Stefania Milan awarded ERC Proof of Concept Grant

for her research on deciphering social media algorithms

The European Research Council (ERC) has awarded a Proof of Concept Grant to Stefania Milan, associate professor of New Media and Digital Culture at the UvA. Milan will receive €150,000 for her research on deciphering social media algorithms. Personalisation algorithms, which filter content on the basis of someone’s profile, increasingly mediate the web experience of users. By forging a specific reality for each individual, they determine which news, opinions and rumours users are exposed to. But these algorithms are kept a closely guarded secret by social media platform companies such as Facebook. The few experiments auditing these algorithms rely on data provided by platform companies themselves, are highly technical and fail to put social media users in the driver seat. Read more >

Collecting and Conserving Net Art. Moving Beyond Conventional Methods

by Annet Dekker

In Collecting and Conserving Net Art. Moving Beyond Conventional Methods published by Routledge, Annet Dekker analyses and proposes new views on the conservation of net art, and (re)consider traditional concepts such as authenticity, performativity and networks, while questioning what is a document? As the publisher mentions: Collecting and Conserving Net Art explores the qualities and characteristics of net art and its influence on conservation practices. By addressing and answering some of the challenges facing net art and providing an exploration of its intersection with conservation, the book casts a new light on net art, conservation, curating and museum studies.Viewing net art as a process rather than as a fixed object, the book considers how this is influenced by and executed through other systems and users. Arguing that these processes and networks are imbued with ambiguity, the book suggests that this is strategically used to create suspense, obfuscate existing systems and... >

Vidi grant awarded to Carolyn Birdsall:

Mapping Transnational Conflict Heritage: Radio Collections in Europe, 1930 - 1960

NWO-funded VIDI Project ‘Mapping Transnational Conflict Heritage: Radio Collections in Europe, 1930 – 1960’ Conflict and war are commonly understood to seriously impact cultural collections, but the current challenge is how to map these developments effectively. In this project, radio archival collections in Europe during and after World War II open a new door to specifying how cultural objects came to be part of the heritage of war. Birdsall proposes a tripartite model for studying sound archival collections in terms of their 1) transformation, 2) relocation, and 3) valorisation. Combining insights from archival, heritage, and media studies, Birdsall analyzes how radio collections were archived, circulated and used under conditions of war, occupation and reconstruction. Contact Read more >

CLARIAH Media Studies summer school, July 2-6

The Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (Hilversum)

The CLARIAH Media Studies summer school takes place from July 2 to 6 at The Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (Hilversum). Full registration is closed. Attendance during Day 1 and 5 is open. The first and last days are open to the public, and include keynotes (by Eric Hoyt and Dana Mustata), and CLARIAH and project presentations. One of the highlights of this event is that participants will be able to work, for the first time, with the automatic speech recognized transcripts of an important part of B&G’s radio and television collections. Programme >

Mastervak Journalistiek wint Onderwijsprijs FGw 2018

Het vak ‘Multimediaal Onderzoeksjournalistiek Project’ van de duale master Journalistiek en media heeft de Onderwijsprijs 2018 van de Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen gewonnen als beste mastervak. Tijdens het vak werken de studenten in groepjes aan multimediale onderzoeksjournalistieke producties waarvan een groot deel ook gepubliceerd wordt in landelijke media. Kenmerkend voor het vak zijn de projectvorm en de inbreng van experts uit de journalistieke praktijk. De jury roemde met name de ambitieuze studiecultuur binnen het vak. Ook de intensieve samenwerking tussen studenten sprak de jury aan, plus het feit dat de deelnemers het vak hoog waarderen. Het vak wordt gecoördineerd door dr. Mirjam Prenger. Zie verder >

16 april Student MA Journalistiek, Timo Nijssen

wint De Tegel als beste journalistieke talent

Afgelopen maandag, 16 april, won Timo Nijssen (22), student van de master Journalistiek en media aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam, De Tegel, de nationale prijs voor de Nederlandse journalistiek, als beste journalistieke talent. Hij is daarmee de jongste winnaar van De Tegel voor Talent. Nijssen won de CBS Talenttegel voor een multimediale productie die hij in 2017 maakte voor de Volkskrant over waarom een flesje water uit Hongkong daar meer kost dan in Nederland. De jury schrijft: “Persoonlijke verwondering leidt tot een indrukwekkende journalistieke Odyssee. Niet alleen origineel uitgewerkttot een multimediale productie met mooi gemaakte infographics – maar ook verdiepend en onderbouwd met een veelvoud aan interessante cijfers.” Het was de achtste keer op rij dat (oud)studenten van de MA Journalistiek en media genomineerd waren voor De Tegel voor beste journalistieke talent en de vijfde keer dat de prijs is gewonnen door een (oud)student. >

Media Studies & Communication Science ranked 1st in the world in latest QS Rankings

The University of Amsterdam (UvA) is ranked best in the world in the field of Communication Science and Media Studies in the 2018 QS World University Rankings by Subject. In the latest QS Rankings, which were published on Wednesday, 28 February, Communication & Media Studies jump from 2nd to 1st place. ‘We’ve always put the quality of our teaching and research first. Over the past few years, we’ve been delighted to see our efforts reflected in a solid position in the rankings. This number 1 position is, of course, the icing on the cake. We are incredibly proud to have been able to put the UvA’s Communication Science department on the map’, says Martine van Selm, director of the College of Communication and professor in the Corporate Communication group. ‘The UvA’s department of Media Studies is also thrilled with the news’, says Rens Bod, department chair and professor of Computational... >

‘The Making of the Humanities’ conference returns to Amsterdam!

15-17 November 2018

This is the place where the conference series started in 2008, 10 years ago. The University of Amsterdam will host the 7th Making of the Humanities conference at its CREA facilities, from 15 till 17 November 2018. The MoH conferences are organized by the Society for the History of the Humanities and bring together scholars and historians interested in the history of a wide variety of disciplines, including archaeology, art history, historiography, linguistics, literary studies, media studies, musicology, and philology, tracing these fields from their earliest developments to the modern day. Deadline for abstracts: 1 June 2018. Read more >

€ 625.000 for Huygens ING/UvA-CREATE project ‘Virtual Interiors’

by NWO Creative Industries Funding

The Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) has granted Smart Culture – Big Data / Digital Humanities funding of € 625.000 for the project Virtual Interiors as Interfaces for Big Historical Data Research: Spatially enhanced publications of the creative industries of the Dutch Golden Age, by prof. dr. Charles van den Heuvel (Principal Investigator; Huygens ING & UvA), prof. dr. Julia Noordegraaf (UvA-CREATE), prof. dr. Gabri van Tussenbroek (UvA), dr. Madelon Simons (UvA) and their private partners Brill (Marti Huetink) and the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (Johan Oomen & Jesse de Vos). The project, which will start in 2018, will focus on the question of how we can develop and publish digital maps and virtual rooms using historical data to represent the cultural life of the past in a reliable way. It is designed to link with the Investment Grant NWO Large project ‘Golden Agents’, led by Charles van den Heuvel at Huygens ING and with participation of researchers of the UvA research... >

Media Tactics and Engagement

NECS Conference June 27-29, VU and UvA

Please be aware that NECS 2018 has two main locations: the University of Amsterdam (UvA) Oudemanhuispoort (OMHP) site, and the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU) Main Building. The main conference registration desk, the information desk, and the Publishers Forum are located at the VOX-POP/Venture Lab Building, just around the corner from Oudemanhuispoort. Directions and information on travelling between the conference locations can be found here. The changing media landscape requires continuous (re)invention of the ways in which photography, film, television, digital media, and the arts are produced, distributed, accessed, and consumed. Back in the past like today, the question of media tactics and engagement is crucial once more. Today the question seems even more urgent, since large corporations provide platforms and services that foster the desired behaviour of the average media viewer/user/consumer and produ(c/s)er; nevertheless, in previous decades, ways of planning long-term strategies, tactical reactions to unforeseen circumstances and engagement have determined media practices and... >