Sea Change: Transforming Industries, Screens, Texts

The Screen Studies Association of Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand in conjunction with Victoria University of Wellington will hold the first biennial SSAAANZ conference in Wellington from November 23-25 2016. This inaugural conference presents a unique opportunity to reassess the links between film, media, culture and society in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. While categories such as location and nation remain important to the cultural industries of both countries, significant economic, technological and social developments mean that our understandings of identity and place are evolving constantly. Australia and New Zealand are not only nations, but also islands that share an ocean with numerous other countries and cultures. The changing mediascapes are evident in the continuing relationships with media industries of the United States, but also in emerging connections and cultural exchanges with Asia and the Pacific.

We invite scholarly presentations that address the conference themes, including:

• The relationship between Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and/or Pacific rim screen industries and cultures
• Local and regional cinemas
• Geographies of Australia, New Zealand and Pasifika media
• New histories of Australian and/or Aotearoa New Zealand screen industries and cultures
• Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, Māori, and Pasifika film and television practices
• Economic, government and regulatory influences on Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand screen industries
• Creative personnel and Trans-Tasman success
• New theoretical approaches to Screen Studies
• Changing distribution and exhibition practices
• Gender and sexuality in Australia and/or Aotearoa New Zealand screen cultures
• Critiques of labour circulation and practices in the Australian and Aotearoa New Zealand screen industries
• New perspectives on local and regional screen audiences
• Digital media and transnationalism
• The effects of globalization on local and regional film and media
• New interpretations of Australian and New Zealand film and media texts, genres, cycles and aesthetics

We also welcome general papers on any area of Film, Television and Media Studies

Individual papers will be 20 minutes in length. Pre-constituted panels are welcome.

Please send abstracts of 150-200 words to ssaaanz@gmail.com by June 15, 2016. Abstracts should include name, institutional affiliation, full contact details, and a short biographical note.

Please visit our website at www.ssaaanz2016.info for conference information and regular updates.

Conference background

The17th Film and History Association of Australia and New Zealand (FHAANZ) conference, held at Queensland University of Technology between 1 and 3 July 2015. The conference concluded with the 2015 joint FHAANZ and Screen Studies Association of Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand (SSAAANZ) meeting. At the meeting, it was voted that the next Australian and New Zealand screen conference to be held will be badged as a SSAAANZ conference, with a film and history (or film history) strand, to be held in Wellington in November 2016. Sea Change is the outcome of these discussions.