Embodied communication across time and space

22-24 October 2013

Örebro Castle, Örebro, SWEDEN

The Swedish-Norwegian interdisciplinary international workshop ”Revisiting identity, REID” is organized by the Communication, Culture and Diversity, CCD research environment at School Humanities, Education and Social Sciences, HumES Örebro University, SWEDEN, in collaboration with the following research environments in Örebro and Trondheim: Statped midt, Department of Language and Communication studies, ISK and Department of Social Work and Health Sciences, ISH at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU, NORWAY and the Center for Rehabilitation Research, CRR, Orebro County Council, SWEDEN. We invite participation at the REID international research workshop on 22-24 October 2013 where the theme of identity will be focused. This activity builds upon a tradition of exploratory research conference-cum-workshops organized by the CCD research group since the end of the 1990s.

REID: Theme, Aims and Description

While there is no dearth of literature in the area of identity, a large majority of it takes its points of departure either in philosophy, policy studies and/or political science, or in more sector framed domains that build upon identity categories (like gender, ethnicity, class, functional disabilities, etc). Disciplinary arenas such as education and health sciences, including the multidisciplinary fields of language and communication studies, disability studies, gender studies etc., have focused the concept of identity in a range of ways. This interest often tends to be discussed in terms of what can be called identity sectors. To challenge static and demarcated description of identities, the workshop REID, takes its point of departure in the complexities that characterize and shape societies – past and present – including the increasing pace of change and diversification that interfaces at global, national and local levels. Institutional settings such as K-12 education, higher education, health services, care services etc. provide enclaves that encompass people of all ages, gender, class, race etc. From a social practice perspective one could say that both institutions and individuals are shaped by the “living and daily doings” of these actors.

We invite contributions that challenge demarcated fields of study and conceptions of identity as gender, identity as functional disability, identity as race, identity based upon language groupings etc to the international conference-cum-workshop “Revisiting Identities, REID”. Accepted contributions will take a social practices perspective as a point of departure for exploring the performance, living and doing of identity positions across time and space. We particularly welcome contributions that take an intersectional stance. Empirically driven studies that explore the following types of queries are elicited:

• In what ways do micro-level analyses of naturally occurring human communication contribute to our understanding of identification processes?
• What kinds of theoretical-analytical framework(s) allow for attending to the complexity and dynamics of identity processes?
• What are the ways in which institutional settings, media settings, community of practices and affinity spaces provide affordances and obstacles for specific identity positions?
• In what way can shifts in identity positions be traced across time and space (in interactional and/or historical data)?

REID has the following explicit aims:

• Allow for the discussion of current research results specifically from a social practice perspective, representing different domains/disciplines that build upon interactional and/or historical studies where identity positions and processes are center-staged.
• Provide a platform for discussing methodological and conceptual issues of relevance in the light of diversification and mobility across time and space.
• Initiate the setting up of a multidisciplinary international research network.

REID: Key conceptual and methodological concepts

social practice, caring, learning/socialization, intersectionality, naturally occurring interactional data, historical archive data

REID: Abstracts and full-length drafts

We elicit abstracts (max 500 words) of data-driven studies that are clearly related to the themes and aims of the REID workshop. Empirical studies from different institutional settings are invited, as well as discussions of theoretical-methodological issues. The abstract should be structured using the following six headings:

1. title and five keywords

2. a statement of the theoretical and methodological framework used

3. the research questions focused upon

4. the empirical materials explored

5. preliminary/final findings of the study, and

6. how the study being reported is related to REID.

Author/s of accepted abstracts will be invited to submit a full length draft for discussion at the REID workshop (see Deadlines). Selected full-length papers will be considered for publication in an anthology with an international publisher.

Organization Committee:

Chairs: Sangeeta Bagga-Gupta
Marianne Öberg-Tuleus (Sweden)
Aase Lyngvær Hansen (Norway)

Committee members:
Kicki Ekberg
John Kjelaas
Julie Feilberg, Sigrid Sletterbakk Berge and Lars-Olov Lundqvist