Iain MacPhearson, Academic Fellow, School of Languages, Literatures and Cultures University of Ulster, will talk about his work on the documentary, Bothan air a' Phrèiridh (Cabin on the Prairies). It's a journey of discovery on an emigrant's road to the 'Far West' of Canada and back again, portraying family stories and separations both overseas and at home.

Colin Sparks, Professor of Media Studies, University of Westminster, will present a paper related to his ongoing research to critically interrogate the notion of `transitology, - that is, the prevalent view in political economy that we are witnessing a general international process of democratization. In the course of a series of case studies of the mass media, the limits of this conception have been examined and a more satisfactory alternative explored. This paper summarises those more detailed studies and presents the outline of an alternative.

Respondent: Philip Ramsey, PhD student, Centre for Media Research

Ian Buchanan, Professor of Critical and Cultural Theory, Cardiff University, will discuss Ray Lawrence’s Jindabyne (2006) as an example of what Fredric Jameson would term a national allegory of contemporary Australia. He will seek to show how it illuminates the political unconscious of 'white' Australia; he specifically refers to the occasion on February 13, 2008, when the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd issued a national apology to the indigenous people of Australia for the 'hurt caused by two hundred years of statesponsored action against them', after which, as Buchanan puts it 'a rash of redneck blogs sprang up', resisting the presumed need to apologise for the damage done to displaced aboriginal children and their families.