OURMedia/NuestrosMedios IV: Building Communication Societies

["Stefania Milan" <smilan@ips.org>]

OURMedia/NuestrosMedios IV: Building Communication Societies

An International Conference

July 22-25, 2004 Porto Alegre, Brazil



  :::: CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR PROPOSALS ::::



Proposal Deadline: May 10, 2004, 22:00/10pm GMT (17:00/5pm EDT).



OURMedia/NuestrosMedios is an international network of more than 270

academics and activists: researchers, practitioners and advocates

working in more than forty countries to strengthen media and

information/communication technologies (ICTs) that support social

justice, human rights, community autonomy and grassroots empowerment.



Our work spans many fields: community media, independent media, radical

media, citizens media, grassroots networking, telecommunications

policy, indymedia activism, cultural arts, communications theory,

social-movement research, sociology, anthropology, cultural studies,

development communication and communication for social change.



Our annual meeting is a time for OURMedia members to learn from

each other and to strengthen our analyses, strategies, collaborations

and campaigns. At this point, membership is free and open to anyone who

shares our guiding principles: please see our website:
<http://www.ourmedianet.org/>http://www.ourmedianet.org.



We invite you  to join us (membership is included with conference
registration).



OURMedia/NuestrosMedios IV: ãBuilding Communication Societiesä will take
place in

Porto Alegre, Brazil, July 22-25, 2004 as a pre-conference to the IAMCR,

the International Association of Media and Communications Research,

but is independent from that event, with our own program, specific criteria

for session proposals and registration fees (scaled to the participant's
ability to pay,

no-one will be turned away for lack of funds).



Please see
<http://www.ourmedianet.org/om2004>http://www.ourmedianet.org/om2004 for
more information.



This four day conference will feature:



 ++ FIELD TRIPS to local Brazilian grassroots media and ICT projects,

advocacy campaigns and popular education centers



 ++ PRESENTATIONS AND PARTICIPATORY SESSIONS: panels, workshops and

strategic discussions to focus on connecting research, advocacy and practice.

Topics include:

** Connecting Research and Advocacy for Citizensâ Media, Community Media

** Current Media/ICT Policy Issues and Implications.

** "Best Practices" and "Notable Failures," (stories and lessons from

citizens' media and grassroots networking projects, media/ICT advocacy

and policy campaigns, researcher-practitioner collaborations and other

social movements that relate to current efforts for community/citizens

media, "communication rights," "media democracy,ä "free speech," "media

diversity," "media justice" and other goals.)



 ++ POLYMEDIA LABORATORY: "NossoMidiaLab" -- an open space for experimentation,

creation, collaboration and skill-sharing to explore autonomous and
community uses

of video, audio, Internet and other traditional and new media technologies.
Help create it:

http://docs.indymedia.org/view/Global/NossoMidiaChamada



A Call for Proposals is currently open until May 10. You do not have

to submit a proposal to attend the conference. For more information on

registering to attend or submitting a proposal, please visit our web

page or write to <mailto:om2004@ourmedianet.org>om2004@ourmedianet.org to
request a copy of

the Call for Proposals or the Registration Form.



OURMedia/NuestrosMedios

<http://www.ourmedianet.org/>http://www.ourmedianet.org



-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stefania Milan
Inter Press Service
Assistant to the Editor in Chief
via Panisperna 207
00184 Rome, Italy

phone: +39.333.2309945
<mailto:smilan@ips.org>smilan@ips.org