The PSW Lecture by Mark Deuze will be preceded by a closed seminar on ‘new methods for media research’. Four presentations will be given on innovative methods for studying media content, production and consumption in today’s digital cross-media environment, with Mark Deuze as discussant. The seminar is aimed at PhD students and post-doctoral researchers from social sciences and humanities with an interest in media studies.

The seminar will be organized on Thursday 20 September, from 13h30 to 17h30, at the University of Antwerp, Stadscampus, Gebouw C, aula C.001, hoek Grote Kauwenberg / Vekestraat.

Inter-university research seminar “New Media, New Methods”

Mark Deuze suggests to think of our lives as lived in rather than with media. The ubiquity and pervasiveness of media in today’s cross-media environment entail major challenges for media researchers. New media are blurring old boundaries between text and context, production and consumption, public and private sphere, and mass and self-communication. The convergence and the increasing centrality of the user in media require new approaches to the role and influence of media in our daily lives.
New media not only raise new questions, but also create new possibilities for research. On Thursday 20 September 2012, a PhD seminar will be organized on new methods for media research. In four sessions, young scholars will present innovative methods for studying aspects of life in media. For each session, Mark Deuze, media professor at Indiana University and author of the book Media Life (2012), will act as discussant. 

Programme

13h30: Social network analysis in media studies – dr. Katrien Van Cleemput (University of Antwerp)

Social network analysis is a research method that considers the relationships between entities (individuals, organizations, documents…) as the basic units of analysis. It is a method that is becoming increasingly popular in the social sciences, history , linguistics and economics. In this presentation, the possibilities of social network analyses for communication studies (and its subfields) will be discussed.

14h30: Using a website’s API as a data gathering tool – dr. Peter Mechant (IBBT-Ghent University)

An API or a set of rules and specifications for interacting with a website is not only a tool for computer scientists and engineers. Social scientists can also use them and benefit from them in their research activities. This talk will address these opportunities and will show, using practical examples, that one does not need lots of expertise to gather data on transforming audiences via APIs.

15h30: A case of Q-methodology in audience research – Cédric Courtois (IBBT-MICT-Ghent University) and dr. Ike Picone (IBBT-SMIT-Vrije Universiteit Brussel)

This presentation concerns an innovative approach to the mixing of methods in audience research by means of the Q-method, in order to fully grasp similarities and differences in the way people, through their ‘media repertoires’, engage with media in everyday life. In contrast to conventional research designs, which proceed by applying different methods sequentially, our method-mixing fuses qualitative and quantitative methods into one small-scale fieldwork design.

16h30:  Using logging software in news production studies – Prof. dr. Geert Jacobs (Ghent University) and Prof. dr. Tom Van Hout (University of Antwerp / Leiden University)

In this presentation, we discuss how logging software from writing process research can be integrated in a linguistic ethnographic approach to news production. Based on a specific case, we explore aspects of data collection, analysis and representation.  

Practical information

The seminar will be held at the University of Antwerp, Stadscampus, Building C, aula C.001, entrance at the corner of Grote Kauwenberg / Vekestraat, Antwerp.
Participation to the seminar is free thanks to sponsorship by the Flemish Government and the Antwerp Doctoral Schools. Registration is required and can be done online at www.ua.ac.be/pswlectures -> seminar -> registration (soon available).

Participants to the seminar can also attend the PSW Lecture by Mark Deuze at 18h00. 
The inter-university seminar ‘New Media, New Methods’ is organized by the University of Antwerp (Prof. dr. Hilde Van den Bulck and Prof. dr. Steve Paulussen), in cooperation with Ghent University (Prof. dr. Geert Jacobs) and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel / Erasmus University College Brussels (Prof. dr. Martina Temmerman and dr. Ike Picone).