Call for Papers | Play on the Edges. 3rd Global Conference, Nov. 1–3, Prague, Czech Republic

3rd Global Conference: Play on the Edges
Saturday 1st November – Monday 3rd November 2014
Prague, Czech Republic


gamingPlay on the Edges is a special track within the larger conference on Play. While “play” may connote games, theatrical performances, and other more traditional connotations, we invite submissions on this special “edgy” conceptualization of “play.” One might think of Play as a metaphor for global modalities. Recent events that have received attention on a global scale include such diverse items as the Russian and Ukrainian conflict, the sectarian conflicts within Iraq, the continued fluctuation of the world economy, and—on a lighter note, perhaps—a world-wide focus on the World Cup events. From a global scale we might instead refocus on the micro-applications of play in the psychology of interpersonal relationships or the structuring of groups such as our conference. How weirdly can we restructure the concept of play to shed some light on the human (and non-human?) world of experience?

We invite presenations on this special strain of “weird notions of play” in such areas as global events and the concept of play: gaming, manipulation for winning, taking sides, strategies and “power plays.”

Possible Themes for this special strand:

  • Politics: is politics a game? What are the “rules” and how can they be transgressed? Does the ‘game plan’ change on the international vs. national plane?
  • Play and sports: is professional sports like the World Cup and the Olympic events a game or serious business? Can it be both? How do spectators participate in these international games?
  • Economic theory and practice: Does the economy function as a game and if so, how players use them for personal, corporate, national advantage?
  • Global concepts of play: Does media itself creates games and rules and to what extent citizens participate, knowingly or unknowingly?
  • Play between persons: How does the English idiom “playing the field” establish the rules of gender interrelationships? Do other cutures construct the play between the genders along different models?
  • Weird Play: How does the concept of play function in surprisingly unfamiliar arenas to reveal, make evident, the complexity of the human and non-human world of experience?

In order to support and encourage inter-disciplinarity engagement, it is our intention to create the possibility of starting dialogues between the parallel events running during this conference. Delegates are welcome to attend up to two sessions in each of the concurrent conferences. We also propose to produce cross-over sessions between these groups – and we welcome proposals which deal with the relationship between Making Sense of: Dying and Death, Strangers, Aliens and Foreigners and Making Sense of: Play.

What to Send:
300 word abstracts should be submitted by Friday 15th August 2014. If an abstract is accepted for the conference, a full draft paper should be submitted by Friday 26th September 2014. Abstracts should be submitted to the Organising Chairs; abstracts may be in Word or RTF formats, following this order:

a) author(s), b) affiliation as you would like it to appear in programme, c) email address, d) title of proposal, e) body of proposal, f) up to 10 keywords.
E-mails should be entitled: Play 3 Abstract Submission

Please use plain text (Times Roman 12) and abstain from using footnotes and any special formatting, characters or emphasis (such as bold, italics or underline). We acknowledge receipt and answer to all paper proposals submitted. If you do not receive a reply from us in a week you should assume we did not receive your proposal; it might be lost in cyberspace! We suggest, then, to look for an alternative electronic route or resend.

Joint Organising Chairs:

The conference is part of the Probing the Boundaries programme of research projects. It aims to bring together people from different areas and interests to share ideas and explore various discussions which are innovative and exciting. All papers accepted for and presented at this conference are eligible for publication in an ISBN eBook. Selected papers may be invited to go forward for development into a themed ISBN hard copy volume.

Inter-Disciplinary.Net believes it is a mark of personal courtesy and professional respect to your colleagues that all delegates should attend for the full duration of the meeting. If you are unable to make this commitment, please do not submit an abstract for presentation.

For further details of the conference, please visit:
http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/probing-the-boundaries/making-sense-of/play/call-for-papers/

Please note: Inter-Disciplinary.Net is a not-for-profit network and we are not in a position to be able to assist with conference travel or subsistence.

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