(for the workshop see below)

1. CALL FOR HOMER-PANELS AT THE NECS 2013 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

Submission Deadline: January 21, 2013

The History of movie-going, exhibition and reception or HOMER Group was founded in June 2004 by an international group of cinema scholars to promote the understanding of the complex phenomena of cinema-going, exhibition, and reception, from a multidisciplinary perspective. HOMER has organized panels, conferences and workshops, with the  ‘Cinema in Context’ conference in Amsterdam (April 2006) and the ‘The Glow in their Eyes’ conference  in Ghent (December 2007) as highlights. Since then, the field of ‘new cinema history’ has grown substantially. This body of research has achieved critical mass and methodological maturity. It defines itself a social history of a cultural institute and aims to identify film as a cultural artifact consumed by a variety of audiences. ‘New cinema history’ addresses wider societal, political and other forces in historicizing film spectatorship, cinema-going and exhibition.

The time is right to review the current state of research in the history of movie-going and film exhibition and distribution. For this year, HOMER has joined forces with the major European film and media studies organization NECS, which is so kind to integrate a number of HOMER panels into their 2013 international NECS conference, i.e. HOMER@NECS 2013.

We support the submission of individual papers or pre-constituted panel proposals from HOMER members and interested non-members, as we seek to bring together scholars dealing with these subjects from all over the globe. The growing number of case studies in local film history increases the need for comparative studies of cities, regions, and nations, while the relationship between micro and macro history(ies) is becoming a major issue for the field. The analysis of patterns and networks in film culture also calls for special attention to methodology. We aim to bring European perspectives on cinema-going and film exhibition into dialogue with US, Australian, African, South American and Asian research.

Possible topics for papers are e.g.:

• Film exhibition, cinema-going and film experience in relation to theories of imperialism, post-colonialism, diaspora, etc.;
• Long term tendencies such as the rise of cinemas in rural and urban environments, the boom of cinema-going, the decay and subsequent closure of many (provincial and neighborhood) cinemas and the rise of multiplexes;
• Tensions between commercial and/or ideological film exhibition, between urban and rural areas, and between provinces and regions;
• Institutional developments, geographical location and programming trends;
• Audiences and film experiences in urban and rural contexts;
• A comparative international perspective on cinema-going and exhibition;
• Representations in films of cinema-going, film exhibition, film culture(s);
• Reflections on methods: How to reconcile/combine large scale analysis with in depth case study? How to compare national or regional research/databases on exhibition and cinema-going?
• The “top down” forces of industry, commerce and ideology vs. “bottom up” forces of experience;
• Contesting concepts of public and private space in media experience;
• Cinema’s integration into to the metropolitan experience of modernity, vs. its role in the construction of community in less urbanized and rural areas.

We explicitly invite non-HOMER scholars who are working on the mentioned topics and want to share their research with international colleagues. As with the Ghent conference a selection of papers presented at the conference will be published in an edited volume in 2014 (publisher to be confirmed) HOMER@NECS 2013 will be also preceded by a one day HOMER workshop (practical information on the workshop follows below).

Practical information

You can submit an individual paper proposal or a pre-constituted panel proposal. Panels may consist of 3 to 4 speakers with a maximum of 20 minutes speaking time each. All presenters are obliged to provide a title, an abstract of maximum 150 words, 3 to 5 key bibliographical references, name of the presenter and institutional affiliation, plus a short panel rationale (150 words max.) in case of a preconstituted panel.

Please submit all individual paper or panel proposals by Monday January 21, 2013 to liesbeth.vandevijver@ugent.be. You will be notified of acceptance shortly thereafter.  Please note that HOMER papers and panels should not be submitted via the NECS online submission system, but via e-mail to Lies Van De Vijver, as they will be reviewed separately by the HOMER 2013 programming team.

2. CALL FOR PARTICIPATION AT THE HOMER workshop June 19, 2013

Submission Deadline: January 21, 2013

Please email all inquiries to liesbeth.vandevijver@ugent.be

To bring together HOMER members and other interested scholars, HOMER@NECS 2013 is preceded by a one day HOMER workshop. If you are interested in the topics of the CFP, you are kindly invited to participate. The workshop does not consist of formal paper presentations (as the conference will), but of informal discussions on methods, approaches, possibilities for collaboration and an overview of the field.

The aim of the meeting is to discuss the state of the art of the research done by members of the HOMER project and rethink the organizational status of HOMER as a network.

We kindly request your participation by answering six questions (see below). Please answer these questions briefly (max. 10 lines each), but thoroughly to give an accurate picture of your research (stages) today. These answers will be bundled to give an overview of current research. Key-note Richard Maltby will open the discussion on the state of the art during the HOMER workshop.

Provisional program:

• 10:00   Welcome and general introduction by Daniel Biltereyst (Ghent U.) and Philippe Meers (U. of Antwerp)
• 10:30   Key note by Richard Maltby (Flinders U.)
• 11:00   Discussion on the State of the Art  (based on information on projects provided by participants)
• 12:30   LUNCH break
• 14:00   Discussion continued
• 14:30   General comments and conclusion
• 15.00   Discussing HOMER: organization, visibility, joint projects, etc.
• 16.15   Coffee break
• 16.30   Closing discussion
• 17:00   End

Please submit your participation proposal by Monday January 21, 2013 to liesbeth.vandevijver@ugent.be. You will be notified of acceptance shortly thereafter.

We look forward to seeing many of you in Prague!

The HOMER programming team

• Daniel Biltereyst
• Philippe Meers
• Clara Pafoort-Overduin
• John Sedgwick
• Judith Thissen
• Daniela Treveri-Gennari
• Lies Van De Vijver

HOMER workshop June 19, 2013

• Title
• Promoter
• Funding body
• Funded research period
• Researcher(s)
• 1. Describe your research SUBJECT.
• 2. Describe the main OBJECTIVES of the research.
• 3. Describe the PERIOD your research is focused on.
• 4. Describe the geographical REGION your research is focused on.
• 5. Describe your research METHODOLOGY.
• 6. Describe, if possible, the main OUTCOME / RESULTS of the research and mention PUBLICATIONS.