Call for Papers

Locating Photography

Durham Centre for Advanced Photography Studies
University of Durham, UK

20-22 September 2007

Deadline: 30 November 2006

Following the success of its inaugural conference 'Thinking Photography -
Again' (July 2005), the Durham Centre for Advanced Photography Studies
(www.dur.ac.uk/dcaps) invites proposals for a conference on 'Locating
Photography'.

From its inception to the present, photography has been haunted by what
Allan
Sekula termed the 'universal language' myth, whereby the photographic image
is
deemed to possess broad cross-cultural currency and to be comprehensible
within conventions shared by a vast trans-national audience. The reliance
of
the world's press on international agencies such as Reuters or Associated
Press means that the same photographs of global events appear in newspapers
in
London and Washington, Madrid and Mexico City, Paris and Senegal. This
process
of centralisation and globalisation has been accelerated by the advent of
digital photography and the internet, which now allow photographers to
submit
pictures to agencies within minutes of their being taken. Photojournalists
now
roam the world, filing images of the events which shape it, images which
are
then circulated back around the globe.

At the same time, the history of photography has frequently been understood
in
national terms, and scholars continue to situate the work of individual
photographers in the context of specific national cultures. There are by
now
numerous publications devoted to e.g. 'American/ German/ Soviet
Photography',
and many of the longest entries in the recently published Oxford Companion
to
Photography (2005) are those devoted to a series of 'national'
photographies:
from Australia to the United States, via (among others) Austria, France,
Germany, Great Britain, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Switzerland.

'Locating Photography' seeks to investigate the relationship between
national
paradigms and the apparently universal nature of the medium. What is at
stake
in insisting on or resisting the national paradigm? Why has it been so
persistent, and can it continue to provide an adequate framework for
understanding the history of the photographic medium in a global, digital
age?

Possible topics include but need not be limited to:

.Global language versus national histories.
.Is there such a thing as a 'national tradition' in photography? How can it
be
theorised?
.Vernacular photography.
.The changing role of the photojournalist: national, trans-national,
international.
.Photography and its institutions.
.Nationalism and internationalism in photographic movements (e.g. the
inter-
war avantgarde)?
.Photography and the national imaginary.

Proposals are invited for 30 minute papers related to the conference theme.
Please send a 200-300 word abstract and your contact details by November
30,
2006 to photo.groupdurham.ac.uk. Notification of acceptance will be sent
out
in December 2006.