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I’m attending four conferences or symposia across the next four weeks.  In a perfect world, each will come with details blogging; however, if I don’t get around to writing much for a few weeks, here’s why …

[X] Learning Futures Symposium – 10 & 11 September, Canberra – This is a two-day symposium held at ANU looking at the changing shape of education, pedagogy and learning in general in the face of changes brought on by digital communication under the web2.0 umbrella.  The programme (pdf) looks pretty interesting, with showcases of Australian social software educational efforts and some great sessions which are more centred around conversations than too many formal presentations.

[X] Thinking Society, Thinking Culture – 13 & 14 September, Perth – This is an interdisciplinary forum organised by the Institute for Advanced Studies at UWA with the aim of bringing WA’s many academics, researchers, artists across the range of historical and cultural studies, and other social sciences, together the share their work and build fruitful interdisciplinary networks and exchanges.  I’m giving my paper “‘We’re sorry, but the clip you selected isn’t available from your location’: Watching Battlestar Galactica in Australia and the Tyranny of Digital Distance” in ‘A Digital World’ session which takes place on Friday, 14 September starting at 10.30; this panel will also feature Toby Burrows talking about ‘e-Research and the Humanities: Current Directions’, Ethan Blue talking about ‘Prison Medical Photography in Early 20th-Century California’ and Jeremy Blank speaking on ‘Past,Present,Futures:Integrating practice in Visual Art studies’. 

The keynote is being delivered on Thursday (13th) evening by Ross Gibson from UTS talking on “The Aesthetics of Repletion“; this talk is open to the public, so if you’re in Perth, come along!

[X] PerthDAC – Digital Arts & Culture – 15 to 18 September, Also Perth – DAC has a history of being at the cutting edge of digital arts and media studies and this year looks to be no exception.  There’s lots to look forward to, from talks on blogs in education to Axel Bruns on produsage to a host of key names in game studies talking about everything from Second Life to the Wii. DAC is concurrent with BEAP (the Biennale of Electronic Arts Perth) so the theory of DAC will mix with the performance and exhibitions of the latest in digital art which will no doubt be a very rich and exciting four days!

[X] The Australian Blogging Conference – 28 September, Brisbane (Free!)- Sessions will include The Politics of Blogging; Researching Blogging; Blogs, Creativity and Creative Commons; Legal Issues; Citizen Journalism, Blogs and Education; Business and Corporate Blogging; and Building a Better Blog.  I’ll be facilitating part of the Blogs and Education session, although I’m not sure how many people will be there since I suspect the concurrent Citizen Journalism session, which includes a focus on YouDecide2007, might prove quite a draw-card.  That said, Blogging in Education is certainly fun to talk about and there’s a lot going on in the world of edublogging, so I trust we’ll have some great exchanges in our session, too! To see who’s already confirmed they’re attending, click here; that list will grow substantially across the next few weeks, I suspect!

I’m also chuffed it’s September because that means Jill Walker Rettberg will be joining us at UWA for the month! And let’s not forget that October will also include Australia’s first Podcamp which will also be held in Perth!