Streets to Screens: Mediating conflict through digital networks

Event details

Sponsored by University of York, iCS, British Academy/Leverhulme and Goldsmiths

Please note that this event is being held in London

From Gaza to Ukraine, Afghanistan to Syria, social media is being used by people within conflict zones to organise, document and communicate their lives and struggles from the streets to our screens. As these pieces of content travel through time and space, they come into contact with various actors – from activists, to NGOs, news agencies, and global audiences – who attempt to claim purchase on the narrative of those events as they unfold. Over the course of the last decade, we have seen the emergence of forms of reportage that seek to navigate the diverse and fractured media ecology. These mediations are said to challenge the ways in which the mainstream media cover conflicts and global publics are invited to bear witness.

This one-day symposium will explore a number of key issues in mediating conflicts today, and will address some of the following questions:

• What role do networked eyewitnesses, activists and citizen journalists play in conflict communication today?
• What are the challenges faced by those mediating conflict online?
• In what ways are social media content produced within the zone of conflict shaping the coverage produced by news organisations?
• What are the implications of these forms of reportage for eyewitnesses, activists, citizen journalists, perpetrators, NGOs, journalists, news media, audiences and global publics?

A selection of the best papers will be published in a special issue of the journal Information, Communication and Society

Confirmed speakers

• Stuart Allan, Cardiff University
• Malachy Browne, Storyful
• Lilie Chouliaraki, LSE
• Andrew Hoskins, University of Glasgow
• Ben O'Loughlin, Royal Holloway
• Sam Gregory, WITNESS
• Liam Stack, New York Times
• Claire Wardle, UNHCR