Programme > Conférence John D. H. Downing - "Understanding Media of the Voiceless"

Downing Understanding Media of the Voiceless

A conference by John D.H. DOWNING

Professor Emeritus and Founding Director, Global Media Research Center, Southern Illinois University (USA)

Friday 22, june 2018 | 10:15-11:15 am | Amphi MIEE (UPEC)

John Downing will begin by briefly describing how he became involved with nano-media issues from the mid-1960s onwards, up to 1980 in Britain, and then from 1980 in the USA and beyond. He will then offer some comments on terminology – e.g. ‘alternative’, ‘community’, ‘social movement’, ‘activist’, ‘independent’ media, and still other terms. He will mainly focus on six dimensions of these media, in order to challenge common misunderstandings of (1) the importance of media ‘size’; (2) the timespan of their impact; (3) their social movement and/or community base; (4) their relation to commercially owned media; (5) their growing global reach; and (6) the problematic of ‘voice’.

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John D. H. Downing has written extensively on alternative media and social movements. His PhD is from at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He is professor emeritus and founding director of the Global Media Research Center, College of Mass Communication and Media Arts, Southern Illinois University. He previously taught at Greenwich University, UK, the City University of New York, and the University of Texas, Austin. His books include:

1996 Internationalizing Media Theory: transition, power, culture: reflections on Russia, Poland and Hungary 1980-95
2001 (with Tamara Villarreal Ford, Genève Gil, Laura Stein): Radical Media: Rebellious Communication and Social Movements
2005 (with Charles Husband) Representing 'Race': Racisms, Ethnicities and Media
2008 Editor (with Mojca Pajnik) Alternative Media and the Politics of Resistance: Perspectives and Challenges
2010 Editor, Encyclopedia of Social Movement Media

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