CALL FOR PAPERS: Visual and audio-visual Communication

Researchers, including postgraduate and final or honours year students in communication, media, journalism, and public relations are invited to submit papers for a PRism special living issue on visual and audio-visual communication.

This issue is accepting contributions on an ongoing basis: it is a living issue, and you are encouraged to submit work that responds to or comments on the contributions already posted.  Or, send something entirely new.

Click here to see contributions to the visual and audio-visual communication issue so far.

PRism (ISSN 1448-4404) is a free-access, online, fully-refereed online academic public relations and communication journal. It was established in 2002 to meet the need for readily available, quality controlled PR research materials online, and published its first issue in 2003. PRism is hosted by Massey University and supported by an international editorial board comprising 50 leading communication academics.

Research in visual communication is one of the youngest within the social sciences. There are no established criteria to conduct this type of research, however, the fields of psychology, education, art history,ethnography, cultural and multimedia studies can provide some guiding principles toward building empirical knowledge. Visual elements can make valuable contributions at three different stages of empirical enquiry: data acquisition, data analysis and data reporting.

We would like to review innovative tools to collect visual information, novel ways to analyse it and original reporting channels,new publication outlets (including this journal:) These both shape and are shaped by what we notice as valid research elements and how we understand what we see. We expect contributions in PR and communication related (but not limited) to the following fields: education, learning, personal development, professional development, teacher development, corporate and community development and leadership development.

Possible topics:

• The ethics of visual representations
• The comparative richness of visual and audio-visual media in different contexts
• Innovative uses of visual and audio-visual communication in business, the arts, education, research, or other fields, e.g.:
• What new research approaches can be developed to account for the specificity of visual or audio-visual elements as opposed to textual elements?
• How can audio-visual elements be integrated in the learning process?
• How do different research streams use visual and audio-visual elements to present social constructs from their specific fields of interest?
• How are collective identities defined, constructed and represented in visual media? What methodologies can we develop to make sense of this construction process?
• How do visual artifacts and methods help or hinder the representation of constructs such as cognitive interpretations, understanding and insights? How may they assist analysing interaction or impact on behaviour?
• How may individual and collective visual representations complement each other in, for instance, collective capacity building?

Notes for intending authors

Please send articles of from 5000 to 7000 words to Fabrice Desmarais at the email address below.  Please indicate “Call for Papers – PRism” in the subject line. Expressions of interest, commentary, and opinion pieces may also be sent for consideration.  Please make contact, we welcome your interest.

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Because of its online format, PRism is able to spearhead publication modalities and will endeavour to support the different kinds of multi-media that researchers would like to propose, including specifically still pictures, audio files, moving media and film digital clips (which will be viewed through Windows media player (PC), Quicktime media players – download here or Flash animation. In addition, PRism is also open to other types of audio-visual material that researchers have collected.

Articles should be academically rigorous (e.g. methodologically and theoretically sound, and thoroughly researched and referenced) but written in a style that is accessible to anyone interested in communication and its implications. Use plain English and, if you must use jargon, clearly explain its meaning. When submitting your final article (as a word document , rtf or pdf file attached to an email), please also send a 100 word biography that tells us a few fun facts about you and your interests.

Please adhere STRICTLY to APA style in preparing your manuscript and references. Articles which do not fulfil these criteria will not be sent to referees. We reserve the right to edit your work before publication.

All articles submitted to PRism must be original, unpublished work, and should not be under simultaneous consideration by any other publishing outlet. If a full article is accepted for publication following successful progress through the refereeing process, the author agrees that it will then be published and archived on the PRism website. If an article published on PRism is later published elsewhere, the latter publication must acknowledge prior publishing on PRism.

If you would like high-level, constructive feedback on your work in progress, please send an abstract or article draft for consideration. Our referees are dedicated to making the publishing experience a pleasant one; they will highlight your strengths and guide and encourage you step-by-step through any changes needed to reach publishing standard. Support of this nature for postgraduate publishing is rare: so please take advantage of the opportunity while it exists. We wish you good luck and look forward to receiving your work!

Please send articles to: 

Fabrice Desmarais

FABRICE@waikato.ac.nz

Waikato Management School
The University of Waikato 

Phone +64 7 838 4466 ext 6113