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COMMUNICATION AND POWER. STRUCTURAL VIEWS OF A PERSISTENT RELATIONSHIP

Guest Editor: Daniel Moya López (University of Seville)

MEDIACIONES journal (a publication of scientific, academic and creative dissemination, edited by the Faculty of Communication of UNIMINUTO , Colombia) ComPoder (Research Group on Communication, Power and Critical Thinking in the Face of Global Change) and Ladecom (Laboratory of Communication Studies of the University of Seville) invite professors, researchers, creators, leaders, managers, students- independent or linked to public, private, multilateral or community organizations and institutions- to submit their contributions to this monographic issue around the axis of the Communication-Power dialogue.

Communication and power are elements that have constantly interacted since the beginning of history (Reig, 2019). The media have had an historical role in perpetuating hegemony (Laguna and Martínez-Gallego, 2015), so it is essential to study them critically. But, although the media have established themselves as one of the main discursive mechanism that power has to exert its influence on public opinion, reducing this fact only to the sphere of the media leaves out other influential actors within this broad process. Thus, it is also of interest to critically observe the communication process that originates from other entities such as cultural industries (cinema, video games, OTT platforms, sports, etc.), social networks and even artificial intelligence tools.

Studies in the Political Economy of Communication are the starting point. As established by Mosco (2006), Political Economy deals with the study of power relations. It is always an object of interest, even more so in a changing and dizzying world with the presence of the digital media ecosystem, but also with the challenges of technological progress, which always present the necessary research on who controls these processes.

The academy, as an institution, faces the challenge of providing society with clarity and insight in a scenario dominated by noise and infoxication, which translates not only into the proliferation of hoaxes, but also into an increase in hate speech. This issue aims to bring together contributions that assist to explaining and understanding the world around us based on the structures of power.

The approach to this relationship between communication and power acquires particularly significant virtues from the structural approach, that is, from the articulation of data into critical analyses. The focus can range from business concentration in a given productive sector to the analysis of the owners of a given communication outlet o agent (such as those mentioned above), as well as the study of media treatment from the critical analysis of discourse.

Studies that apply a historical perspective to these relations between power and communication are also relevant, as well as those that analyze public communication policies: either as actions that postpone the domination of the market system in the communication flow, or as actions that seek to recover communication sovereignty for citizens. In this sense, this monographic issue also opens the door to those studies that analyze alternative communication as a counterpoint to the dynamics of domination through discourse.

In short, this is a monograph that invites to the analysis of the relationship between communication and power from a critical approach that questions the processes of domination through discourse. An invitation to the exercise of critical thinking in favor of civil and social utility.

The monograph opens up several avenues for the analysis of the relationship between communication and power:

  • Media and power. Media shareholding
  • Culture as a disputed territory. Appropriation through cultural industries
  • Discourse as a tool for hegemony: Critical Discourse Analysis and case studies
  • Public communication policies
  • Journalistic business models
  • Critical theory. The Political Economy of Communication
  • Power and History of Communication
  • Ethics, Communication and Power
  • Alternative Communication

The following types of contributions are accepted for this call:

- Research, innovation and research-creation articles

- Reflection or review articles derived from research processes

- Reviews

- Interviews

- Graphic, literary, audiovisual, sound, multimedia and transmedia works

Contributions should be submitted with one of the following sections of the journal in mind:

Research and innovation. This section includes contributions corresponding to contributions of new knowledge resulting from research, innovation and research-creation completed or in process.

Reflections. This section publishes reflections and reviews on specific topics from an analytical, interpretative and critical perspective of the author.

Artifacts. This section is dedicated to making graphic, audiovisual, sound, multimedia and transmedia works visible.

Deadline: August 20, 2024

More information:

https://revistas.uniminuto.edu/index.php/med

mediaciones@uniminuto.edu