Where:
and Melbourne Town Hall, 90-130 Swanston St, Melbourne, Victoria
When
10-12 February 2020
Confirmed Keynote Speakers:
PATRICIA HILL COLLINS, Distinguished University Professor Emerita (University of Maryland)
GARY FOLEY, Professor of History (Moondani Balluk, Victoria University)
VICTORIA GRIEVE WILLIAMS, Adjunct Professor (RMIT University)
Driven by desires to dismantle entrenched power structures, populism and autocracy, and to save the Earth, people from the local grassroots are connecting with activists internationally from #BlackLivesMatter to #ExtinctionRebellion to #IsupportStandingRock to #ReclaimtheNight and other Anti-Rape and Anti-Violence Against Women supporters, from the Arab Spring to #SOSBlakAustralia and other movements around the world.
We have married the lessons of women, Indigenous, black and gay liberation movements of the 60s and 70s with organising against racism and discrimination of the 80s and 90s with new models and tools of resistance in the digital age. Protests are now transformed by new technologies and social media, allowing people to assemble, share experiences and give voice to perspectives that would otherwise be excluded.
How do we make sense of these protest movements in the digital age and in relation to social change over time? This conference offers a chance for pause, reflection and critical engagement of this complex question. Papers, posters and panel proposals are invited on the following themes:
- Creative, storytelling and performative approaches to the analysis or presentation of protest cultures or forms of activism, ‘artivism’, ‘craftivism’ and other communities of practice (especially from the perspectives of exiles, minority and marginalised communities)
- Possible topics may include (but are not limited to): climate change, environmentalism, racism, discrimination, same-sex marriage, sexism, surveillance, exclusion, mental health issues, homelessness, cyber-bullying, violence against women, men, children or families, human rights, Indigenous rights, refugee rights, women’s rights, land rightsHow storytelling, song, voice, dance, music, art, festivals and other modes of performance amplify the voices of marginalised people through social movements and protest, and to what effect
Non-violent resistance, symbolic protests, political non-cooperation, hunger strikes, civil disobedience or civil resistance (satyagraha)
Media (documentary, film, video, audiovisual) and narrative representations of historically, socially, culturally, economically and politically disadvantaged groups and minority voices
Innovations in protest practice to advance inclusion, share knowledge, change government policy, and engage wider local and global publics
How identity-based activism (Indigenous, LGBTIQAx, elders, ethnicity, disability, migrants, refugees, youth, students, gender) engages political issues
Challenges protesters face and the philosophies, tools and leadership strategies they adopt, reinvigorate or reject
Contextualising and exploring the relationship and differences between social media protests today (YouTube, Skype, WhatsApp, virtual private networks, hashtags, street and screen activism) and traditional protests in the pre-Internet age (sit-ins, wade-ins, lunch counter protests, pamphleteering, speaker shout downs, obstructions); what we can learn or unlearn from past social movements
- Collective action that combines politics with technology, activism in literature, visual activism, guerrilla activism, grassroots activism, culture jamming, vigils, boycotts
- Theories of participation, community engagement and the public sphereInsights into the nature of social change and its relationship to protest action.
- Conference Targets
- This conference aims to bring together academics/activists to explore all forms of protest action, issues, events, experiences and people (from scholars, organisers and grassroots peoples’ activism) and from those writing from within or about the global South.
- We welcome presentations from those working on the overarching topic of Stories of Resistance, Survival and Social Change, over space and over time. That is, our focus is transnational and historical as well as contemporary and local.
- In particular, we invite theoretical and empirical contributions that reflect on one or more of the following questions:
How might we consider the ubiquitous protest sign ‘you cannot represent us’ that is now being brandished by waves of dissenters, non-conformists, resistance fighters and their allies around the world?
In what ways are we witnessing new kinds of ‘performance protest’? – music, song, dance, festivals, expressive, creative and bodily repertoires of resistance, cultural revitalisation, community outreach and empowerment
Are there ‘safe spaces’ for protest and what forms do these spaces take both online and offline?
What does it mean to be an ally for a cause? What do allies gain or risk losing? What are the limits and possibilities of ally work? How have minority voices worked with allies? What makes a valuable or authentic ally?
What existing or new concepts allow us to observe and describe instances of social change in protest movements over time?
How are digital tools being used to document protests and activism and how are these uses transformative and emancipatory, or undermined through policing, incarceration or surveillance?
Why and how do everyday citizens without activist experience come to be mobilised, to stage protests or occupy public spaces, in order to grow their movements and catalyse social change?
Send abstracts, panel proposals and enquiries to: activism2020@gmail.com
Applicants are invited to submit an abstract of max. 250 words and a short bio of max. 250 words by 1 October 2019.
