IAMCR - International Association for Media and Communication Research

The Communication and HIV/AIDS Working Group and the Health, Communication and Change Working Group of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR) welcome the submission of papers for the 2012 Conference to be held in Durban, South Africa from July 15-19, 2012 at the Howard College Campus of the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN).

The theme of the conference, ‘South-North Conversations’, reflects the inherent asymmetries in communication flows between the developed and the developing nations.

Wider understandings of ‘developed- developing- underdeveloped’ countries in transition as well as the ‘core-periphery’ are changing. It can be evidenced by BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa), the ‘African Renaissance’ and the African Union. We cannot, therefore, continue to assume that communication and media – seen in terms of value and meaning systems, historical trajectories, monetary and technological transfers – can continue to be seen as they have been in the past.

The Health Communication and Change Working Group of the IAMCR is calling for papers for the 2011 conference in Istanbul, Turkey, 13-17 July. The conference theme is ‘Cities, Connectivity & Creativity’.

The Health Communication and Change Working Group is a forum for critical thinking and examination of health communication theory and practice that moves thinking beyond behaviour change and toward social change. We encourage conceptual papers that focus on epistemology, theory and methodology in health communication.

It is in this light that we now invite papers for this new working group on health communication and change.

IAMCR’s new working group in Health Communication and Change is inviting submissions for the IAMCR 2009 Conference in Mexico City. The theme of the conference is "Human Rights and Communication".

Health Communication as a scientific discipline has grown significantly in the past years, establishing itself institutionally with academic courses and programmes worldwide. Traditionally. its focus was on individual behaviour change, with behaviour change communication as a central approach. The theoretical emphasis has primarily been on psychological and social-psychological issues rather than on communication issues.