The conference is visualized by two students looking at their  cell phones with very different facial expressions
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Conference

Media and Emotional Mobilization

Emotional mobilization is both a threat to and an important prerequisite of deliberative democracy in Europe. It can however also be important for creating engagement and understanding in various target audiences. Thus, the dynamics of passion and reason in European public discourse remains enigmatic and is in dire need of scholarly attention for the benefit of multiple stakeholders. Our conference aims to investigate the reciprocal relationship between emotions and the production, content, and audiences of media from a broad perspective. Why are emotional messages attractive and how do they construct their salience? What purpose do they fullfil in media? Can harmful consequences (such as disinformation and conspiratorial meaning-making) be averted and corrected? Or are emotions simply the key difference between the human and non-human condition in future communication determined by Artificial Intelligence and synthetic media?

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We invite scholars of media and journalism in the humanities and social sciences to explore questions like these at our forthcoming conference “Media and Emotional Mobilization” at Linnaeus University, campus Kalmar at the shores of the Baltic Sea. The conference aims at an open exchange of ideas in a vibrant and emerging hub of media research in Sweden, the future state-of-the-art “Linnaeus Media Observatory” (LMO, under formation). LMO aims to unite media research and practice in a collaboration between media and journalism studies, media production, research into media and democracy, intermedial studies and journalism education. In the spirit of open communication of research, our aim is to publish the papers of the conference in an appropriate format.

Open lecture with media expert Karin Wahl-Jørgensen

Keynote speaker Karin Wahl-Jorgensen
Åsa Westerlund

We live in a time of information clutter where people look for emotional validation in the media instead of facts. How did we get here and how do we get out of the situation? Professor Karin Wahl-Jørgensen is one of the foremost media experts who has studied the relationship between emotions, media and politics. In her keynote lecture "Mediated emotion in turbulent times: The good news and the bad news" you can take part of  her insights. 

The open lecture will be held as a webinar on Thursday 12 October at 13:15-14:00.

Contact information

If you have any questions or inquiries about the conference, please send a mail to meme2023@lnu.se and one of the conference organisers will contact you. 

The conference is organized by the Department of Media and Journalism (MJ), the Centre for Intermedial and Multimodal Studies (IMS), Fojo Media Institute and the knowledge environment A Questioned Democracy (IfDem).

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A sustainable event

The conference “Media and Emotional Mobilisation” is a sustainability-assured meeting in accordance with Linnaeus University’s guidelines for sustainable events. These guidelines are linked to the 17 global goals in Agenda 2030 and comprise the three dimensions of sustainable development: the economic, the social, and the environmental. 

Learn more about Linnaeus University´s sustainable events.

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