[ Monster Media ]

First, I rename the topic "Are Weblogs Monsters?" by "Monster Media", since most of the entries are definitely NOT on Weblogs - which lost, in any rate, their monstrosity in the meantime and grew up very fast.

For one week there is still the chance to send an abstract of 300 to 500 words and a short CV to the organizers of the conference Transmediality and Transculturality, to be held in Mainz on December 6 to 9, 2007. The deadline is September 28, 2007.

Transmediality and Transculturality at Johannes-Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany, brings together scholars who work in transmediality studies and/or transculturality studies, and aims to coordinate and extend research which investigates and applies the terms and theories of transmediality and transculturality.

Regarding transculturality studies, the international discussion does not yet seem to have successfully bridged the gap between, among others, the disciplines of social philosophy, American studies, and Romance or Latin-American studies, while the latter have a history of applying the terms transculturality and transculturation dating to the 1940s.

The term transmediality, on the other hand, as it is currently developed in media studies, narratology, art history, and aesthetics competes with the terms remediation and adaptation. A more systematic understanding of the types and typologies of change and process which are connoted by transmediality and transculturality may prove enriching for the critical usefulness of both terms as well as for the various disciplinary approaches involved.

We invite papers addressing connected theoretical issues as well as critically applying the terms to literature, media, visual art, and film, or to other cultural artefacts and phenomena. Suggested areas for paper topics are

• differing concepts of transmediality and transmedialization, or transculturality and transculturation, and their sources
• transmediality, transculturality, and temporality
• transculturality, globality or globalization, and planetarity
• transcultural and transmedial narrative(s)
• intermediality/interculturality and transmediality/transculturality
• transmedial and transcultural genres?
• historical transculturality or transmediality?
• transmediality and transculturality as systematics of change
• transmediality and transculturality in relation to other ’transes,’ e.g. translinguality, transnationality, transdisciplinarity, transpersonalization, transversality/transversal reason, translation, transcreation
• transmediality and transculturality as diversity archives and diversity guarantees in studies and philosophies of life forms and life knowledge or in bioethics?

Presentations in parallel workshops should present a critical thesis and are scheduled for 15 minutes, with the same time for discussion. The conference language is English. Funding through Forschungsfonds 2007 of Mainz University includes the publication of a volume with conference contributions and results.

Contact:
Dr. habil. Nadja Gernalzick
gernalzick@uni-mainz.de

Katarina Sakic, stud.phil.
sakick@uni-mainz.de

FB 05, American Studies
Johannes Gutenberg-Universität
Jakob-Welder-Weg 18
D-55099 Mainz
Germany
phone: +49-6131-392 2711