The aim of the proposed book “Mediated Shame: Disparaging Poverty in Media and Popular Culture” is to explore how media impose shame on and facilitate shaming of economically underperforming people who have poor living standards and belong to the lower class.

“Mediated Shame: Disparaging Poverty in Media and Popular Culture” Book editors are Irena Reifová and Martin Hájek, of Charles University, Prague.

They invite the chapters not limited to but including reflections on issues pertinent to the emergence of poverty shaming in and through media. Who are producers and targets of poverty shaming in the realm of media popular culture? What specific facets of social positions and cultural identities are being subjected to shaming discourses? Does shaming respond to the particular frustrations and anxieties as endured by those who stoop to shaming? How do media industry professionals understand and interpret incorporation of shaming figures in the media outlets they develop and produce? What semiotic means of stigmatizing poverty are used in shaming? Does the shaming differ across societies? What are the historical forerunners of mediatized shaming? Can we trace any strategies of resistance or subversion of shaming?

Abstracts of 250-300 words should be submitted by 15 June 2018.

Link to full call for chapters on the ECREA mailing list.