando Hesíodo relata el mito de Pandora describe como, al abrir la vasija que contenía todos los males, permitió que se dispersasen por el mundo. Solo quedó uno dentro: la esperanza. Una segunda versión del mito, afirma que en la vasija que Pandora portaba no contenía en realidad males, sino bienes y, al abrirla, todos ellos, a excepción de la esperanza, regresaron con los dioses. De este modo, en la mitología griega, la esperanza se presenta como un concepto ambivalente, puede ser descrita como un bien o como un mal, como una consoladora llamada a la acción o como una baza para el inmovilismo y la inacción.
Después de más de diez años retórica y a-críticamente inclinados hacia la tríada ciencia-innovación-crecimiento económico, en los que la ciencia sólo aparecía en su papel de motor de innovación y desarrollo, la crisis económica y social de los últimos años ha servido como caldo de cultivo para la aparición de apesadumbrados diagnósticos sobre le futuro. La academia, dentro y fuera del estado Español, sufre igualmente los efectos de un modelo económico y político basado en recortes, que tiene importantes efectos sobre la organización y las prácticas epistémicas mismas. En este contexto general, el segundo encuentro de la Red esCTS pretende reflexionar sobre el papel que pueden, y deben, desempeñar los académicos frente al desencanto y la desesperanza; sobre la responsabilidad ante los modos de articulación entre el presente y los futuros posibles.
Queremos lanzar el debate acerca de la necesidad de no limitarnos a elaborar diagnósticos, de salir de la retórica de una esperanza pasiva y habilitar las condiciones que permitan imaginar futuros diferentes. Propuestas como la “open science”, los modos de producción científicos impuros, o los modos de activismo desde la ciencia son ejemplos de vías alternativas para generar espacios de esperanza en la intersección entre la academia y la sociedad. En este segundo encuentro de la Red esCTS conminamos, entonces, a reflexionar sobre la responsabilidad que tenemos ante la elaboración de las imágenes del futuro, a examinar nuestras disciplinas, las relaciones entre la academia y la sociedad y explorar las fuentes en las cuales podemos obtener inspiración para articular dicha responsabilidad.
Envío de propuestas
Invitamos a que envíen sus propuestas de participación los investigadores (doctorandos/as, jóvenes doctoras/es y profesores) del área de los estudios sociales de la ciencia y la tecnología, en cualquiera de las múltiples disciplinas en que estos se ubiquen: historia, sociología, historia de la ciencia, filosofía de la ciencia, medicina, feminismos, ingeniería, antropología, psicología, estudios ambientales, derecho, género, etc.
Idiomas: se aceptan propuestas en todos los idiomas oficiales del Estado Español, en inglés y en portugués.
Normas de envío
Extensión máxima: 200 palabras.
Incluid datos de contacto: nombre y apellidos, email, centro o universidad a la que pertenece. Sugerencias para los doctorandos y las doctorandas: a la hora de enviar sus propuestas, rogamos que indiquen también su afiliación, la etapa del doctorado en que se encuentran y una breve relación de aquellos temas que les gustaría trabajar en el taller de doctorandos que se va a organizar en este nuevo encuentro: problemas concretos relacionados con la tesis, su estructura, aspectos metodológicos, preparación de artículos para su publicación, participación en congresos internacionales, etc.
La propuesta debe ser enviada a: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Fecha de aceptación de la comunicación: 15 de de 2012
¡Esperamos vuestra participación!
Red de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología del Estado Español (eSCTS)
La eSCTS es una red de profesionales sin ánimo de lucro, cuyo objetivo es poner en contacto y propiciar la comunicación de todas y todos aquellos que trabajamos en el área de los estudios sociales de la ciencia y la tecnología (CTS). Nuestra intención es consolidar los estudios CTS en el Estado español y habilitar un espacio de participación, comunicación y reflexión para los investigadores ya establecidos y para aquellos más jóvenes que comienzan sus carreras (doctorandos/as y recién graduadas/os), un espacio de discusión y encuentro que dé cuenta de la diversidad académica, cultural y política del Estado español.
http://redescts.wordpress.com/category/red-escts/
Historiography as Intervention: Communicating Across Geographies, Communities & Divides
Writing history is far from neutral. Recovering undocumented stories can reassess different groups’ actions and contributions. Counterhistories can denaturalize the present and challenge ideologies. The past provides tools, warnings, solutions and mistakes. Historiography can engage in contemporary struggles and change the way we see the world and its possibilities. This ICA preconference convenes communication scholars pursuing historiographic work and historians addressing communication- related areas. Some topics may be established and vibrant areas of historic inquiry; others may be neglected areas needing appraisal. Panels will address historic issues in communication scholarship, such as evolving theories and philosophies, and also stage engagements between related fields, such as medical historians and health communication scholars or political communication scholars and social- movement historians. The preconference will also feature invited speakers from both fields. Throughout, international and intercultural representation will afford insights from comparative histories of relevant topics, such as media policies or strategic interventions. Ultimately, this preconference aims to instigate intersections and encounters that can provoke collaborative interventions with issues facing our discipline, schools, communities, and countries.
Submitted papers should present historiographic methods and/or historic data, theories or subject matter within a framework of social intervention by providing tools, offering insight or communicating information. Work should be from or of interest to historians and communication scholars. Innovative proposals for transdisciplinary, multimodal or media-based presentations (e.g., interactive digital archives, documentary screenings, database tours) are highly encouraged. Potential topics include, but are not limited to, historiographic interventions through: • Demystifying moral panics • Recovering contributions, such as minority or female scholars • Counteracting contemporary stereotypes, such as racial technophobia • Raising ethical issues through representing a particular voice, perspective or agenda • Comparing methods, such as Foucauldean genealogy, Derridean hauntology or Hayden White’s discourse tropes • Challenging dominant ideologies and fields of knowledge • Rethinking newness; historicizing contemporary issues and conversations • Staging interdisciplinary conversations, as with visual communication scholars and art historians, across the field of sound studies, or economics and communication infrastructures • (Re)making the past, (un)making the present, envisioning potential futures • Critiquing dominant narratives and concepts, such as convergence culture, network society, silent cinema’s “train effect,” the long tail, social media’s role in the Arab Spring, affective labor, excesses of postmodernism or textual studies, political economies of information, etc. • Suggesting policy strategies and solutions
Send paper abstracts or project descriptions of 300 words by November 15, 2011 to D. Travers Scott, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Authors will be informed of decisions by December 15, 2011. Papers are due May 1, 2012. The preconference will be May 23, 2012 at the conference hotel, the Phoenix Sheraton Downtown. The preconference is sponsored by the International Communication Association’s Communication History Interest Group and organized by D. Travers Scott of Clemson University. Diversity and Local Contexts: Urban Space, Borders and Migration Prague
Scholars are invited, who will contribute to the study of the following problem areas: 1. The city as the space of specific social processes influenced by the broader context. 2. The changing perception of the city from the perspective of the locals and of foreigners. 3. Diversity in the city, and its manifestations in the urban milieu particularly in terms of migrant groups. 4. Phenomena not peculiar to the urban milieu, which are imported from foreign spaces and have continuing significance in urban life. Submission Deadline: 31 January 2012. This Meeting is organized with the support of UNESCO-MOST Programme. ISEE 2012: Ecological Economics and Rio +20 : Contributions and Challenges for a Green Economy
*Abstract Submission* There will be three tracks for abstract submissions: Panels (for long presentations), Roundtables (for short interventions) and Posters. Submissions can be in the form of individual abstracts or as full Panels and Roundtables. Full Panels/Roundtables require a cogent theme, a brief introduction giving the rationale, names of session chair(s), and abstracts/papers of all contributors. Alternative innovative formats, including performances, films and installations, would also be welcome for consideration. Abstracts should be a maximum of 700 words and must be submitted online via the conference website: www.isee2012.org.
All abstracts for Panels and Roundtables will be reviewed by an international review panel (see schedule below). Abstracts for poster presentations will be evaluated by the ISEE Local Organizing Committee.Acceptance of all abstracts will be based on relevance for ecological economics and the conference theme, originality, and overall quality. Official notification of abstract acceptance or rejection, or optional poster presentation will be emailed to the corresponding author on 15 December 2011. Conference organisers will make every effort to seek funding to reimburse travel costs and participation fees of those from non-OECD countries and for student researchers (with proof of university attendance). Those needing funding must submit a full paper in advance. *Conference Deadlines* 15 November 2011 – Session, paper, poster abstract submissions 15 December 2011 – Author notification 2 March 2012 – Pay registration fee online to ensure inclusion of abstract in conference brochure 29 May 2012 – Conference begins
CCA 2012 Annual Meeting: Call for papers on the theme “Technology and Emerging Media”
Articles must have been previously presented at the Canadian Communication Association (CCA) conference under the theme “Technology and Emerging Media” (see deadline and link below for submission details): Please note that this theme focuses upon the following topics: - Information and communication technologies, notably their design, diffusion, and uses; - Digital media and related social phenomena; - Issues relating to recent technological innovations in the field of communication -eg, social media/social Web, mobile media, online games, and new diffusion platforms for traditional media. Papers should meet the criteria of a scholarly article, and must therefore include an outline of the problem/issue being addressed, a theoretical or conceptual framework, as well as a description of research method(s) employed. The editors reserve the right to reject a text that doesn't meet these criteria. Papers should be between 25,000 and 35,000 characters in length, including spaces, footnotes and bibliography. They may contain tables and pictures. The text should be organized in sections identified by titles and subtitles. Bibliographical references should appear at the end of the text and follow the APA format (6th edition).
The first page must contain the title of the paper, authors' names with their affiliations and institutional addresses, as well as a 150-word abstract. - Deadline for submitting proposals to CCA conference: November 22, 2011 ( http://www.acc-cca.ca/) - Deadline for submitting *full* papers for publication : May 15, 2012 Papers should be sent in *.doc, *.docx or *.rtf format to the *two* addresses below: Guillaume Latzko-Toth
And since the link to the conference management system is not easy to find, here it is: http://ocs.sfu.ca/fedcan/index.php/cca2012/cca2012/login
Taking Animals Apart: Exploring Interspecies Enmeshment in a Biotechnological Era
The Robert F. and Jean E. Holtz Center and Program in Science and Technology Studies (STS) at the University of Wisconsin--Madison is sponsoring a three-day conference to bring together advanced graduate students in animal studies, science and technology studies, and allied disciplines (English, History, Anthropology, and Fine Arts among others) to discuss the relationships between animal studies and STS. We welcome papers or projects that explore the overlap of humans and other organisms as well as their mutual interaction with technology. Each participant will present a pre-circulated paper, article, creative composition, or dissertation chapter for constructive feedback in a roundtable discussion with peers and with scholars from the University of Wisconsin.
Our keynote speaker will be Susan Squier -- Brill Professor of Women's Studies and English at The Pennsylvania State University; acting director of its Science, Medicine, Technology in Culture program; and author of _Poultry Science, Chicken Culture: A Partial Alphabet_.
Mornings will include facilitated discussions on animal studies and STS as well as sessions on participants’ written work. In the afternoons, participants will attend field trips to sites of human-animal enmeshment in and around Madison. As part of the conference, artwork on the conference theme will be on display in a juried exhibition and honored at the keynote reception. A free public film screening of a movie on the theme of human-animal relations will conclude the conference weekend.
Modest travel stipends may be available from the Holtz Center at the University of Wisconsin to offset the costs of lodging, meals, and travel. The option to stay with local students will be available, should participants wish to do so. Please send a paper proposal of 250 words and a curriculum vitae to Peter Boger at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or Jen Martin at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by December 15, 2011. Accepted papers will be due April 30, 2012. Visual artists and creative writers of fiction, nonfiction or poetry should contact Heather Swan for more information at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Holtz Center for Science & Technology Studies 6317 Sewell Social Science Bldg 1180 Observatory Drive Madison, WI 53706 http://www.sts.wisc.edu Between Scientists & Citizens: Assessing Expertise In Policy Controversies
We are increasingly dependent on advice from experts in making decisions in our personal, professional, and civic lives. But as our dependence on experts has grown, new media have broken down the institutional barriers between the technical, personal and civic realms, and we are inundated with purported science from all sides. Many share a sense that science has lost its "rightful place" in our deliberations. Grappling with this cluster of problems will require collaboration across disciplines: among rhetorical and communication theorists studying the practices and norms of public discourse, philosophers interested in the informal logic of everyday reasoning and in the theory of deliberative democracy, and science studies scholars examining the intersections between the social worlds of scientists and citizens. For this conference, we invite work on expertise in policy controversies from across the disciplines focused on argumentation, reasoning, rhetoric, communication and deliberation.
We expect to publish the proceedings, likely in electronic format. For further information, contact Jean Goodwin (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)). For consideration, submit a 250 word abstract with an additional 5-10 item bibliography, and a separate cover page with complete contact information, to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by October 31, 2011.The Wise Scientist: Historical and Philosophical Reflections on the Place of Wisdom in Science
This conference seeks to put this fact in its historical and philosophical context, exploring past and present attitudes towards the relationship between scientific practice and what could broadly be called wisdom. Wisdom is a multifaceted concept, including the ability to know what is important, the skillful appreciation of how things in general hang together, and the deep insight which can result from a lifetime of exploring nature's depths. Examples of how wisdom, or a lack thereof, have played a role in science abound, including the illuminating critiques of feminisms, the constitutive role religious values have played in the history of natural science, and reflections on scientists as public advocates for environmental responsibility. We welcome topics including but not limited to: - Case studies which highlight particularly wise (or spectacularly unwise) scientists -
The changing role of individuals in the scientific process, and how that affects the interplay of values and epistemic goals - The role of scientists in society at large in shaping discourse and providing guidance - Hypothesis formulation, that unformalized creative moment in the scientific method - The need for an ongoing feminist critique of science in order to clear the cobwebs of ideology - The effect Eastern and Western religions can have on the epistemic goals of science. The keynote speaker will be *Dr. John Vervaeke*, a professor of cognitive science at U of T. He will discuss the function of wisdom as enhanced relevance realization in scientific practice. Abstracts should be no longer than 300 words, and must be received by *February 30th*,* 2012*. Submissions or questions about the conference should be send to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), along with your name, e-mail and institutional affiliation.The measurement of values
The workshop solicits papers that address the question of how the social sciences have approached the study of values by looking at the relation between theoretical concepts, research methods, and empirical data and their development over time. Examples are the emergence and use of concepts such as preferences, attitudes, and (public) opinion, and the organization of large-scale data collection projects that range from central depositories for globally gathered ethnographic data to quantitative survey research. The aim of the workshop is to engage scholars in discussion who look at this development in various scientific disciplines (e.g. economics, political science, sociology, anthropology, and psychology) and different parts of the world (e.g. North and South America, Europe, the Soviet Union, and the developing world, particularly post-colonial countries). The workshop focuses on the formative period for collaborative research projects on values and the consolidation of this research within different social science disciplines throughout the middle of the twentieth century. Scholars working on comparable aspects in neighboring academic fields and time periods that are directly related to this development are invited to submit proposals as well.
The workshop can include participation of 10 to 15 scholars and will take place from June 7-9, 2012 at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin. The workshop language is English. Please send abstracts of no more than 500 words to Stefan Bargheer (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) by October 1, 2011.Norway 32nd Nordic Conference of Ethnology and Folkloristics “Dynamics of Cultural Differences”
Our session will highlight contemporary complexities and dimensions of understanding cultural variations of knowledge. If we consider knowledge as plastic and malleable, knowledge changes and adapts within national and local culture. Thus, knowledge may partake in dynamic processes, which challenge ideas about cultural and social boundaries. We welcome papers focusing on the cultural and social aspects of mobility in the following themes: - Mobility and knowledge transfers - Mobility and professional cultures - Mobility in science, technology and medicine - Places/spaces of mobile knowledge
Panel discussion and paper presentation language: English Please e-mail your abstract of maximum 450 words to the panel organizers by January 10th 2012. CC the abstract to the conference organizers .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) . Accepted abstracts are posted online on February 15th 2012. Check the following website for more information: http://www.bergen2012.no/kongresser/kongresser-2012/den-32-nordiske-etnolog-og-folkloristkonferansen-18-21-jun/welcome/ HOPOS 2012
VALUES AND NORMS IN MODELING (VaNiM 2012)
Abstracts of no more than 500 words can be sent to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) until January 10, 2012. All proposals have to be submitted under one of the four conference themes:
1st International Conference of the Society for the Ethics and Politics of Emerging Technologies
Keynote speakers: Wiebe Bijker (Maastricht University) Annemarie Mol (University of Amsterdam) Colin Milburn (UC Davis)
From Monday evening July 2 to Wednesday evening July 4 2012 the first international conference of the Society for the Ethics and Politics of Emerging Technologies (EPET) will be held at Maastricht University, the Netherlands. We invite contributions from scholars in the fields of philosophy, science and technology studies, and artists working on one of the four main themes of the conference. PROGRAM Technology is an important driver of change in today's world, and the desirability of such change is a matter of concern in public debate and policy making. Whereas the influence of morality on technology is well acknowledged, the influence of technology on morality is much less considered. This conference aims to investigate the phenomenon of techno-moral change from a philosophical, historical and sociological perspective. Moreover, it explores how our capacity to imagine, and relate to, techno-moral change may be enhanced by the arts. Lastly, it will consider to what extent and how the phenomenon of techno-moral change should be taken into account in public debate on emerging technologies. Contributions may focus on one of four themes: 1. Conceptualizing techno-moral change 2. Researching techno-moral change 3. Imagining techno-moral change 4. Governing techno-moral change.
1. Conceptualizing techno-moral change The first theme focuses on analytically or philosophically understanding the phenomenon of techno-moral change. What is moral change? How to define it? What concepts and models do we have to develop to describe moral change? And how to understand the interplay of moral and technological change? We welcome papers focusing on the (im)possibility of moral change and ethical change.
2. Researching techno-moral change The second theme explores how and to what extent empirical philosophy, STS, Technology Assessment and scenario studies can be employed to anticipate possible techno-moral change. We welcome historical studies about cases and patterns of past techno-moral change, as well as empirical and philosophical studies of current examples. To what extent and how do technologies change social and cultural practices and values? And how are these technologies in turn constructed by them?
Imagining techno-moral change The third theme addresses the question how the arts can support imagining techno-moral change. Here, artists, philosophers and art theorists are invited to explore how the arts have been addressing techno-moral change in the past, or how they believe art could (or should) address these issues in the future. All art forms can be included, such as the fine arts, theatre arts, new media arts, (interactive) performances, dance, film and literature.
4. Governing techno-moral change The fourth theme deals with the policy implications of techno-moral change. To what extent can it be explored in advance, and how can such explorations be made relevant in the contexts of TA and anticipatory governance of emerging technologies?
SUBMISSION OF PAPERS Authors should submit an electronic version of an extended abstract (total word count approximately 250-500 words). Final papers (if invited after the conference) must not exceed a total word count of 3500 words and an abstract of not more than 250 words. The submissions should be made electronically, as pdf, rtf or Word format. Paper submission: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)Perception, Reception: The history of the media in society
A great deal of work has been done by scholars on the institutional, political and cultural history of various media. ‘Perception, Reception’ will build on this literature to explore the ways in which the media have historically been understood, conceptualised, and imaginatively represented. Thus the conference will not focus on the content of the media as such, so much as the depiction, perception and reception of the media in different contexts over time.
How have readers, consumers, and the respective media industries themselves framed arguments about the media as a force for good (or evil) at different points in time? Have contemporaries always seen the media as agents of change, or is there a counter-history of the media to be written in terms of promoting conservatism, deference and order? How have people understood and represented the media in terms of concepts of personal and geographical space, time, or changing belief systems? Can we think ‘internationally’ about perceptions of the media in different states and nations over time, or is the media still best understood and examined in largely local or regional contexts?
We welcome proposals from a range of chronological, geographical and methodological backgrounds
Abstracts, of around 200 words for papers of between 20 to 25 minutes duration, should be sent by close of business on 30 September 2011 to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
‘Perception, Reception’ is jointly organised by the Centre For Media History, Aberystwyth University, the journal Media History, the Trinity Long Room Hub, Trinity College Dublin and Swansea University.
Professor Tom O'Malley; Dr Sian Nicholas; Professor Kevin Williams; Dr Jason McElligott Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Association for Medical Huminities Annual Conference
• Local, regional and national medical identities related to place and space. • Medical migrants (movement in search of treatment and training) • The impact of culture, politics and socialisation on medical practice • The development of identities – professional hierarchies within and between specialisms • Alternative therapies • Rise of advocacy groups – the emergence of a collective patient identity • Professional organisation – the development of the BMA/IMA • Changes in identity as a result of medical intervention – amputees, etc. • Medicine in war • Patient as consumer: private medical care • Charitable medicine – Medecins Sans Frontieres versus medical missionaries
Conference Organising Committee:
Dr Oonagh Walsh, University College Cork, Dr Ciara Breathnach, University of Limerick, and Dr Olwen Purdue, Queen’s University Belfast.
Please send a 200 word proposal to the organisers at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) by January 31, 2012. Suggestions for panels are also welcomed.
Oonagh Walsh School of History University College Cork Cork, Ireland
+00 353 2388 43963 Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) Two historically-themed panels at the XXXII SCAR and Open Science Conference
1. Voicing Silences in Antarctic History This session provides a forum for new perspectives on the history of the Antarctic. Contributions that address historical ‘silences’ as opportunities to ask new questions, in addition to simply adding new facts, are especially encouraged as the session aims to showcase the increasingly diverse – and sophisticated – nature of historical scholarship on the Antarctic region. These include new methodological approaches like material culture, labor history, and environmental history in addition to new contributions in fields such as the history of science, Cold War geopolitics, and the history of European imperialism. Papers addressing all time periods and all national contexts are welcomed, as are papers that employ perspectives from cognate disciplines such as archaeology or science studies.
2. Historical Views on Gateways to Antarctica The session focuses on the significance of port cities in the history of Antarctica. It examines the important role these "gateway" cities have played as connection points between the history of the Antarctic continent and that of the rest of the world. The session will explore Antarctic logistics, science, and rescue expeditions, and ask questions about the role of "gatekeepers" in these histories. It will also pay particular attention to the history of exchanges between Antarctic expeditions and local communities. The objective of the session is to highlight the great variety of historical experiences, including personal and institutional network relationships that have over time linked Antarctica to the rest of the world. Peder Roberts University of Strasbourg/Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Knowledge in a Box: How Mundane Things Shape Knowledge Production
As “knowledge chests” or “magazining tools” the history of box-like containers also go back to book printing and the typographical culture. The artists’ boxes of the early nineteenth century were used to store the paraphernalia of a new fashionable trend. In the late nineteenth century the box became the pharmacist’s laboratory and a device for standardizing and controlling dosage of oral remedies. In the twentieth century radiotherapy the box was elevated to a multifunctional tool working as a memory aid to forgetful patients or as “knowledge package” that predetermined dosages, included equipment, and ready-made radium applicators. Focusing on medicine, boxes have played a crucial role since the eighteenth century when doctors ought to bring instruments to their patient’s house for surgical or obstetrical interventions. In modern operating rooms boxes organize the workflow and build an essential part of the aseptical regime. Late twentieth century biomedical scientists store tissue samples in large-scale biobanks, where samples contained in straws are placed in vials, then the vials in boxes which in turn are stacked up in "elevators". This storage system facilitates retrieval with barcodes, indexing each individual sample so that additional variables can be retrieved from a database. Thus the container and its content are tied up in a close epistemic and material relationship.
As it is usually the case the box embodies the knowledge that goes into the chemical laboratory and its function; it classifies objects into collections of natural history; it meaningfully orders letters in a printer’s composition or painting equipment for the artist’ convenience; it standardizes pharmaceutical dosage forms and allows pharmacists to control the production and consumption of their remedies; in the commercial world it misleads or informs customers; it persuades consumers for the integrity of the product that they enclose; it hides the identity of the object(s) that contains, it shapes professional identities and is essential for mobilizing, transporting, accumulating and circulating materials and the knowledge they produce and embody. Furthermore, if we do understand matter and materiality not as given, solid, continuous, and stable but rather as something being done, performed, shaped and embedded in practices, then we should examine closer how bottles and boxes themselves materialize differently in a set of diverse practices. How do they change their ontologies by migrating from the kitchen to the laboratory, from the workshop to the operating room? We welcome innovative understandings of the role that boxes and containers have played historically and continue to play in technology, medicine, and science.
We see the workshop as contributing to an ongoing interest in science and technology studies on the importance of mundane things in scientific practice and technological innovations. Dates: July 26-29, 2012 Submission guidelines: Deadline for proposals: January 15, 2012 Please submit a 300-words abstract along with your name, institutional affiliation, email and phone number as a word or pdf attachment to the organizers of the conference Proposals will be reviewed and notification of the outcome will be made in February 15, 2012. We are pursuing publication outlets for selected papers from the workshop. Therefore we expect full papers from those that will participate by May 30, 2012. Details will be provided after notification. Conference registration fee: 50 euros Place: The venue of the conference is a wonderful tobacco warehouse renovated to host the tobacco museum of the city of Kavala in northern Greece. Contact info: For further information please contact the organizers: Susanne Bauer .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) Maria Rentetzi .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) Martina Schlünder .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Call for Papers: Well-being in Contemporary Society
In recent years, well-being has enjoyed a renaissance in philosophical discussions, as well as in fields like psychology, economics, development studies and sociology. Although these approaches share a common goal – to better understand what well-being is and how it can be enhanced – these developments have led to a great diversity in philosophical and scientific approaches to the analysis of well-being. Despite the increasing amount of research, most of the work on well-being is also performed at a highly abstract level. This is especially true in philosophy, but relatively little work has been devoted to the application of theories of well-being also in other fields, in particular when it comes to an understanding of life in contemporary society. Developments such as globalization, consumerism, and the rapid innovation and use of new and emerging technologies, all exert significant impact on the well-being of people living today, and we need a better understanding of their consequences for well-being.
Contemporary society requires that well-being researchers examine these problems – and, if possible, propose solutions to address them. This international conference aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines, including, but not limited to, psychology, economics, sociology, philosophy and development studies, in order to examine the practical role of well-being in contemporary society.
Potential Topics
We are looking for contributions that examine the notion of well-being in the context of contemporary society. The conference particularly welcomes papers that employ a notion of well-being to address social, political and ethical issues in present-day society. Suggested topics for the workshop include, but are not limited to:
● Theoretical developments and approaches in the philosophy and science of well-being in relation to contemporary society, culture and life.
● Well-being in social and political philosophy and/or in policy studies
● Positive psychology (and related research fields) and its practical applicability
● New and emerging technologies and well-being
● Intercultural and interpersonal comparisons of well-being
● Reliability, validity and applicability of well-being measures
● Other specific practical issues pertaining to well-being in contemporary society
The workshop will include both invited papers and an open call for papers. For the open call, we invite extended abstracts (1500-2000 words). Please anonymise the abstract, and include title, name and address in the accompanying email. The abstract, and any questions you may have about the conference, should be sent to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Your abstract should be submitted before February 15th 2012, and will be subject to blind peer review.
Publication
Following the conference we aim to publish the papers, subject to a blind review process, in either an edited volume or a special issue of a relevant journal. We did so successfully with our previous conference, Good Life In a Technological Age, from which select papers were published as book in the prestigious Routledge Studies in Science, Technology and Society series, and will be available in February 2012.
Important Dates
Abstract Submission Deadline: February 15. 2012 Notification of Acceptance: March 1, 2012 Conference Dates: July 26-27, 2012Spaces of Resistance
SECTVIII will explore the spatialities and speeds of resistance to dominant and exclusionary power structures, how spaces are shaped by and produced through various forms and temporalities of resistance, and how they can enable or impede resistance. Focusing on the current practices of resistance in Arab cities and reaching relationally and comparatively beyond, we will investigate forms of resistance, inscriptions of resistance, and the impact of commemorative sites and spatial imaginaries as resistance.
Convened by: Saree Makdisi, UC Los Angeles Howayda al-Harithy, American University of Beirut Mona Fawaz, American University of Beirut David Theo Goldberg, UC Humanities Research Institute
Details and call for proposals to be announced January 2012. Ethnography in Sociology of Science and Technology Session by RC 33 (Research Committee on Logic and
Papers debating these general methodological issues and papers discussing specific problems using a concrete ethnographic study in a specific research project are both equally welcome. Submission Please submit an abstract online to the centralized conference website created by Congrex. Please note that only abstracts submitted online can be incorporated in the sessions, and no changes/updates to the submitted abstract will be allowed. It is the author's responsibility to submit a correct abstract - any errors in spelling, grammar, or scientific fact will be reproduced as typed by the author. Deadlines: Submission of abstracts December 15th, 2011 Notification of authors January 31st, 2012 Registration for the Conference April 10th, 2012 Further Information On the Conference: http://www.isa-sociology.org/buenos-aires-2012/ On ISA: http://www.isa-sociology.org/ On RC 33: http://www.isa-sociology.org/rc33.htm
Gordon Research Seminar on Science and Technology Policy
The keynote will discuss conflict, cooperation, collaboration and competition in science and technology policy. We hope (but do not require) that the presentations and posters will raise questions such as: - Which international institutions, multinational corporations, and non-governmental organizations are demonstrating promising results in collaborative efforts to address global health issues? - How has international conflict co-produced energy regimes and security? - Is science and technology policy for energy shaped by an intense competition and/or mutual collaboration between national programs striving towards the Green Economy? - How does the interest in Global Climate Change affect other global issues and their policy solutions? - How do multilateral policies shape cooperation around issues of energy, health, and the environment? - How is civil society implicated in these processes of conflict, cooperation, collaboration and competition? While covering broad themes of health, energy, and the environment, this particular conference is encouraging junior scholars to examine the international implications of their policy case studies and theory. This seminar will include a career panel of recent graduates who have gone into science and technology policy research or practice. For more information or to submit your application, please go to the Gordon Research Seminar for Science and Technology Policy 2012 website, http://www.grc.org/programs.aspx?year=2012&program=grs_scipol Sustainable Transitions: Navigating Theories and Challenging Realities
Previous STRN conferences in Amsterdam and Lund have explored the plurality of issues related to such transition processes. Various approaches have been developed to describe the path-dependency of socio-technical systems’ developments and to explore and engage in transition’s challenges.
This third IST conference hosted by the ‘SusTrans’ research alliance in Denmark welcomes further explorative studies. Furthermore, it also aims to engage in the core research program of the community through deepening the analysis of how opportunities for transformative change of systems reconfigurations may be recognized and exploited. This includes strategies for changing or dismantling existing systems as well as nurturing diversity in solution frames.
HistelCon 2012
HISTELCON 2012 aims to build a comprehensive view of the origin and early development of electrical, and particularly of telecommunication, technologies. Original and innovative contributions are invited in areas including, but not restricted to:
origins and early developments of technologies milestones in electrotechnology
scientists and technologists involved in the above museum items illustrating the above
Participants with different backgrounds – engineers, historians, museum curators etc, are welcome. Young researchers and engineers are particularly welcome
You are invited to submit a 500-word abstract of your paper in MS Word format with the title, the name(s) and affiliations(s) of the author(s) to the Conference Secretariat, by February 12, 2012. The papers reviewed and accepted by the Conference Technical Programme Committee will be published in the Conference Proceedings and in the IEEE Xplore Digital Library. Guidelines for preparation of papers will be provided in due time.
HISTELCON 2012 provides also a special opportunity to experience Italy in a charming season of the year and to visit, in particular, the University of Pavia and the Museum of Electrical Technology recently established in the University where Alessandro Volta was a professor for a long time.
NeuroCultures - NeuroGenderings II
In March 2010, participants of the international and transdisciplinary conference “NeuroGenderings” put together an expert group to critically examine research on the sexed brain. Scientists from Europe, the US, Canada and Australia from different disciplines such as neuroscience, neurocultures, the humanities, social and cultural studies, gender studies, feminist science studies, and science and technology studies, launched this network to improve reflective analysis within/of the neurosciences and to initiate dialogue across disciplinary borders. The aim of this group is to elaborate innovative theoretical and empirical approaches to address the question of sex and gender in the brain; to analyze the social and political underpinnings of the ongoing “cerebralization” of human life and especially of gender; to evaluate the current state of neuroscientific methods, evidence, and interpretations regarding sex/gender in the brain, and to discuss the impacts of neuroscientific gender research in socio-political and cultural fields.
Some of these approaches can already be read in a special issue of Neuroethics, “Neuroethics and Gender” (papers published online first available at: http://www.springerlink.com/content/120989/?Content+Status=Accepted; the final issue will be available in late 2012). In co-operation with the network NeuroGenderings, the Gender Research Office at the University of Vienna will launch a three-day Conference entitled “NeuroCultures – NeuroGenderings II”. We aim to expand the network an invite scholars and student who engage with neuroscientific research as neuroscientists and/or brain science studies scholars with insights from the social and cultural studies of science, technology, and medicine, as well as from feminist and queer theory to discuss current developments in the field of neurocultures and gender.
The aim of the conference “NeuroCultures – NeuroGenderings II” is to improve reflective scientific approaches concerned with sex/gender and the brain, and to gain particular insight into the transformation or persistence of gendered norms and values that accompany the mutual entanglements between brain research, various disciplines and public discourse. With the expansion of the domains of neuroscientific knowledge, today we are witnessing an abundance of emerging neurocultures (such as neuropedagogy, neuroeconomics, neuromarketing, neurotheology, neuroaesthetics, among others) in which bio-socio- cultural relations are (re-) negotiated within research, neuro- (technological)applications, and public discourses. We use the notion of the “cerebral subject” – the cultural figure of the human according to which all we need to be ourselves is our brains (Ortega & Vidal 2007) – to describe how thought, behaviour, subjectivity and identity are collapsed with the brain’s biology in these neurocultural fields. The cerebral subject is a specific kind of subject; the brain vocabulary produces a culturally and historically specific version of the human and, as such, impacts individual, social, cultural and political spheres. Gender aspects have to be seriously taken into account within these endeavours on various levels: their empirical significance, the close entanglement of neuroscientific research with society, the impacts of neurofacts and neurotechnologies (in the broadest sense) on socio- cultural gender symbolisms and gendered power relations. Additionally, the hybrid conceptions of neurocultures have to be questioned in terms of their potentials for disrupting nature-culture dichotomies on both material and epistemological levels. Contributions to these discussions are welcome in the following thematic strands:
I. Empirical NeuroGenderings: Empirical research on aspects of gendering the brain including biological and socio-cultural aspects; analyses on methodological aspects and biases in the construction of sex/gender in brain research; research on the constructive processes in brain imaging, their relevance in knowledge production and in the transgression of brain concepts and findings into popular discourse; approaches from feminist and queer neuroscience in relevant fields. II. NeuroCultures and Brain Plasticity: Analyses of empirical research on brain plasticity, including a critical discussion of the concept itself and its impact on gender-related aspects in society; discourses on current forms of neurobiological determinism that frame all processes of thought and action explainable and predictable in terms of the brain’s structures and functions, irrespective of whether these structures and functions are innate or formed by experience. III. Image and Politics of the Cerebral Subject: Social movements’ uses of brain arguments on gender and sexuality for progressive or conservative agendas; re-politicizations of critical analyses of the cerebral subject and gender; questioning the lack of societal, political and economic situatedness and reflections of gender and intersectional categories; the cultural appeal of using the brain to account for gender and sexuality; social and political uses of brain- based arguments on sex, gender, sexuality, but also class, race, age.
IV. Power und Politics of NeuroCultures/NeuroGenderings: Emergence of a neurogovernmentality with its technologies of power and the market economy, as these are implemented into technologies of the self, where the individual brain functions as the target of control, repair and manipulation; gender dimensions of social neurosciences, neuroeconomy, neuropedagogy, neurotechnologies in general, and particularly in neuroenhancement technologies where these converge with notions of convertibility and modifiability of the brain, and are embedded in paradigms of individual optimization within modern meritocracy. V. Transdisciplinary and NeuroGenderings: Studies on gendered brain narratives from the perspectives of history, sociology, philosophy, cultural studies, and arts; analyses of popular culture’s accounts of brain and gender.
VI. Theory and Epistemology of NeuroGenderings: Theoretical and epistemological discussions about concepts as feminist materialism; approaches from gender, feminist & queer technoscience that address the fragmentations of the border between nature-culture-technology, the relations between sex, gender, and brain; other important notions/ critical tools that are developed in feminist and queer scholarship. VII. Other gender relevant fields of research. Contributions to this conference can be submitted for oral presentation (20 min) or for a poster presentation. For paper submissions, please use the online tool on our conference site: http://neurocultures2012.univie.ac.at and indicate the strand in which you aim to present your paper/poster. Abstracts for papers/posters should not exceed 3000 characters (including spaces). Deadline for proposal submission: 25 March 2012. The papers will be selected within a short time frame and confirmed by mid-May 2012. *DISCCRS VII Interdisciplinary Climate Change Research Symposium
*The selection committee will favor applicants who plan to engage in interdisciplinary research careers in any subject relevant to the study of climate change, its impacts or its solutions.* We encourage applicants from the *natural* and *social sciences*, *mathematics*, * engineering*, and other fields, so long as their research focus relates to climate change, its impacts or its solutions. Although the emphasis is on the U.S. research system, we welcome applicants from all countries who are interested in learning about the U.S. research system or connecting with U.S. researchers. *Airfare and on-site expenses are supported through grants from NSF and NASA.* *Symposium application instructions:* http://disccrs.org/application_instructions
*ELECTRONIC RESOURCES *In addition to our annual symposia,* DISCCRS provides online tools for catalyzing interdisciplinary discussion and collaboration:* http://disccrs.org/disccrsposter.pdf *Please display and distribute the poster as widely as possible! * *Online Ph.D. Dissertation Registry:* Join over 2500 climate change researchers by registering your Ph.D. dissertation and adding your abstract to our fully searchable database. You can also browse the registry to see what other climate change researchers have been doing recently. http://disccrs.org/register *Electronic newsletter:* With timely climate change job listings, news stories, funding opportunities and more, *our weekly e-newsletter is automatically provided to anyone who registers their Ph.D.
Internet Research 13.0: Technologies
Salford - Greater Manchester - UK
Internet Research 13.0 will focus on the theme of technologies, understood in the broadest sense as crafts, techniques, and systems. The conference will examine the place of the Internet in the contemporary world and in relation to a range of existing and emerging technologies, considering its impact in a context where life is entangled with technologies of all kinds as never before. The conference will bring together scholars, researchers, students and practitioners from many disciplines to map and situate the development of the Internet as part of the history of human technology.
To this end, we call for papers, panel and pre-conference workshop proposals from any discipline, methodology, community or a combination of them that address the conference themes, including, but not limited to, papers that intersect and/or interconnect with the following:
* the speed and acceleration of technological change * the past, present and future of technology * emerging and converging technologies * educational technology * cultures of crafting * connectivity and access * space, location and mobile technologies * technology, networks and attachments * technology and the body * technologies of the self * technology, regulation and ethics
Sessions at the conference will be established that specifically address the conference themes, and we welcome innovative, exciting, and unexpected takes on those themes. We also welcome submissions on topics that address social, cultural, political, legal, aesthetic, economic, and/or philosophical aspects of the internet beyond the conference themes. In all cases, we welcome disciplinary and interdisciplinary submissions as well as international collaborations from both AoIR and non-AoIR members.
SUBMISSIONS
We seek proposals for several different kinds of contributions. As in the past, we welcome proposals for traditional academic conference PAPERS, organized PANEL PROPOSALS that present a coherent group of papers on a single theme, as well as PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS which focus on a particular topic. We also invite proposals that will focus on discussion and interaction among conference delegates. A common form of this type is the ROUNDTABLE SESSION, but we would also like to encourage other formats, such as OPEN FISHBOWL SESSIONS. (See the Wikipedia entry under “Fishbowl (conversation)” for a description of this format. Fishbowl sessions should cover broad topics of interest to a wide segment of the AoIR community.) Finally, we invite short 5-minute talks on topics of interest to the community as part of our Ignite-IR panels. Please see below for more information on this format.
DEADLINES
Submissions Due: 1 March 2012 (Papers, Panels and Pre-Workshops. Details below.) NOTE: The submission deadline is a HARD DEADLINE; there will be NO extensions to this date.
Notification: 1 May 2012
Full Papers Submissions Due for inclusion in Selected Papers of IR: 1 July 2012
Ignite-IR Final Proposal Deadline: 1 August 2012
Ignite-IR Slides Due: 15 September 2012
SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS
All papers and presentations will be evaluated in a standard blind peer review.
PAPERS (individual or multi-author) – submit abstract of 600-800 words
PANEL PROPOSALS – submit a description of 600-800 words on the panel theme, plus a 250-500 word abstract for each paper or presentation. The panel organizer must assemble these materials for submission
ROUNDTABLE and FISHBOWL PROPOSALS – submit a statement indicating the nature of the discussion and form of interaction, and listing initial participants. (In the case of a fishbowl proposal, this will include the name of the moderator, and the names of the first four speakers for the fishbowl.)
PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS – please submit all workshop proposals via email to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
IGNITE-IR – please submit a one-paragraph abstract and other information. Details at http://ir13.aoir.org/ignite-ir
Papers, presentations and panels will be selected from the submitted proposals on the basis of multiple blind peer review, coordinated and overseen by the Program Chair. Each individual may present only one paper during the conference, though they may be listed as a co-author on multiple papers. In addition to this one presentation, they may also appear on a panel, roundtable, or performance. The exception is the Ignite-IR lightening talk, which may be in addition to any other presentations.
PUBLICATION OF PAPERS
Full papers submitted by the 1 July 2012 deadline will undergo review to be published in an open-access, online collection, Selected Papers of Internet Research (ISSN 2162-3317). A template and guidelines for preparing your final paper are available on the conference website (http://ir13.aoir.org/papers)
Selected papers from the conference will alternatively be published in a special issue of the journal Information, Communication & Society. Authors selected for submission for this issue will be contacted prior to the conference.
PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS
On 18 October 2012, there will be a limited number of pre-conference workshops and symposia that will provide participants with in-depth, hands-on and/or creative opportunities. We invite proposals for these pre-conference workshops. Local presenters are encouraged to propose workshops that will invite visiting researchers into their labs or studios or locales. Proposals should be no more than 1,000 words, and should clearly outline the purpose, methodology, structure, costs, equipment and minimal attendance required, as well as explaining its relevance to the conference as a whole. Proposals will be accepted if they demonstrate that the workshop will add significantly to the overall program in terms of thematic depth, hands on experience, or local opportunities for scholarly or artistic connections. These proposals and all inquiries regarding pre-conference proposals should be submitted as soon as possible to the program chair (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
IGNITE-IR
For the second year, the Internet Research conference will offer the opportunity to present short, five minute talks in rapid succession. Presenters provide a deck of twenty slides, which will auto-advance each fifteen seconds. Details on the session maybe found at the conference website. Because talks are intended to be of the moment, the submission deadline is much later than for papers: 1 August 2012.
CONTACT INFORMATION
Program Chair: Feona Attwood, Communication, Sheffield Hallam University, UK, email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Local Conference Chair: Ben Light, School of Media, Music, and Performance, University of Salford, email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Eighth International Conference on Webometrics, Informetrics and Scientometrics (WIS)
Please send your extended abstracts to: Hildrun Kretschmer at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) with a copy to Kyungran Noh at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). *COLLNET and ISSI* COLLNET is a global interdisciplinary research network of scholars who are concerned to study aspects of collaboration in science and in technology (see COLLNET web site at: http://www.collnet.de/).
This network of interdisciplinary scholars was established in January 2000 in Berlin with Hildrun Kretschmer as coordinator. Since that time there have been twelve meetings: the first in Berlin, September 2000, the 2nd in New Delhi, February 2001 and the 3rd in Sydney (in association with the 8th ISSI Conference), July 2001. The former ISSI President Mari Davis has mentioned in the Newsletter, July 2003: Importantly, ISSI needs alliance with other groups, such as COLLNET, for broader reach among a range of interdisciplinary researchers and to encourage new thinking and perspectives on investigations in science and in technology.
*Important Dates:* Extended Abstract (3 pages. Abstracts less than 2.5 pages are not accepted): April 15, 2012 (deadline) Acceptance: May 15, 2012 Full Paper: July 30, 2012 (deadline) (Camera-ready version, maximum 10 pages including tables, figures, references). The extended abstracts will be peer reviewed by the Programme Committee. The accepted full papers will be published in the proceedings. *Further Details*
ESHS 5th Conference
* Providing a high-level interdisciplinary European forum for research in the History of Science; * Promoting cooperation between its members; * Promoting the preservation of and access to scientific heritage; * Promoting, assisting, and advising on the teaching of the History of Science; * Advancing the education of the general public in the historical, cultural, and social aspects of science.
The deadline for submitting symposia proposal at the 5th International Conference of the European Society of History of Science is approaching.
All Program Dates
Deadline for symposia proposals: December 16, 2011 (Notification of acceptance by 31 January 2012) Deadline for grant application: January 17, 2012 (Notification of acceptance by 11 May 2012) Deadline for abstract submission: January 24, 2012 (Notification of acceptance by 30 March 2012) Deadline for early registration: May 4, 2012 Opening: November 1st, 2012
If you wish to contact the Organizing Committee, use the contact form at http://5eshs.hpdst.gr/contact
Selective reproductive technologies– routes of routinisation and globalisation
Keynote speakers
Sarah Franklin, BIOS Centre, London School of Economics and Political Science
Lene Koch, Centre for Medical Science and Technology Studies, University of Copenhagen
Renzong Qiu, Institute of Philosophy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing
Rayna Rapp, Department of Anthropology, New York University
Margaret Sleeboom-Faulkner, Department of Anthropology, University of Sussex
Key areas of empirical interest
Gamete selection and ‘shopping’ – illicit and legal trade of gametes has become a global business creating markets for so-called ‘ivy league eggs’ in the United States or ‘viking sperm’ from Denmark as prospective recipients ‘shop around’ for donor sperm and/or eggs. Gamete banks and suppliers select their ‘products’ according to genetic, chemical, morphological and social criteria.
The emergence and development of pre-gestation genetic testing techniques – carrier testing and pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) have become important components of reproductive decision-making for many prospective parents burdened by a fear of genetically transmitting a ‘life of suffering’ to future offspring. In the United Kingdom over 100 ‘PGD babies’ have been born and in China over 60 have.
The routinisation of prenatal screening/testing – in Finland and Denmark, prenatal screening for chromosomal disorders is now offered to all pregnant women regardless of age. In many other countries, the possibility of prenatal testing/diagnosis (PND) for certain ‘at risk’ groups has become a normalised part of pregnancy care.
The growing availability and affordability of ultrasound technology – since the 1980s ultrasound equipment has become widespread across the globe. Although initially developed as aids to obstetrics, ultrasound imaging technologies have since been increasingly used to diagnose foetal abnormalities and been implicated in growing sex-ratios in countries like China, Vietnam and India.
Our hope is to promote a strong network of researchers within this increasingly important field. It is our plan to prepare the grounds for a publication resulting from the conference from the very beginning.
Abstract deadline: 15 February 2012, 250 words to be sent to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Selective Reproductive Technologies