[grant macewan: officially a university]

Yesterday the province (as well as the university) announced Grant MacEwan's formal change from "college" to "university" (though it has been granting degrees since 2004).

It's interesting, as a new Edmontonian, to learn about the institution's history. At lunch yesterday I was lucky enough to meet with a previous university admin. who filled me in on MacEwan's grassroots beginning (especially in terms of forwarding the arts and culture scene in Edmonton). Just take a look at the "multidisciplinary" Arts of the Ave. Festival to see how many of the performers, volunteers, writers etc... have a link with Grant MacEwan. If you're in the area, you might want to keep track of the Arts on the Ave. calendar which lists upcoming events such as this weekend's Kaleido fest.

[cross-disciplinary multimodal art]

Marlena Novak’s work is a cross-disciplinary hybrid including HD video, animatography, interactive time-based media, digital photography, and encaustic painting (BFA, Carnegie-Mellon; MFA, Northwestern) with solo exhibitions in Berlin, Cologne, Amsterdam, Enschede and the U.S. Her encaustic-painting technique was the subject of a documentary presented on PBS and she was invited to teach a course in this medium at the Amsterdam Institute for Painting in 1996.


Read more about Marlena Novak here: http://www.creativityandcognition.com/gallery/mnovak/mnovak.htm

[*becoming* technologically iterate]

On ‘Becoming’ Technologically Literate: A Multiple Literacies Theory Perspective/p>

FRANCIS BANGOU & MONICA WATERHOUSE University of Ottawa, Canada

doi:10.2304/ciec.2008.5.4.445

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This article uses a multiple literacies theory framework to explore the processes of ‘becoming’ technologically literate through a year-long ethnographic study of two Master of Education pre-service second language teachers, a Latina woman and an African American woman, who learned how to use computer technology to teach Spanish at a large Midwestern university. The case studies of these two women are analyzed to gain insights into how teacher education programs can support racial minority pre-service teachers in ‘becoming’ technologically literate. First, the authors provide an overview of the multiple literacies theory developed by Masny. Second, the stories of the two pre-service teachers are presented. Finally, curricular and pedagogical recommendations for second language education Master of Education programs are provided.

[digital arts and culture conference: cfp]

The biannual Digital Arts & Culture conference takes place in California in December 2009 (http://dac09.uci.edu)

The abstract submission deadline = May 1st

This time the conference is organised around themes, here is a very interesting one:

"Theme: The Present and Future of Humanist Inquiry in the Digital Field
What contributions may literary, poetic, and aesthetic idioms of humanist inquiry -- traditionally associated with problems of lyrical expression, narrativity, linguistic subjectivity, and authorial and readerly agencies -- continue to offer to the analysis of medial practices and systems in the era of mobile, distributed, and social media? The crux of this question, we
propose, lies in the specifically historical purchase of humanist method: its ability to (re)situate new symbolic practices in complex and nuanced relation to prior traditions and atavisms of expressive language and action -- in contrast to the reductively progressivist, de-historicizing impulses of much of contemporary digitalism.

This theme welcomes exemplary close readings (literary-theoretical, formalist, narratological, ludological, etc.) of electronic literature and poetry, single- and multiple-player computer games, social media, and hard and soft medial apparatuses of the digital field. Especially encouraged are such close readings which also make general claims regarding the significance of humanist investigations of digital arts and cultures."





More info at:
http://dac09.uci.edu/call.html

[phd position: social media]

PhD Position in Sociality and Social Media

University of Amsterdam

(Noord-Holland), hours per week

Job description
We are seeking an individual who is excited about engaging in multidisciplinary approaches to studying information, communication and related technologies in a social context. The appointee will be expected to conduct research on sociality and social media; the research should lead to international journal publications and a PhD thesis. The research can combine multiple methods of investigation, qualitative as well as quantitative. The candidate will be supervised by Prof. Rik Maes and Dr Ard Huizing, who have extensive experience in guiding doctorate students' research, and can provide guidance in a wide range of research methods as well as access to a large set of local and multinational organizations.

Human relationships are increasingly mediated by social media such as social networking sites, micro-blogging services and social recommendation sites. Such new media are said to host new forms of group interaction and togetherness. Appealing to the human tendency to bind oneself with others and thus to form and join groups to engage in interdependent relationships, they afford sociality. In turn, the design and usage of social media are continually re-created and reshaped by participants or members translating, enacting and modifying these technologies to suit their various contexts. This project will explore the co-constitutive interplay between sociality and social media, and the implications of this interplay for design and design theory. Theoretical lenses are provided by those who theorize such notions as ‘object-centred sociality' or ‘the materialization of the subject', which are mainly being developed in social theory, social studies of technology and, increasingly, organization theory. The particular research questions will be framed in line with the interests of the PhD candidate.

Requirements
Required education/skills:

• Master's degree in one of the social sciences (e.g. Information or Communication Science, Management or Business Studies, Sociology or Anthropology)
• Interest (and preferably experience) in field research
  Demonstrated mastery of both written and spoken English
• Determination to complete a PhD degree within four years

Job type: Research / Advising
Workfield(s):
- Research trainees, non-tenured lecturers, researchers(Scientific discipline: Economics)

Organization
University of Amsterdam
The University of Amsterdam (UvA) is a university with an internationally acclaimed profile, located at the heart of the Dutch capital. As well as a world center for business and research, Amsterdam is a hub of cultural and media activities. The University of Amsterdam is a member of the League of European Research Universities.

The Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB) at the University of Amsterdam conducts international research and provides academic courses in information management/systems, accounting, finance, management, organization behaviour, strategy and marketing, economics, and econometrics. The Amsterdam Business School and the Amsterdam School of Economics form part of the FEB.

The Amsterdam Business School's Information Management section is seeking an outstanding individual to fill a PhD student position in the area of sociality and social media.

Conditions of employment
Employment basis: Temporary for specified period
Duration of the contract: see below
Additional conditions of employment:
The appointment will initially be for 1.5 year, to be extended to a total of 4 years upon excellent performance (an evaluation will be held after 8 and 14 months). The salary will be in accordance with the university's regulations for academic personnel, and will range from €2042 (first year) up to a maximum of €2612 (final year) gross per month. The collective employment agreement of the Dutch universities will be applicable. The PhD thesis should be finalized within four years. In this period, the candidate will be expected to do some teaching (20% of the time).

Additional Information
Additional information about the vacancy can be obtained from:

Dr Huizing
Telephone number: 31-20-525-4356
E-mail address: im-phd@uva.nl

Or additional information can be obtained through one of the following links:

• About the organization (http://www.uva.nl/start.cfm/la=en/th=main)
• About the function (http://www.uva.nl/vacatures/vacatures.cfm/0F65D8D6-1321-B0BE-A48F280DF33B0D21)
• Amsterdam Business School (http://www.abs.uva.nl/abshome/home.cfm)
• Information Management section (http://primavera.fee.uva.nl/)

Application
You can apply for this job before 06-04-2009 (dd-mm-yyyy) by sending your application to:

Roetersstraat 11
1018 WB Amsterdam

E-mail: applications-feb@uva.nl

When applying for this job always mention the vacancynumber AT 09-5006.